The Corvette is a clue. Parked outside a cluster of anonymous industrial buildings in Santa Ana, Calif., the 1970 Chevrolet Corvette convertible provides a hint at the automotive flights of fancy in progress behind the gates of n2a Motors. With its carbon-fiber hood baking in the California sun, this particular ’Vette is a test subject for a new paint technique. The car’s owner will be keen to learn how this turns out, because he is Gene Langmesser, president of Kanter Concepts and its newer offshoot, n2a Motors.

As its name implies, Kanter Concepts is known for producing concept cars for major manufacturers. (Remember the Hyundai HCD8? That was a Kanter car.) N2a—for "No Two Alike"—is like the public arm of Kanter, making its facilities and know-how available with a limited-production run based on the Corvette chassis.

Langmesser began his career at GM, and later became a studio engineer for Porsche, where he got his hands on projects like the 959 and 993-model 911. His job was to solve engineering problems that nobody anticipated, and so the Germans at Porsche dubbed Langmesser "the Fireman." One conflagration that required his attention occured when he was testing a 993 prototype in Arizona, and discovered that the new wraparound taillights weren’t quite ready for the combination of rear-engine heat and the American desert. "On hot days, the fasteners on the early cars would melt and the taillights would fall out. That’s the sort of thing that was my job to redesign," Langmesser says.

Porsche trivia geeks should note that the Fireman is also the reason why the 993’s windshield wipers are so close together. "They wanted to keep their old wiper motors in the new car, so I designed a single articulated wiper for the 993," Langmesser explains. "It got rejected because they didn’t want to seem like they were copying Mercedes, so that’s why the 993 has two wiper arms mounted in the middle of the windshield."

With engineering bona fides like the 959 under his belt, Langmesser is keen to ensure that n2a’s fanciful designs are translated into a well-built product. N2a’s first model, the 789, is a rebodied Corvette with a retro style that recalls a 1957 Bel Air at the front and Adam West’s Batmobile at the rear. "The Corvette is a great starting point because it’s a spaceframe design, not a unibody," Langmesser says. "You can pull the body off the Corvette and it’s still an intact drivable car, airbags and all."

The 789 is eight inches longer than a Corvette and three inches wider, yet thanks to its construction (carbon fiber with a thin fiberglass veneer to aid in the application of paint), the car weighs only 25 pounds more than a stock Corvette. The throaty Borla exhaust (included in the $75,000 price over the Corvette donor car) adds about 25 hp, but some buyers have taken power to other levels entirely. One customer fitted twin turbochargers of such behemoth proportions that they had to be mounted in the trunk.

While the 789 has garnered the most media attention thus far, it’s actually a minor component of the facility’s undertakings. "Sixty percent of our work is aerospace," Langmesser admits as we walk into an adjacent building where most of the projects are shrouded in tarps. One endeavor that he is at liberty to discuss is an unmanned carbon-fiber drone plane built for the military and completed two years ago. It is a full-scale model, but not a flying prototype. So, then, was it used to test radar signatures or something, I ask? Langmesser smiles but does not elaborate.Aerospace aside, the staff’s gearhead predilections are evidenced by the items stashed throughout the Kanter buildings: over here, a carbon-fiber fender for a 1969 Chevelle; over there, the Ford Ghia Altair concept car from the ’80s. In the corner of a conference room sits a pristine—and completely incongruous—1982 Honda CX500T Turbo motorcycle. And oh yes, there’s the Crown Victoria Queen Latifah drove in Taxi. N2a didn’t build that one, but Kanter bought it to enter in the Bull Run, a road rally from New York City to Los Angeles.

If the 789 isn’t your cup of tea, n2a has several other projects in the works, ranging from a retro Chevy Nomad-inspired wagon dubbed the GoMad to the Anteros coupe and roadster, a more European riff on the Corvette architecture. Unlike the tiny, dust-covered electric Ford concept car parked nearby in the garage, the Anteros coupe prototype is on its way to production, as n2a recently signed an exclusive deal to build and market the car through 2010.

The blueprint for the Anteros is similar to that of the 789, and arises from the Corvette’s basic drawbacks, especially the Z06: Chevy’s supercar offers world-class performance, but comparatively mundane styling and a low-rent interior. The Anteros eschews the Corvette’s restrained bodywork for more exaggerated curves (particularly the rear fenders). Moreover, the seats, door trim, gauge faces, and instrument panel have all been upgraded, with the goal of putting high quality back into the most obvious places GM cut corners.

This prototype is built on a Lingenfelter Z06 chassis, and when Langmesser pushes the start button, the walls of the building echo with the ragged cacophony of a massive V-8 tuned for a 7,000-rpm sweet spot. The car is slated to debut in November at the LA Auto Show, where n2a will begin taking orders at a price Langmesser estimates to be about $100,000 beyond that of the donor Corvette.

With the Anteros shut down and the garage once again quiet, we move to n2a’s in-house design center, where studio chief Alberto Hernandez sits at his computer, tweaking a CAD rendering of a custom recreational vehicle currently under development on the shop floor. It’s a Ford F650 chassis split down the centerline, widened by 22 inches, and wheelbase extended 80 inches—the better to accommodate features that include a shower and a "toy box" in the back for ATVs and dirt bikes.

In the middle of the room is a raised table, upon which sits a scale clay model of one of n2a’s next undertakings, the Stingray-influenced Stinger. The walls are covered with sketches of possible projects: a blocky, gangster-looking coupe based on the Cadillac XLR chassis, and variations of the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky.

The wildest work in progress is a new car for DiMora Motorcar—its proportions evoke a modernized Duesenberg, or perhaps the Maybach Exelero. "That’s all carbon fiber and aluminum, and it’ll be powered by a custom-built V-16," Langmesser says. The estimated price is $2 million.

Of course, there’s one more choice in the n2a design portfolio: none of the above. "If somebody wants something different, I can build anything. If someone wants a unique car, you’re talking about at least a quarter of a million dollars. It could be a little more or less, but that’s the ballpark," Langmesser says. "Our only limitation is your imagination. And your wallet."

Anteros, www.anterosmarketing.com
n2a Motors, www.n2amotors.com