The BatBerry, a home-built Batmobile, readies itself for Canada’s streets

By day, Tim Neil works as an application manager at Canadian tech firm Research in Motion. By night, weekend and whenever else he's been able to find the time over the past 16 months, Neil has been building a replica Tim Burton-era Batmobile by hand at his home from scratch, down to the thrusters and proper dashboard layout, which he's dubbed the BatBerry. The Dark Knight really is rising.

Built as all good Batmobiles from the Michael Keaton films are from the bones of a Chevy Caprice sedan, Neil has steadily chronicled his progress, and occasional sidesteps, on his blog. The one conceit to modernity comes from the integration of Blackberry electronics, using his smartphone and a Blackberry Playbook for the car's various controls, like the hidden machine guns with fake bullets and video cameras for additional visibility.

The photo above shows the BatBerry as it stood last Halloween; Neil says in a recent post he hopes to have his creation on the road sometime later this summer, and that it will be street legal. Homebuilding any hot rod can become a black hole of time and money, but for 14 months of work I'd say the BatBerry looks impressively well done.