Street Heat : Car of the 21st Century Is Born in O.C.

Orange County has been a national center of automotive design for years now. The Mazda Miata, Toyota Previa van, Lexus coupe, Cadillac Eldorado and Dodge Viper are among the products of local design and modeling studios.

But no one has built a car here--until now. Renowned Italian automotive engineer and designer Giotto Bizzarrini has joined forces with shopping center developer Barry Watkins, a sports-car enthusiast, to build the BZ 2001, which Watkins calls the sports car of the 21st Century.

A week ago, Watkins talked about the production car as an entry in the high-cost luxury-exotic market, with prices pegged at about $250,000. But he acknowledged Monday that he has been concerned about the shrinking worldwide market for such high-priced cars and is now considering another direction.

Company officials will decide by the end of the summer whether to go ahead with the original marketing plan or to try to produce a similarly styled car that would use a U.S.-made chassis and engine, a less-exotic aluminum or fiberglass body and would be priced for the broader U.S. performance-car market.

If the project proceeds as a luxury-exotic car, the hand-built vehicles would be assembled at the Watkins Racing stable in Tustin, Watkins said.

The prototype built there is a two-seat roadster with a carbon-fiber and Kevlar body. It was unveiled in Long Beach Friday for the three-day Long Beach Grand Prix weekend.

To design and build the cars that Watkins expects to sell, a new company, Disegno di Bizzarrini, is being formed with master body-crafter Luis Romo behind the wheel as president.

Romo was part of the Mazda research and design team in Irvine that developed the Miata in the late 1980s and was project master for the prototype Dodge Viper when that sheet metal was hammered into shape at Metal Crafters in Costa Mesa in 1990. He was also project manager at Metal Crafters for development of the Plymouth Speedster concept car that was introduced on the international auto show circuit late last year.

Watkins would not discuss the financing of the project except to say that “we have been able to do it so far with less money and in less time than if we’d been in some major corporation.”

Others in the automotive world suggest that to get to this point--with one drivable prototype--Watkins and Bizzarrini must have invested close to $1 million.

“And if they go for cars that can be driven in the United States, that’s megabucks,” said George Peterson, president of AutoPacific Group, a Santa Ana automotive consulting firm. “It costs $500,000 just to get a new engine through the (Environmental Protection Agency) certification, and for safety testing, well, you have to crash half a dozen cars.”

If the BZ 2001 ever does hit the streets here, it will be a head-turner.

The bright-red prototype reflects the lush curves of classic Italian design, updated with contemporary aerodynamics. The integrated side panel and rear fender line, for example, flow from the vertical to the horizontal and incorporate the rear deck and wing in an unbroken sweep. The flush-mounted front headlight lenses include a thin, wraparound turn signal visible from front and side.

But Watkins and Bizzarrini have gone deeper than the skin. To an enthusiast, the beauty of the BZ 2001 might be in the host of weight-saving and performance-enhancing modifications and innovations, though some of those might not survive if the car were built for the U.S. market.

The list includes 17-pound magnesium wheels, about 10 pounds lighter than most aluminum wheels; a 15.8-pound carbon clutch and flywheel that shave 30 pounds of weight and add the equivalent of 40 horsepower to the car; twin 7-pound radiators that together cut another 25 pounds; and 7-pound brake rotors that together trim 28 pounds.

The car that Watkins and Bizzarrini began with weighed almost 3,400 pounds. The prototype BZ 2001 weighs in at 2,800 pounds--a 600-pound savings that, Watkins maintains, will translate into a sizable increase in speed, maneuverability and stopping power.

Watkins says he brings to the new company not only an abiding love for fine automobiles but also the necessary financial and marketing talents to make it work.

Watkins is also owner of Watkins Properties, which has built nearly 2 million square feet of shopping centers, including the French Quarter in Tustin at the Costa Mesa Freeway and 17th Street.

He said he began discussing the manufacture of an advanced concept sports car early in 1990 at a meeting with British automotive specialist Ian Webb. Webb introduced Watkins’ ideas to Bizzarrini but is not part of the business venture.

In one of their talks, both Watkins and Webb picked Bizzarrini as the designer they would want to develop their concepts, Watkins said, and Webb wrote to Bizzarrini in Italy and aroused his interest in the project.

Watkins met Bizzarrini in August, 1990, when the designer--whose work included the renowned 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO and the ISO Grifo, as well as Lamborghini’s first 12-cylinder engine--came to California to be honored for his work during ceremonies at the annual Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance.

Watkins was racing his classic 1959 Devin SS open roadster at the nearby Monterey Vintage Car Races but also was at the Pebble Beach event showing a rare 1959 Corvette with body by Italian designer Carrozzeria Scaglietti, with whom Bizzarrini had worked at Ferrari.

“His attention was drawn by the ‘Vette,” Watkins recalled during a recent interview at his Tustin office. “Later that evening we sat down and, through an interpreter, started talking about a 21st-Century car.”

A number of sketches were drawn. Bizzarrini went back to Italy, and Watkins and his associates turned their efforts to building a scale model that reflected the early thinking.

In October, 1990, Watkins and Webb visited Bizzarrini at his studio in Italy. “We showed him the model and asked him to take it and modify it and make it into a Bizzarrini for the year 2001,” Watkins said.

Work on the prototype began in August, 1991, Watkins said. Last week, he and Bizzarrini drove the car for the first time.

“It was a great relief to finally get it all together,” Watkins said. “The car has magic.”