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    Volkswagen Beetle
    Volkswagen Beetle
    Volkswagen Beetle
    Ebook89 pages41 minutes

    Volkswagen Beetle

    By Richard Copping

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    About this ebook

    Few cars have achieved the iconic status of Volkswagen's classic and much-loved Beetle – yet its origins are intertwined with the dark days of Nazism. This book looks at those origins, at the marque's initial post-war rescue by the British and the effect of early VW Director General Heinz Nordhoff's forward-looking desire to perfect one model rather than spread the company's talent over a range of designs, at the impact of radical-minded advertising campaigns and at the Beetle's never-to-be-beaten production record for a single model of nearly 22 million cars. Bringing the reader right up to the present day, marque expert Richard A. Copping recounts the Beetle's story in a lively and authoritative manner guaranteed to delight devotee and casual browser alike.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
    Release dateSep 10, 2014
    ISBN9781784420208
    Volkswagen Beetle
    Author

    Richard Copping

    Richard Copping is Britain's most prolific author on matters Volkswagen, with well over twenty books written about Beetles, Transporters, the VW Golf and more. His deep-rooted love for the marque has encouraged him to amass a large collection of archive brochures, to travel the length and breadth of the country visiting many of the Volkswagen enthusiast events, to photograph all types of Volkswagen whenever the occasion arises and, above all, to write about the vehicles in a style that has come to be recognized as both authoritative and lively.

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      Book preview

      Volkswagen Beetle - Richard Copping

      VISIT

      INTRODUCTION

      HAILED AS AN icon of the twentieth century, the Beetle luxuriates in the unchallengeable position of being the most produced model of a single type ever, with 21,529,464 examples having been built in a continuous run spanning the years 1945 to 2003. Instantly recognisable as the same car, whether of 1949 vintage and the arrival of the first De Luxe version for export, or the last German-built example dating from January 1978, or indeed the Última Edición manufactured in Puebla, Mexico, in 2003, a Beetle is a Beetle. Other car makers may choose to overlook this fact, preferring to promote their own models as the most produced, but, without exception, such pretenders to the crown carry little more than continuity of name.

      On 17 February 1972 Beetle production numbers exceeded those of the Model T Ford. Its origins are decidedly murky, but clearly there would have been no Volkswagen without Hitler and the Nazis, despite the protestations of supporters of its designer, Ferdinand Porsche. Similarly, if the Nazi-built and owned Beetle factory had not been located in the British zone of occupation, the buildings would probably have been demolished and the assets distributed as war reparations. Equally, there would not have been an army officer present with the ingenuity to produce a vehicle as much needed transport for occupying personnel. That the Volkswagen saloon and not its military sibling, the Kübelwagen, was the only option remains a further quirk of fate.

      Above all, if a former director of Opel had not been appointed Director General of the Volkswagenwerk in January 1948 and taken the highly unusual step of developing one model to perfection, rather than replacing it every few years, Volkswagen might well have survived, but its first car would have become obsolete by the mid-1950s. Heinz Nordhoff held faith with the Beetle until his death in April 1968. He had made it his life’s aim to achieve where Hitler had failed, although his terminology would have differed somewhat. Under his tutelage, the Beetle successfully won over Europe, including fiercely independent Britain, conquered the United States, extended its influence into Australasia, and became a mainstay of the Brazilian and Mexican economies.

      Technical details are kept to a minimum in this book: they are not the kingpins of the Beetle’s story. A basic specification of an early model is all that is required:

      Length: 4,050 mm. Width: 1,540 mm. Height: 1,500 mm. Wheelbase: 2,400 mm. Track: front, 1,290 mm; rear, 1,250 mm. Total weight: 1,100 kg.

      Construction: frame with tunnel-shaped centre section forked at the rear, welded-on platforms. Front axle: independent suspension through longitudinal upper and lower torsion bars, two square sets of torsion bar leaf-springs passing through beams. Rear axle: independent suspension through swinging half axles with spring plates, one solid round torsion bar spring on each side.

      Engine: four-cylinder, four-stroke rear engine with horizontally opposed cylinders, air-cooled. Bore: 75 mm. Stroke: 64 mm. Capacity: 1,131cc. Compression ratio: 5.8:1. Maximum PS (Pferderstärken [Metric horsepower]): 25 at 3,300 rpm.

      Throughout the 1950s Volkswagen could not meet the demand for the Beetle. By the mid-1960s, when this picture was taken, 4,550 Beetles were being manufactured daily.

      Nazi propaganda depicted starry-eyed construction workers gazing admiringly upwards at the wondrous factory they were building.

      A CAR FOR THE MASSES: 1933–45

      ONLY DAYS AFTER his appointment as Germany’s Chancellor, a smartly suited Adolf Hitler addressed journalists and car manufacturers as he opened the 1933 Berlin Motor Show. His theme was the need for the rapid motorisation of Germany – to be effected by tax incentives for car buyers, the repeal of

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