Movie Cars Take Spotlight At Austin Auto Show

The annual Austin Auto Show is officially underway, showing off hundreds of the latest and greatest in the automotive world offered by members of the Austin Automobile Dealers Association. But the exhibit that's really grabbing headlines is one boasting some of the most iconic cars in TV and movie history, including:

  • The DeLorean time machine from Back to the Future
  • The Ecto-1 from Ghost Busters
  • The Knight 2000 K.I.T.T. from Knight Rider
  • The Mystery Machine from Scooby-Doo

And your kids will no doubt dig the one-of-a-kind Toyota Sienna SpongeBob van.

The guy behind the screen cars' appearance is reality star VideoBob Moseley from the Reelz Channel's Screen Machines. He told Austin-area reporters that his obsession with building replicas of TV and film cars began in 2003 when he bought a DeLorean and set out to replicate the fantasy vehicle from the iconic 1985 film.

"Things just got way out of hand and I started building these complete total replicas," Moseley said, noting it took a decade of research, visits to Universal Studios and befriending several Back to the Future filmmakers to get every detail right.

""Basically we have a book of every square inch of the original car that we reference. So we get every single wire, color, gauge, direction, every single zip tie...every little part is exactly the way it was in the film," he said.

Moseley's Ecto-1 began as a 21-foot 1960 Cadillac ambulance with terrible gas mileage.

"This was actually an in-use hearse up until when I bought it so it's all original interior. Runs and drives, still has that nice formaldehyde smell in the back," he said.

Mosely also makes an interesting point about the K.I.T.T. while perusing the newest, tech-heavy rides at the show.

"There's a lot of things that were totally considered fantasy in a car like this, like GPS and video screens and all those things which are now standard equipment on just about every new vehicle," he said.

Are you headed to the Austin Auto Show? Post your pics and thoughts on the E3 Spark Plugs Facebook Fan Page.