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Holy Toledo! (Design Challenge)

Being an engine builder for a wide number of niche applications can have its perks. Little competition, strong repeat business, and reputation among other things.

So why has small-time engine builder Toledo Ironworks expanded so aggressively over the past couple of years? Call it hopeless optimism. Or poor business modeling.

In any case, it has led to an absolute glut of available engines from their Toledo V6 line, and they need to move them. They're not terribly picky about what their engines end up in. The market? Somewhat more finicky. But that's what all your fancy engineers and marketing geniuses are for, right? That's right, you global automotive power, you!

Oh, and did I mention? Toledo made their whole catalog of this family available, so you'll have 2 displacements and 6 total variants to choose from.

Rules:
1. Design year (all trims/tabs must match): 1978.
2. MUST use the Toledo V6 series engine (attached to this post).
3. NO modifications to ANY tabs or settings in the engine designer.
4. May submit up to 2 vehicles, but they must compete in separate categories (see below)
5. Tires must be quality 0, no semi-slicks.
6. Limited production body/chassis parts ARE allowed, but ONLY for the Sports category.
7. VANILLA CONTENT ONLY. No Steam mods/bodies allowed.

Scoring:
All entries will compete head-to-head against other entries in the same Category (outlined below). The vehicle's Design Score will be the average of the Competitiveness score for the category's two main demographics as calculated in the market tabs. This will have a little twist, however. Your scores for BOTH Gasmea and Fruinia will be averaged as well, and the margin depends on which category your submission is competing in. In essence...

Design Score = (((Gasmea Competitiveness A + Gasmea Competitiveness B)/2) + ((Fruinia Competitiveness A + Fruinia Competitiveness B)/2))/2

The top 1-2 competitors in each category will get a full review, with everyone else getting a short blurb.

Categories, Markups:
Each category is graded by its Competitiveness in the following market demographics, at the listed markup.

Sports: Sport Budget, Sport. 25% markup.
Entry Level: Commuter, Family Budget. 5% markup.
Upscale: Family Sport Premium, Premium Budget. 15% markup.
Truck: Utility, Light Delivery. 10% markup.

There will also be one category that doesn't have a scoring system, and completely subjective. ALL cars are automatically entered into this.

WTF: My personal favorite odd-ball design. Could be something that tries to span too many categories, or something that does exceedingly well in a demographic not listed here.

Submission:

In the Model Name field in the car designer, please put your board nick. In the trim, you may put the model and trim name for your creation. Export the car and PM it to me. In the PM, please give me the manufacturer/model/trim name, the ENGINE VARIANT name your model uses, and the category in which it is going to compete.

Example:
Townsend Tassel 6, 6T29-SDE, Entry Level

Submission deadline (EXTENDED): Thursday Feb 25, 12:00:00 pm Pacific Daylight Time (UTC-8h)

Accepted Submissions:
Entry Level
VicVictory - Townsend Tassel 6 (Benchmark only)
HighOctaneLove - Bogliq Admiral GX
thecarlover - Solo Toledo Beaver BM
CadillacDave - CMC Padrino Bilancio
nerd - Rado Ordures

Upscale
VicVictory - Townsend Tassel Super 6 (Bechmark only)
Madrias - Storm Prince II
squidhead - Flug Stolt concept
DeusExMackia - Erin Civera GT-L
nerd - Rado Crawler Luxury

Truck
VicVictory - Townsend Texas (Benchmark only)
thecarlover - Solo Orca T
boksi - Automurdermotive Theodoro 4x4

Sport
VicVictory - Townsend Trigger (Benchmark only)
HighOctaneLove - Bogliq Fox Sports
DeusExMackia - Erin Comprida SV6 Turbo
squidhead - Kraft Haus Technik Flug concept
Madrias - Storm Prince II TCE
CadillacDave - CMC Padrino Mostro

Pending Submissions:

Rejected Submissions:

For the sake of not making people dig through all 6 files to get an idea of what this package includes, I'll post the trims' basic stats here.

6T29-SDE - 113HP, 150TQ, 28 prod units, 838 mat cost
6T29-STO - 210HP, 232TQ, 43 prod units, 1812 mat cost
6T33-SDE - 128HP, 168TQ, 28 prod units, 869 mat cost
6T33-SMF - 159HP, 181TQ, 32 prod units, 1380 mat cost
6T33-SQS - 154HP, 178TQ, 28 prod units, 962 mat cost
6T33-STO - 233HP, 262TQ, 43 prod units, 1833 mat cost

Looks like an interesting challenge, actually. Might join in, try my hand at building my car around an engine rather than trying to fit the engine to a car.

Ok wow, this looks like a seriously good challenge. Count me in!
Quick question: what mods are we allowed to use?

None. Vanilla content only. Sorry, but I've had problems running Steam content while doing closed beta, and it's a pain to uninstall the Steam stuff every time I switch back and forth between the two. Hopefully this won't be an issue for very long.

Here are my entrants for this competition...

1. Bogliq Admiral GX



Using engines purchased from Toledo Ironworks, the Admiral was designed to appeal to the budget minded American.

2. Bogliq Fox Sport



In an attempt to ensure Admiral sales went well, Bogliq created the Fox, also powered by a Toledo engine. It was hoped that the Fox would find it's way into the heart of Americans everywhere, as well as in their driveways!

No worries. In fact, it makes it more of a challenge in a way!

Erin presents its entrant to the competition, the Erin Comprida SV6 Turbo!

AutomationHub Page

Thanks for your submission... any other brave souls?

Well, I'm working on a FWD SUV, with torsion bars and and a 0-60 time of a century. I'm also redoing the Ordures (french word for 'garbage') sedan you might remember from the 8-track tape 1966 challenge and The Highway Patrol 1978 challenge.

Finalizing the fine-tuning here. Went VERY weird on the chassis engine combo and the group Im competing in

Seems the sport category is popular. Remember, you each can submit two cars if you like, so long as they're different categories.

*edit* Just a little tidbit of info so far. There's been a bit of variety in motor usage. INCLUDING the benchmark cars, here's the break down so far...
6T33-SQS - 3 cars
6T29-STO - 2 cars
6T33-SDE - 1 car
6T29-SDE - 1 car
6T33-SMF - 1 car
6T33-STO - unused

I'm working on something. Loving the challenge of working around an engine I can't change, but having so many designs to work with is nice.

And now every category has at least one entry. As well, every variant of the Toledo V6 has landed in at least one car.

So who wants to ratchet up the competition? Still looking for more entries!

Any deadlines?