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Car of the Day: April 4, 2010; Johnny Lightning '50 Volkswagen Type 1 Beetle "Split Window"
Topic Started: Apr 3 2010, 03:45 PM (794 Views)
Sak
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Ezekiel 25:17
Today's Car of the Day is JL's Volkswagen Typ Einz of 1950...

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From Wikipedia:

The Volkswagen Beetle, also known as the Volkswagen Type 1, was an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen (VW) from 1938 until 2003. It used an air cooled rear engined rear wheel drive (RR layout). Over 21 million Beetles were produced in all.[2]
In the 1950s, it was more comfortable and powerful than most European small cars, having been designed for sustained high speed on the Autobahn, and ultimately became the longest-running and most-produced automobile of a single design. It remained a top seller in the US, even as rear-wheel drive conventional subcompacts were refined, and eventually replaced by front-wheel drive models. Its success owed much to its extremely high build quality, and innovative, eye-catching advertising. The Beetle car was the benchmark for both generations of American compact cars such as the Chevrolet Corvair, and subcompact cars such as the Chevrolet Vega and Ford Pinto. It was the German equivalent and counterpart to the Morris Minor, Renault 4CV, Citroen 2CV, Fiat 600, Saab 92, and Volvo PV444 immediate post-war European economy cars. The 1948 Citroen 2CV was the beginning of a switch to front wheel drive by European manufacturers in the 1960s and 1970s. Volkswagen were among the last to change with the Golf. The Beetle was 13 ft (4.0 m) long and the Mini was only 10 ft (3.0 m), but they had similar interior space[citation needed].
The car was originally known as Käfer, the German word for "beetle", from which the popular English nickname originates. It was not until August 1967 that the Volkswagen corporation itself began using the name "Beetle" in marketing materials in the US. Previously, it had only been known as either the "Type 1" or as the VW 1100, 1200, 1300, 1500, or 1600 which had been the names under which the vehicle was marketed in Europe; the numbers denoted the vehicle's approximate engine size in cubic centimetres. In 1998, many years after the original model had been dropped from the lineup in most of the world (production continued in Mexico until discontinued, officially on 9 July 2003[3]), VW introduced the "New Beetle" (built on a Volkswagen Golf Mk4 platform) which bore a visual resemblance to the original.
In an international poll for the award of the world's most influential car of the twentieth century the Beetle came fourth after the Ford Model T, the Mini, and the Citroën DS
History
Starting in 1931, Ferdinand Porsche and Zündapp developed the Porsche Type 12, or "Auto für Jedermann" (car for everybody). Porsche already preferred the flat-4 cylinder engine, and selected a swing axle rear suspension (invented by Edmund Rumpler), while Zündapp used a water-cooled 5-cylinder radial engine. In 1932, three prototypes were running.[5] All of those cars were lost during the war, the last in a bombing raid in Stuttgart in 1945.
The Zündapp prototypes were followed by the Porsche Type 32, built in 1933 by NSU Motorenwerke AG, another motorcycle company.
In 1933, Adolf Hitler gave the order to Ferdinand Porsche to develop a "Volks-Wagen" (literally, "people's car" in German, in which it is pronounced [ˈfolksvɑːgən]). Hitler required a basic vehicle capable of transporting two adults and three children at 100 km/h (62 mph). The "People's Car" would be available to citizens of the Third Reich through a savings scheme, or Sparkarte (savings booklet),[6] at 990 Reichsmark, about the price of a small motorcycle (an average income being around 32RM a week).[7]
Erwin Komenda, Porsche's chief designer, was responsible for the design and style of the car. But production only became worthwhile when finance was backed by the Third Reich. War started before large-scale production of the Volkswagen started, and manufacturing shifted to producing military vehicles. Production of civilian VW automobiles did not start until post-war occupation.
Production up to 1945
Initially called the Porsche Type 60 by Ferdinand Porsche, the car was officially named the KdF-Wagen by Hitler when the project was launched. The name refers to Kraft durch Freude ('Strength Through Joy'), the official leisure organization in the Third Reich. It was later known as the Volkswagen Type 1, but became more commonly known as the Beetle after World War II.
In October 1935 the first Type 60 prototype, known as the "V1", was ready.[8] In 1936, testing of the first three "V3" prototypes,[8] built in Porsche's Stuttgart shop,[9] began. Thirty "W30" pre-production models, produced by Daimler-Benz,[8][10] underwent 1,800,000 mi (2,900,000 km)[10] of further testing in 1937. All cars already had the distinctive round shape and the air-cooled, rear-mounted engine. Also available was a rollback soft top called the Cabrio Limousine.[11] Early production "VW38" cars had split windows; both the split window and the dash were retained on production Type 1s until 1952.[10]
The factory had only produced a handful of cars by start of the war in 1939. Consequently, the first volume-produced versions of the car's chassis were military vehicles, the Type 82 Kübelwagen (approximately 52,000 built) and the amphibious Type 166 Schwimmwagen (about 14,000 built).
The car was designed to be as simple as possible mechanically, so that there was less to go wrong; the aircooled 25 hp (19 kW) 995 cc (60.7 cu in)[12] motors proved especially effective in actions of the German Afrika Korps in Africa's desert heat. This was due to the built-in oil cooler and the superior performance of the flat-4 engine configuration. The innovative suspension design used compact torsion bars instead of coil or leaf springs. The Beetle is more or less airtight and will float on water; indeed, it is hard to slam the door on one since the difference in air pressure pushes it back before it shuts.[citation needed]
The model village of Stadt des KdF-Wagens was created in Lower Saxony in 1938 for the benefit of the workers at the factory.
A handful of Beetles were produced specifically for civilians, primarily for the Nazi elite, in the years 1940–1945, but production figures were small. Because of gasoline shortages, a few wartime "Holzbrenner" Beetles were fueled by wood pyrolysis gas producers under the hood. In addition to the Kübelwagen, Schwimmwagen, and a handful of others, the factory managed another wartime vehicle: the Kommandeurwagen; a Beetle body mounted on the Kübelwagen chassis.
669 Kommandeurwagens were produced up to 1945, when all production was halted because of heavy damage to the factory by Allied air raids. Much of the essential equipment had already been moved to underground bunkers for protection, which let production resume quickly after hostilities ended.
Influence of Tatra
Much of the Beetle’s design was inspired by the advanced Czech Tatra cars, designed under chief engineer Hans Ledwinka. In particular, Tatra’s T97 and T77a models show striking similarities with the later Volkswagen from many angles.
Tatras of the 1930s used streamlined bodies with rear-mounted engines. The T97,[13] which is widely held to be the closest Tatra model to Porsche’s Volkswagen, had a four-cylinder horizontally-opposed (‘flat four’) air-cooled engine. On a smaller scale, the company’s V570, a prototype for a smaller car, also shows quite a resemblance to the later German car.
But it wasn’t just Tatra’s aerodynamic styling that influenced Porsche. Tatra had pioneered the use of air-cooling in road vehicle engines with the original T77 in 1934. Air-cooling was demanding technologically, but desirable: there was no anti-freeze in the 1930s[citation needed], so a vehicle could not be left parked for long in cold weather with its coolant in situ. Tatra’s wealthy customers could afford to pay for advanced technology, but Ferdinand Porsche was out on a limb in specifying air-cooling for his people’s car. In the end, it was subsidies from the Nazi government that paid for Porsche’s engineering good taste and brought the convenience of air-cooling to a mass audience — albeit only after World War II.
According to the book Car Wars, Adolf Hitler called the Tatra "the kind of car I want for my highways".[14] In the same book, it is said that Ferdinand Porsche admitted "to have looked over Ledwinka’s shoulder" while designing the Volkswagen.[14] Tatra launched a lawsuit, but this was stopped when Germany invaded Czechoslovakia. At the same time, Tatra was forced to stop producing the T97. The matter was re-opened after World War II and in 1961 Volkswagen paid Tatra 3,000,000 Deutsche Marks in compensation. These damages meant that Volkswagen had little money for the development of new models and the Beetle's production life was necessarily extended. Tatra ceased producing passenger cars in 1950, then resumed again in 1954 as a manufacturer of large luxurious cars and limousines under various Communist governments in Czechoslovakia. Even the company’s last limousines were rear-engined and air cooled.
Tatra is now a truck manufacturer. All its engines are still air-cooled, despite the demands of modern emissions regulations.
Post-war production and boom
In occupied Germany, the Allies followed the Morgenthau plan to remove all German war potential by complete or partial pastoralization. As part of this, in the Industrial plans for Germany, the rules for which industry Germany was to be allowed to retain were set out. German car production was set at a maximum of 10% of the 1936 car production numbers.[15]
The Volkswagen factory was handed over by the Americans to British control in 1945; it was to be dismantled and shipped to Britain.[16] Thankfully for Volkswagen, no British car manufacturer was interested in the factory; "the vehicle does not meet the fundamental technical requirement of a motor-car ... it is quite unattractive to the average buyer ... To build the car commercially would be a completely uneconomic enterprise."[16] The factory survived by producing cars for the British Army instead.[16] Allied dismantling policy changed in late 1946 to mid 1947, although heavy industry continued to be dismantled until 1951. In March 1947, Herbert Hoover helped change policy by stating
"There is the illusion that the New Germany left after the annexations can be reduced to a 'pastoral state'. It cannot be done unless we exterminate or move 25,000,000 people out of it."[17]
The re-opening of the factory is largely accredited to British Army officer Major Ivan Hirst (1916–2000).[18] Hirst was ordered to take control of the heavily-bombed factory, which the Americans had captured. His first task was to remove an unexploded bomb which had fallen through the roof and lodged itself between some pieces of irreplaceable production equipment; if the bomb had exploded, the Beetle's fate would have been sealed. Hirst persuaded the British military to order 20,000 of the cars,[7] and by 1946 the factory was producing 1,000 cars a month. During this period, the car reverted to its original name of Volkswagen and the town was renamed Wolfsburg. The first 1,785 Beetles were made in 1945.


The jeweled one-millionth VW Beetle
Following the British Army-led restart of production, former Opel manager (and formerly a detractor of the Volkswagen) Heinz Nordhoff was appointed director of the Volkswagen factory.[7] Under Nordhoff, production increased dramatically over the following decade, with the one-millionth car coming off the assembly line by 1955. During this post-war period, the Beetle had superior performance in its category with a top speed of 115 km/h (71 mph) and 0–100 km/h (0-60 mph) in 27.5 seconds on 36 mpg (15 km/l) for the standard 25 kW (34 hp) engine. This was far superior to the Citroën 2CV and Morris Minor, and even competitive with more complex and fragile small cars like the Austin Mini.
In Small Wonder, Walter Henry Nelson wrote:
"The engine fires up immediately without a choke. It has tolerable road-handling and is economical to maintain. Although a small car, the engine has great elasticity and gave the feeling of better output than its small nominal size."
Opinion in the United States was not flattering, however, perhaps because of the characteristic differences between the American and European car markets. Henry Ford II once described the car as "a little box."[citation needed] The Ford company was offered the entire VW works after the war for free. Ford's right-hand man Ernest Breech was asked what he thought, and told Henry II, "What we're being offered here, Mr. Ford, isn't worth a damn!" With that, the Ford Motor Company lost out on the chance to build the world's most popular car since their own Model T.
During the 1950s, the car was modified progressively: the obvious visual changes mostly concerned the rear windows.[19] In March 1953, the small oval two-piece rear window was replaced by a slightly larger single-piece window. More dramatically, in August 1957 a much larger full width rear window replaced the oval one. 1964 saw the introduction of a widened cover for the light over the rear licence plate. Towards the end of 1964, the height of the side windows and windscreen grew slightly, giving the cabin a less pinched look: this coincided with the introduction of a very slightly curved ("panoramic") windscreen, though the curve was barely noticeable. The same body appeared during 1966, with a 1300 cc engine in place of the 1200 cc engine: it was only in the 1973 model Super Beetle that the Beetle acquired an obviously curved windscreen. The flat windscreen remained on the standard Beetle.
There were also changes under the bonnet. In 1954, Volkswagen added 2 mm to the cylinder bore, increasing the displacement from 1,131 cc to 1,192 cc.[20] This coincided with upgrades to various key components including a redesign of the crankshaft. This increased power from 33 bhp to a claimed 40 bhp and improved the engine's free revving abilities without compromising torque at lower engine speeds.[20] At the same time, compression ratios were progressively raised as, little by little, the octane ratings of available fuel was raised in major markets during the 1950s and 1960s.[20]
There were other, less-numerous models, as well. The Hebmüller cabriolet (officially Type 14A), a sporty two-seater, was built between 1949 and 1953; it numbered 696. The Type 18A, a fixed-top cabriolet, was produced by Austro-Tatra as a police and fire unit; 203 were assembled between January 1950 and March 1953.[21]
Beetle sales boomed in the 1960s, thanks to clever advertising campaigns, and the Beetle's reputation for reliability and sturdiness. On 17 February 1972, when Beetle No. 15,007,034 was produced, Beetle production surpassed that of the previous record holder, the Ford Model T. By 1973, total production was over 16 million, and by 23 June 1992, over 21 million had been produced.
As of 2009, the Beetle is arguably the world's best-selling car design. More units of the Toyota Corolla brand have been sold, but there have been total redesigns of the Corolla, each amounting to a new car design with the same name.


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Ah, the Split Window Generation! By the time I was a small boy, the Splitskis were already a legend among VW enthusiasts, and were going for big money on the collector's market. In 1953 the back window went to an oval, which lasted until 1957, when, for safety reasons, the rear window was widened into the large rectangle it kept until the end.

The Johnny's a nice rendition of this model (a different tooling than the mid '60s version they cast several years earlier). I also have a copy in a pale blue metallic that mimics the Budgie oval version of the 1950s. The Beetle is one of the most popular diecast subjects, to this very day. There was a character that most other cars just did not have.

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JustDavid
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SUV
Pretty color...I didn't know they had an oval window before the rectangular one. I learned something new today.
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ivantt
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New casting? Quick! Take it apart!
Sak
Apr 3 2010, 03:45 PM

The Beetle is one of the most popular diecast subjects, to this very day. There was a character that most other cars just did not have.

My rule of thumb is anything VW Beetle is worth buying for the collection or trading in the future.

This is a lovely looking production.
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Sak
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Ezekiel 25:17
David, there's a Hot Wheels version of the oval window Beetle. MANY different variations, from the mid '90s. My favorite is in a pink pearl (from some special issue) with blackwalls. My wife likes Beetles- I found her one at a show from the Getty promotion, in green, and it sits above her sewing table.
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james_autos
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Minivan
It was never actually called a Beetle, was it? It's a Volkswagen. Beetle is just a nickname. There's a nice bit of useless information for those who didn't know.

I'm not a fan, but I could do with a split window like this one in my collection.
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Sak
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Ezekiel 25:17
No, never an official name. The current one was always known as the 'New Beetle', but its air-cooled ancestor was, intramurally, the Type 1, as the Transporter was the Type 2, and the KG, and 1500 squarebacks and fastback the Type 3. Especially confusing is that the original transporter is also the Type 1 (among the transporter line). Too many types?

However, over here, it was the Beetle, or the Bug. The Germans called the car 'kafer' (imagine the umlaut sitting on top of the 'a' in that word), which translates to beetle.

You know, if you stop and think about it, the old two-stroke Saabs and the Morris Minors were kind of insect shaped, so let's just say it's not that exclusive :02:
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Sak
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Ezekiel 25:17
Here's the Hot Wheels oval Beetle...one I repainted and swapped wheels on.

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The ovals now are quite rare- they weren't exactly common anymore when I was a kid, either. Finding them is a treat- but it seems VW owners are more inclined to be at exclusively VW shows.
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JustDavid
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SUV
Nice work Sak...that color seems well fitting for a VW of this vintage.

I'll have to keep an eye out for the HW oval window version. Thanks for the heads-up. :)
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Tone
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Rocket 88
Quote:
 
My wife likes Beetles- I found her one at a show from the Getty promotion, in green, and it sits above her sewing table.


This one George?

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Sak
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Ezekiel 25:17
Yep, that's the one. I find that most of the time, diecasters do a very imperfect job on the Beetle in this scale (e.g. the Majorette, and more recent Siku efforts, for instance). Hot Wheels, meanwhile, did a bravisimo job on this one- the large rear wheels nothwithstanding...
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Swifty
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The Mustang II is a Mustang too!
Nice casting- the real example used to belong to VWOwner.
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STUTZ
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Nice JL casting!
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