As far as personal custom car projects go, Ronin RS 211 is undoubtedly one of the best. It’s not just the design and build and the quality of the thing, but also the story behind it. Inspired by the original Lotus 2-11, the Exige-based Ronin is the brainchild of Frank Profera.
Years ago Frank bought a brand-new Lotus Exige which he wanted to modify to his own taste. Unfortunately, he crashed the car and pretty much wrecked it. But that instead of chucking it away, he saw converted the crashed Lotus into one of the most magnificent custom cars we’ve ever seen.
The coolest thing about this video is that Frank had no plans to bring his Ronin RS 211 to Jay Leno’s garage. Rather, it was Jay who flagged him down on the street and asked him to come on the show!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UZNDEaDlro
Ronin RS 211 is powered by the same 1.8-liter Toyota engine you find in normal Lotus models, but here it’s boosted to make 680 rear-wheel horsepower. Naturally, almost everything is custom-built for this car. And everything is done tastefully and with mind-boggling attention to details.