December 14th, 2009

Ferdinand Porsche was the founder of Volkswagen.

It is said that he was a technical genius and was employed by a great number of car companies eg Austro-Daimler, Mercedes, Daimler-Benz to name but a few.

In 1930 he opened his own design bureau. In 1931 he asked his team of staff to start designing a car with a water cooled three cylinder engine. This should have independent suspension and be able to accommodate four adults. The main purpose was to keep the costs as low as possible to make it affordable to the masses.

In 1932 he found a partner in Zundapp. Originally three prototypes were produced using his designs which was equipped with a new engine. Unfortunately however the engine had a severe overheating problem and melted after ten minutes of running. Zundapp decided to opt out of the project.

NSU a motor cycle manufacturer decided to join forces and a completely new cooled 4 cylinder engine was constructed. The engine was placed in the rear of the car to avoid the traditional transmission with a separate gear box, drive shaft and rear axle. Unfortunately due to the economical climate in Germany at the time NSU decided to withdraw and Porche was again on his own.

In 1933 at the Berlin Motor Show Adolf Hitler announced his ideas to produce a small car for the people of Germany. Porche and  Hitler were to join forces and a contract was signed in 1934. The prototypes were to be built by the RDA, which was the German Auto Manufacturers Association. RDA were soon to understand that this project had a chance to be successful and this they did not want. They purposely delayed the project which made Porsche miss the deadline and thus made him lose his contract. However Hitler realised this and placed the entire project under government supervision. The 3 prototypes were delivered in October 1936.

To this day the VW has stayed almost identical in design. It has a reputation for being a highly reliable car and indeed Volkswagen van leasing is a very popular choice as they have such a solid history behind them.

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