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Thu Oct 18, 2007 2:32 pm

I had mixed up the info I had found.

It was actually Tatra that had sued Volkswagen(F. Porsche) for copying their construction...

http://www.histomobile.com/histomob/internet/73/histo02.htm

Quote: Porsche then designed a car for NSU in 1933 that was known as the Type 32. This car looked even more similar to the upcoming KdF Wagen than the Type 12 did. This car looked similar to the Tatra V570, and shared many mechanical similarities. After World War II, the Volkswagen company paid Tatra for compensation, since Tatra believed its technology and design was pirated in development of the KdF Wagen. Eventaully, NSU dropped the Type 32 project.

Thu Oct 18, 2007 10:22 pm

Hebster52 wrote: Mercedes type 170H 1937:

That looks odd! And the lines of the beetle is very much apparent and evident, though.

If you have information, how many of that were actually built!

Thanks.

Thu Oct 18, 2007 11:23 pm

The interesting thing is that the Mercedes Benz 170H was designed by Ferdinand Porsche and was produced only in 1936-37 and was discontinued as the "people's car" concept was started...

Couldn't find so much about the production numbers...

Here's some info about pte 40's M-B's:
http://www.mbusa.com/heritage/1926-1940.do

The M-B 130 was before the 170H:

Mon Oct 22, 2007 6:22 pm

I have interested in this for years, after seeing my first completely restored 4cyl tatra one day while working in SF. I spoke with the owner for hours and he sent the car back to CZ to be restored by some of the people who actually built the car originally. Take a real close look at them, forget the body and look at the chassis and here are some interesting facts....wide 5 drums...look like porsche A brakes, linkpin, swing axle....oil cooler up front and large steel oil lines going from engine to cooler and back.....what fansinated me the most was the engine. It appears to look like a 356 engine stale air heater, but a all steel shroud that looks like a 911 shroud. It's cool!!!!! generator mounted in the center just like porsche 911's ....WAS this the early 911 prototype shroud....sure looks like some 30-40 years before the 911
VVWCA has had some interesting articles about them.

Tue Oct 23, 2007 1:14 pm

This is a cut and paste from another site, http://www.tatra.demon.nl/cars_history_T97.htm and not written by me;

It's not difficult to spot the close resemblance between the T97 and the Volkswagen Beetle. That's because their history and development have overlapped. For several years during the 1930s - whilst Tatra was working on the construction of the 1931 and 1933 rear-engined aerodynamic prototypes and Porsche was developing the Volkswagen (VW) KdF-Wagen - Hans Ledwinka and Ferdinand Porsche regulary met to discuss their automotive work and designs. As Porsche later admitted in his own words he occasionally 'looked over the shoulder' of his contemporary.

When the T97 was introduced in 1936 it was perhaps the most advanced small car in the world. But Porsche was still working on the development of the VW KdF-Wagen under an enourmous time pressure from Adolf Hitler, who wanted to use the car for his promotion purposes. Hitler however considered the T97 to be too similar to his KdF-Wagen which was to be produced at the new Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg, Germany, even though the T97 was listed at more then five and a half times the KdF-Wagen's target selling price. In 1939 Hitler ordered to remove the T97 and the popular T57 from the Berlin Autosalon because of their close resemblance to the KdF-Wagen which was introduced at the 1939 Autosalon.

In the late 1930s it became clear that VW had used several patents of the Tatra factory. It's likely Porsche used these patents because of the enourmous presure from Hitler to develop the KdF-Wagen in a short time and on a tight budget. Just before the outbrake of WWII Tatra had ten legal claims against VW for infringement of patents. Although Porsche was about to make a settlement with Tatra, Hitler stopped him and told Porsche he would "solve this problem". Shortly after he invaded Czechoslovakia and gained control over the Tatra factory. Hitler immediately stopped the production of the T97 after only 508 cars were built. The T97's big brother, the V8-powered T87, did remain in production during the first years of the war. The T87 was considered by German high command as the ultimate car for the new German Autobahns and was a real favourite amongst German officers.

After the war the KdF-Wagen went on to international stardom as the VW Beetle selling millions and millions of cars, while Tatra found itself stranded behind the iron curtain under a new Communist government who told Tatra what they could and couldn't produce and export. The lawsuit case of the patents was re-opened after the war and dragged on for years, ending in 1961 when VW eventually made a settlement paying Tatra a mere DM 3,000,000.-. Ledwinka never received any money himself and died in relative obscurity in 1967. Porsche later admitted that during the construction of the KdF-Wagen in the 1930s he "occasionally looked over the shoulder of Ledwinka".

:!: I wanted to own a VW prototype, but want something that is actually old, so I decided that a Tatra T97 is it :!:

I bet VW will never display a Tatra T97 in their museum though :wink:

Sun Nov 25, 2007 1:12 am

Bob Shail's Hanomag has surfaced in Australia.
It was presented to the public at a VW show here in Melbourne, as a "Pre war, pre production Volkswagen prototype".

If it is pre war, the question has to be asked, Why is it on a 1943 Kubelwagen chassis?
I was told that it did come out of East Germany, therefore I tend to agree with the previous posts that it is somthing that an east German made after the war.
Here are some pics:

Sun Nov 25, 2007 3:46 am

HI,
am am sorry to say but this car is bull shit.
It is a typical car wich was build after the war in east europa.
The people did not want to have a military car so they just took the chassis and put on a new old body. They used bodys from all cars that they had ( Hanomag, Steyr, Mercedes,.. )
This car was never a prototyp and will never be a protoyp.
The KDF Hanomag signs were made in the Czek republik by a real KDF owner.
The old owner in the UK just build a history around the car to encrise the value.
You can say it is a couchbuild car from the late 40 or 50 ths and nothing else.
Bye Christian

Sun Nov 25, 2007 4:07 am

Thank you Christian.
I have the same opinion as you.
I am not an expert in these pre war cars, but I thought by 1939, when this "prototype" was built, that the Beetle shape was already built as it was displayed at the 1939 Berlin Motor Show.

Sun Nov 25, 2007 4:09 am

I'm amazed that someone went to the trouble stamping cogwheel VW symbols on the gloveboxes!

The car is great, but it seems wrong to present it as a prototype, when clearly it's not. Sad!

Sun Nov 25, 2007 2:39 pm

I would have loved to ask the owner a few questions about his car......

Sun Nov 25, 2007 11:03 pm

This would sure look nice sitting in my driveway.

:wink:

Mon Nov 26, 2007 1:48 am

Kilroy wrote: This would sure look nice sitting in my driveway.

:wink:

Only if you slammed it on earlies. :wink:

Had to be said. Anyway, are the underpinnings of those similar to the VW? Engine/Chassis/Suspension?

Mon Nov 26, 2007 9:12 pm

completely different, leaf spring suspension, etc

Mon Nov 26, 2007 10:49 pm

What are those straps? Original camber-compensators?

Tue Nov 27, 2007 7:30 am

Kubel Nick wrote: completely different, leaf spring suspension, etc

Wonder if he's aware he's lost the lower half of the engine case????? :wink:

Fri Nov 30, 2007 4:39 am

is it strange the number plates are the same?????[/url]

Thu May 21, 2009 7:59 am

www.coachbuilt.com/bui/b/briggs/briggs.htm to see what I mean

Thu May 21, 2009 1:10 pm

wow this is some VW history I never knew about...

Fri May 22, 2009 7:46 am

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Here's these old cars that all look alike.

Just like todays cars, you can't tell one manufacturer from another, they all look alike too.

Fri May 29, 2009 4:01 am

Interesting... :shock:

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&i...amp;_rdc=1