DeLorean Time Machine

Lore & Background

During development, the team decided Doc Brown built the machine in his garage rather than a corporation, giving it a "slapdash, kind of cool look." Production designer Lawrence Paull worked with artists Ron Cobb and illustrator Andrew Probert to ensure the vehicle appeared fixed together from common parts. When Ford Motor Company offered $75,000 to use a Mustang instead, Bob Gale famously retorted that "Doc Brown doesn't drive a fucking Mustang." The specific speed of 88 mph was chosen because it looked "cool" on the speedometer and was easy to remember; notably, a custom gauge was built because a 1979 law limited standard speedometers to 85 mph. The device originally called the "Temporal Field Capacitor" was renamed by Michael Fink and Zemeckis after learning of "neutron flux," which they felt sounded more believable.

In Their Own Story

The act of traveling through time, known as the "time slice" effect, was envisioned by Zemeckis as a violent transition resembling a "Neanderthal sitting on the hood of the DeLorean and chipping away the fabric of time." While early ideas included a cubist effect where the car broke into segments or an electrical envelope, animators settled on a crack in time opening before the vehicle. Practical effects included smoke, sparks, flash-bulbs, and actual fire emitting from the tires, though the gas jet mechanism failed repeatedly during filming. To simulate cold after time travel, liquid nitrogen was poured onto the stainless-steel body. The engine sound heard in the film is not a DeLorean; artists used recordings of a Porsche 928 V8 and the Star Wars landspeeder, as the car's original PRV V6 engines were retained only for physical filming.

Reader's Guide

Three main DeLoreans were purchased from a collector for production: an "A" car (Hero), a "B" car (Stunt), and a "C" car (Interior). The A car is currently displayed at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles. The B car, used for stunts across all three films, was struck by a train and left as rubble; its body panels were sold to Planet Hollywood Hawaii before being recovered and are now displayed in Hubbardston, Massachusetts. The C car was torn apart for interior shots, with parts later used on replicas for Universal Japan. For off-road scenes in the third film, the DeLorean was fitted onto a modified VW Beetle frame. A seventh vehicle, a full-sized fiberglass model, was used solely for exterior hovering shots. In total, five real DeLoreans and one process car were utilized throughout the trilogy's filming.

Did You Know?

• The idea of a refrigerator time machine was scrapped because Steven Spielberg feared children would climb inside and get trapped.
• A custom speedometer had to be built for the film because a 1979 law limited production car speedometers to 85 mph.
• Five real DeLoreans were used during filming, plus one full-sized fiberglass model for hovering shots.
• The engine sound in the movies is actually a mix of a Porsche 928 V8 and the Star Wars landspeeder.
• In 2021, the time machine was added to the Library of Congress's National Historic Vehicle Register.