Rich Benoit is the guy behind the Rich Rebuilds YouTube channel. Although he started the channel rebuilding DeLoreans, the Tesla Model S that his daughter currently drives, he always stressed he was a car enthusiast. He proves that with the Sherp, one of the most capable off-roaders in the world – one powered by a diesel engine, we must add. Benoit made improvements to it and joked he supercharged the thing but don’t expect to see a blower in it: that was a word game with Tesla Superchargers.
A Different Sort Of Supercharging
Steven Salowsky, Rich Rebuilds' manager and official Sherp painter, as you can see above, told HotCars the modifications the Sherp received: “We tuned the Kubota, de-wrapped, polished the aluminum – since we’ve never seen one like that – removed and upgraded the external fog lights to pure LED, used POR Enamel on the body to make it pure black instead of a grayish-black, ordered an LED light bar, removed the rubber mud flaps, and built out a trailer to haul the damn thing. Eventually, we will put a roll cage and gun rack on it for, you know, recreational things.”
No Kaboom On The Kubota
The engine tuning was basically related to adjusting the set screw to allow for more acceleration. With the changes, the front wheels can pop up even with only 36.4 hp. Benoit plans to put a turbocharger on the Kubota V1505-T that powers the Sherp. The stock version is a naturally aspirated engine with the E-TVCS System (Three Vortex Combustion System). The system creates “three intensive air vortexes inside the globular combustion chamber.” The practical effect is to achieve an ideal fuel/air mixture, which represents more power and fewer emissions.
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Making The Sherp Look Sharp
The rest of the changes were just aesthetic. The most important one was removing all the wrap around the aluminum body. It made the Sherp look like a younger sister to the Tesla Cybertruck. Ironically, Benoit did not make fun of that, something he would normally not miss. Replacing the fog lamps for LED units made the Sherp more energy-efficient. However, Benoit is not after that. He just wanted his Sherp to look better.
To Serve, Protect, And Have Fun
The Sherp gets a lot of attention, and that can be a problem. Benoit met the cops after trying to find his drone because someone was afraid of a tank in the woods. Someone thought he was digging illegally, even if he was just trying to find a drone that crashed. The police officers were so nice they told Benoit to go find his drone, which he eventually did. Now they have a Sherp available whenever they need a competent search and rescue vehicle.