The Paper Power Ranger

Like many who are into the automotive hobby, I’ve been into cars since before I could drive. I can remember circling products in a catalog with a friend in 7th grade while we both daydreamed about modifying the cars neither of us owned (this, of course, was in 2001; the year the first Fast & Furious was released). Cars became my life at that point and I couldn’t wait to be able to drive and modify my own car some day. Finally, during my senior year of high school, I bought an RX-7 (an FD); a car I still own today.

For the last 20+ years, and with the most recent 12 years spent in a career in the automotive industry, my life has been consumed by cars and I’ve found myself becoming numb to what was, for the majority of my life, my most favorite thing in the world. My younger self would be extremely disappointed to think for a second that I gave up on my automotive hobby, but as I enter my mid-thirties, my life has been taken over with new ideas, from building cabinets to starting a business. I’ve struggled with the thought that maybe the automotive hobby was just a phase in my life, but cars were all starting to feel the same to me… That was until last year, while doom-scrolling through Instagram, I stumbled upon some accounts that brought another level of ingenuity and creativity to the hobby.

• @howisthatstreetlegal
• @dragon_prototypes
• @carbon12racing
• @wesleykagan
• @3d_magic_mike

*If you haven’t already, do yourself a favor and take a look at these guys on Instagram, YouTube, etc.

So who is the Paper Power Ranger?

In my Kindergarten years, I ate, slept, and breathed the Power Rangers. I had the action figures, the bed sheets, and even the underwear. If it had anything to do with Power Rangers, I was about it. What I didn’t own was a Power Ranger costume… that was until I decided to make my own out of, you guessed it, paper. Using that paper, Scotch tape, and colored pencils, I had pieced together paper plate chest armor, a paper plate helmet, and even a paper plate gun (complete with a functional paper plate holster!).

While pouring over the recently found Instagram accounts and reflecting back on the Paper Power Ranger story, I started to remember what actually steered me into the automotive hobby in the first place (spoiler: it wasn’t Fast & Furious). What led me to automotive was a passion for learning and a passion for creating. I love learning new things and I love creating new things. I love all things fabrication – designing, prototyping, manufacturing, and everything else that goes with it. It took this realization to give me a completely new outlook and appreciation for the automotive hobby I thought I was losing interest in (and it also took this realization to explain why, during my lunch breaks, I’ve been researching which CNC mill I’d like to buy; likely a CNC converted Grizzly G0704 for those wondering).

What is a “Fabricator?”

Merriam-Webster defines a “Fabricator” as someone who constructs, invents, creates, and/or manufactures (specifically : to construct from diverse and usually standardized parts). To some, a fabricator would be someone who make things out of metals while to others a fabricator would make things out of plastic or composites (or even paper). A fabricator is simply someone with an idea and how they get to the end result is entirely up to them.

What is The Fabricator’s Domain?

The Fabricator’s Domain was created as a hub to help people with a passion for vehicle fabrication share their ideas, find new sources for components, discover new manufacturing methods, learn new processes, or just find inspiration. Whether one’s passion is rooted in working on cars, motorcycles, UTVs, etc. fabricator’s enjoy seeing creative solutions, in all types of different scenarios, so they can learn new methods or find new resources to solve challenges. Creativity begets more creativity. Welcome to The Fabricator’s Domain.

Signed,

-The Paper Power Ranger