Jim Kor has been described as a hermit who doesn't get out much in the world.

Yet this engineer is out to change the world. His Urbee is a unique hybrid car. It mostly runs on electricity. But it can also run on fuel made from corn. It is made out of plastic, can zip across the country on 10 gallons of fuel and is produced using an advanced 3-D printer.

"We want to make the greenest car on Earth," said Kor. He designs tractors and city buses for mass production.

Kor took the idea from nature. The Urbee needed to be light and strong like a falcon and fast like a cheetah. But making this happen took a special 3-D printing technology. It delived strength and speed at a low weight.

Assembling A Printed Car

By late 2011, Kor and his team had designed their dream. They built the car's body in a 3-D printing factory in Eden Prairie, Minnesota

Computers read the design software and "printed" each car part layer by layer. A plastic bumper was born, then a hood and other parts. 3-D printing has been used to make gears, grilles, tools, parts and models for other manufacturers. But it had never been used to build the entire body of a car.

"It became the first car to have its body 3-D-printed and now it's the greenest practical car ever made. The Urbee uses eight times less energy than the average little car," Kor said.

Traditionally, it takes years to make a model of a new car. Small changes require new materials, new designs and new tools to build the next version. With 3-D printing, designers can tweak details on a computer and click the Print button.

Once printed, the Urbee car parts were shipped and put together back in Kor's lab in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They were outfitted with two electric motors and a small ethanol engine. Today, the two-seater, three-wheeled Urbee is on tour. It's in England this month, where science and car enthusiasts are going ga-ga over the vehicle.

Dreaming Of Billions Of Urbees

"One day all cars will look like this. ... I'd like to license two-and-a-half billion Urbees," Kor said with a laugh, noting that there are only 1 billion cars in the world today. The goal is to sell each of his cars for about $16,000. We need an environmentally-friendly car like this. But it has to be low-priced, Kor said.

Two weeks ago, a 3-D printing company's customer service worker Ashley Voigt hoisted a red Urbee bumper from one of company's printing machines. "This one took a straight day and a half to make. We could have made it faster if we didn't care how it looked," Voight said. By taking the time to precisely lay each plastic fiber, she got a smooth surface that looks like a finished part.

The Future Of Urbee And 3-D Printing

During a conference about 3-D printing last month, Kor said he has already designed the Urbee 2. The first-generation Urbee gets 70 miles per gallon of fuel. The Urbee 2 will get 120 to 290 miles per gallon.

But Kor first needs $3 million to make the drawings real. He started raising funds in October and if he's successful, production will begin in 2014 at a 3-D printing factory in Eden Prairie. A cross-country drive from New York to San Francisco is scheduled for 2015. On board will be Kor, his son and dog.

"We'll start with a half-scale model car in 2014. Once we have that tested, we are only a month away from making the full-scale model," Kor said. Because all the designs are in the computer, it doesn't take long to scale up.

Hiemenz said the 3-D printing company is excited by Urbee's possibilities. "Jim is this long-haired and small-town guy with a great idea. This car can be charged from a garage outlet or with power" from the sun.

The Urbee is one of the hottest products from the 3-D printing revolution. Twenty years ago, 3-D plastic "printing" was a garage hobby. Now it's a $2.2 billion business embraced by General Electric, General Motors, UPS and other big companies.