56 AUTOCAR.CO.UK 3 1 JULY 2019
A
Great Scott! What
would Doc Brown
make of (^) this?
They’re like something out of a Mad Max movie, and as John Evans
discovers, the artist behind these creations is just as unique and untamed
t 26 feet, it’s easily
longer than a stretched
Rolls-Royce Phantom,
and weighing three
tonnes, it’s heavier
too. It’s powered by a rear mid-
mounted Ford Coyote 5.0-litre V8
that breathes through 25 pipes and
exhausts through 31, and which
is topped by a giant tourbillon, an
escapement device originating in
watches and composed of moving
gears in a rotating cage.
The frame of the vehicle is
made from tubular stainless steel
and the suspension components
are fashioned from alloy. The
elaborate tubing and casting
work obscures the fact that much
of what you see is functional.
Its two enormous front wheels
feature mudguards created from
pieces of cast steel arranged to
look like a dragon’s scales. The
open ‘cabin’ has seats for two
passengers, one on each side of the
driver, and behind them, two more.
It’s called the Valyrian Steel and
is the work of Henry Chang, 56, a
musician, sculptor, designer and self-
taught mechanical engineer living
where else but in Las Vegas, the
entertainment city of the world.
It ’s f r om t he r e t h at he Sk y p e s me at
one in the morning, his time.
“I ’m i n my w ork shop,” he t e l l s
me. “I don’t sleep well; ideas are
constantly whirling inside my head.”
He f lips his phone camera to give
me a guided tour of his den, a large
garage where the Valyrian Steel sits
alongside a second, even larger and
more outrageous-looking vehicle,
a l s o m a de of t ubu l a r s t e e l a nd c a l le d
the Flux Capacitor. The former is
i n s pi r e d b y G a me of T h r one s , t he
latter by Back to the Future.
You get the idea...
“I wish the Mad Max movie people
would call,” says Chang. “I’ve had
ple nt y of of fe r s t o put my c a r s
i n mov ie s but I on l y w a nt t he m
in good ones and Mad Max is
a good one.”
For the 38ft long Flux
Capacitor, he plans to make all
e i g ht of it s 5 4i n r e a r w he e l s –
shod with Mickey Thompson
drag tyres and mounted on two
military-grade axles – steerable.
And in order to complete it, he’s
just sunk $215,000 (£170,000)
i nt o h i s ne x t t oy, a br a nd-ne w,
Ha a s C NC ga nt r y m i l l w it h ,
he boasts, “a 25ft x 15ft cutting
envelope”.
His pride and joy, though, is his
lathe – a huge, US-built machine
dating from World War II when, he
says, lives depended on accuracy.
“It’s beautifully built and so stable,”
he says. “I’ve replaced much younger
cutters but I’ll never get rid of this.”
How did a man who started out
as a jazz pianist end up not only
designing but also building extreme
vehicles whose single purpose seems
to be to surprise and delight?
“My dad was a professor of civil
engineering and I grew up with an
appreciation of structures,” says
Chang. “But I’m first and foremost
an artist and sculptor. I didn’t
k now muc h a b out c a r s w he n I w a s
appr oa c he d t o de si g n my f i r s t , ba s e d
on a golf buggy, but my ignorance
was actually a strength that gave
my imagination free rein.
“Ba s e d on t h at e x p e r ie nc e I
decided that next time I’d spend
BEYOND
THUNDERDOME
Henry^ Chang:^ artist,^
visionary...^ and^ in^
good nick^ for^56