Porsche History

Ferdinand, Ferdinand, Ferdinand

Three generations. Three cars. One unmistakable line.

Ferdinand No. 1: Ferdinand Porsche and the Volkswagen

Long before there was a Porsche automobile, there was Ferdinand Porsche the engineer. In 1931, Porsche opened an independent engineering office in Stuttgart. The company was not originally an automobile manufacturer in the sense that we understand Porsche today; it was an engineering and design consultancy that developed automobiles, engines, chassis, and other technology for outside clients.

Ferdinand Porsche had already been thinking seriously about the idea of a small and affordable automobile for ordinary people. The concept did not suddenly appear with Volkswagen. His engineering office had previously worked on compact-car projects for companies including Zündapp and NSU, and those projects allowed Porsche and his engineers to experiment with many of the ideas that would eventually come together in the Volkswagen Type 60.

On January 17, 1934, Ferdinand Porsche wrote his now-famous “Exposé regarding the construction of a German People’s Car.” His basic premise was surprisingly modern: an inexpensive automobile should not simply be a crude substitute for a more expensive one. It should be a real automobile in its own right: light, dependable, capable of carrying a family, and able to maintain approximately 100 kilometers per hour, or about 62 mph. For a low-cost automobile in the early 1930s, that was an ambitious specification.

Later that year, Porsche’s engineering office received the official commission from the Reich Association of the German Automobile Industry, operating under Germany’s National Socialist government, to develop the automobile that would eventually become the Volkswagen. Within Porsche’s organization, the project was known as the Type 60, and the engineering formula that emerged would become one of the most influential in automotive history.

The car would be compact, inexpensive to operate, and mechanically simple. Its horizontally opposed engine would be air-cooled, eliminating the radiator and coolant system required by a conventional water-cooled engine. The engine would be mounted in the rear and drive the rear wheels, while independent suspension and torsion-bar springing would provide a level of ride quality and sophistication that was unusual for an inexpensive automobile of the period. The body’s rounded shape was also influenced by the still-developing science of automotive aerodynamics.

Anyone familiar with a Porsche 356 should already be recognizing some of the ingredients.

The Beetle Had More Than One Father

Automotive history becomes less accurate when a famous automobile is reduced to one man sitting at a drafting table. Ferdinand Porsche was unquestionably the leader and driving force of the Volkswagen program, but the Volkswagen was the product of a highly talented engineering team. Chief engineer Karl Rabe was one of Porsche’s closest collaborators, while Josef Kales and Franz Xaver Reimspieß were heavily involved with engine development.

One of the most important figures was Erwin Komenda, who headed body development within Porsche’s organization. Komenda was instrumental in transforming the Volkswagen’s mechanical package into its recognizable aerodynamic form, and Porsche’s surviving project records show that he completed the first documented Type 60 body drawing on April 27, 1934. His name will become important again when we get to the Porsche 356.

It is also important to recognize that the Volkswagen did not develop in isolation. Similar small-car concepts were being explored elsewhere in Europe by engineers including Josef Ganz, Béla Barényi, and Tatra designer Hans Ledwinka. Tatra’s work in particular shared several technical and aerodynamic ideas with the Volkswagen, eventually resulting in patent disputes. The German Patent and Trademark Office has therefore described the Beetle as having “many fathers,” which is probably the most historically responsible way to view the car’s development.

Ferdinand Porsche nevertheless remained the central figure who assembled the engineering team, directed the development program, established the overall concept, and carried the project toward production. Rather than saying Ferdinand Porsche personally designed every component and every curve of the Beetle, it is more accurate to say that he led the team that created the Volkswagen.

From Type 60 to Beetle

The first Volkswagen sedan prototype was completed in 1936, and by 1938 the car’s familiar form had largely emerged. Its independent torsion-bar suspension, compact air-cooled engine, rear-engine layout, and relatively aerodynamic body were sophisticated solutions for an automobile intended to be inexpensive and accessible. World events then dramatically altered the Volkswagen story.

The Missing Link: Porsche Type 64

Look at photographs of the 1939 Porsche Type 64, sometimes referred to as the Berlin-Rome car, and the transition from Volkswagen to Porsche suddenly becomes easier to see. The Type 64 was developed for a planned long-distance event between Berlin and Rome and used Volkswagen-based mechanical components beneath an extremely streamlined aluminum body.

The race never took place because of the outbreak of World War II, but the automobile itself survived as an important developmental landmark. Porsche today regards the Type 64 as an ancestor of its later sports cars, and many of the aerodynamic ideas developed by Erwin Komenda for this car would reappear in the Porsche 356.

That makes the Type 64 an important piece of the story. Take the Volkswagen’s basic mechanical philosophy, lower the roof, reduce the frontal area, lighten the body, smooth the airflow, and begin asking the car to perform rather than merely provide transportation. The result starts to look remarkably like the direction Porsche would follow after the war.

The DNA was already beginning to evolve.

Ferdinand No. 2: Ferdinand “Ferry” Porsche and the 356

Ferdinand Porsche named his son Ferdinand Anton Ernst Porsche, although fortunately for generations of automotive historians he became universally known as Ferry Porsche. Ferry grew up surrounded by engineering and automobiles, joined his father’s company in 1931, and became increasingly involved in the firm’s design and testing work, including the Volkswagen program.

During World War II, Porsche’s engineering organization moved much of its operation from Stuttgart to Gmünd, Austria. After the war, Ferdinand Porsche was detained in France beginning in December 1945, leaving much of the company’s future in Ferry’s hands. Ferry and his sister, Louise Piëch, reorganized the business in Gmünd and began looking for a way forward.

Ferry wanted to build a sports car of his own. He later described his motivation with wonderful simplicity: he looked around for the sports car he wanted to buy, could not find it, and therefore decided to build it himself. That decision changed the Porsche name forever because, until that point, Porsche had primarily been an engineering company working for other manufacturers. Ferry’s new car would actually carry the Porsche name.

The 356 No. 1

Ferry’s sports-car project was assigned the engineering number 356, and the first complete automobile, the Porsche 356 “No. 1” Roadster, received its official operating permit on June 8, 1948. Porsche generally recognizes that date as the birth of the Porsche sports-car brand.

Ferry Porsche directed the project, but once again, the automobile was the work of a team. Engineer Karl Rabe remained deeply involved, while Erwin Komenda, who had previously helped shape the Volkswagen, was instrumental in developing the body of the 356. That provides one of the most direct human links between the Beetle and the first Porsche production sports car.

For the production 356/2, Porsche moved the engine behind the rear axle, establishing the configuration that would define both the production 356 and the later Porsche 911. Small-series manufacturing began in Gmünd during the latter part of 1948, and after Porsche returned to Stuttgart, steel-bodied production expanded beginning in 1950 with Reutter supplying the bodies.

The Porsche automobile company was officially underway.

Put the Beetle Beside the 356

This is where having our cars physically together becomes so powerful. Place our 1962 Volkswagen Beetle beside our 1965 Porsche 356 SC and temporarily forget that one carries a Volkswagen emblem and the other a Porsche crest. Instead, look strictly at the architecture and proportions.

The 356 almost looks as though someone took the essential Volkswagen concept and pulled it downward toward the pavement. The Porsche is lower, tighter, cleaner, more aerodynamic, and considerably more athletic, yet the visual connection remains remarkably apparent.

That resemblance is not coincidence. The earliest 356 automobiles relied directly on Volkswagen-derived mechanical components, and many of the engineers responsible for the Volkswagen were also involved in developing the Porsche sports car. The Beetle and the 356 are not twins, but they are unquestionably relatives.

The difference lies in purpose. The Volkswagen was intended to put ordinary families on the road efficiently and affordably, while the 356 took many of those same engineering principles and used them to make the road itself entertaining.

By this stage, the 356 had been refined for well over a decade, and Porsche had extracted an extraordinary amount of performance, reliability, and sophistication from Ferry Porsche’s original idea. Yet the basic platform was approaching the limits of what further development could realistically accomplish.

Porsche needed a new automobile that offered more space, more power, greater comfort, and greater development potential without abandoning the visual identity the company had spent more than a decade establishing.

The responsibility for helping create that automobile would fall to the third Ferdinand.

Ferdinand No. 3: Ferdinand Alexander Porsche and the 911

Ferry Porsche continued the family naming tradition with his eldest son, Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, commonly known as F. A. Porsche and, to many enthusiasts, “Butzi.” He was Ferdinand Porsche’s grandson and grew up in an environment where automotive engineering, industrial design, and motorsport were part of everyday family life.

F. A. joined Porsche’s design operation in the late 1950s, and while still in his twenties he began working on proposals for a successor to the aging 356. One of the important early projects was the Type 754 T7, which explored how Porsche could produce a roomier and more modern sports car without losing the fundamental appearance of the 356.

Ferry Porsche’s instructions reveal just how deliberately the company approached the problem. The new automobile needed more interior space, improved comfort, greater luggage capacity, and significantly more performance, but it should retain the recognizable Porsche line rather than becoming an entirely different kind of automobile.

That philosophy, evolution rather than revolution, would become one of the defining characteristics of Porsche design.

The early T7 proposals leaned closer to a true four-seat configuration than Ferry Porsche wanted, and the design gradually evolved toward a fastback 2+2. The project was eventually assigned the designation Type 901, and the new car made its public debut at the Frankfurt motor show in September 1963.

The exterior form was principally the work of Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, but the new car was far more than a styling exercise. Technically, the 901 represented a major advance over the 356. It featured a self-supporting body, more interior space, increased luggage capacity, substantially revised suspension, and an entirely new 2.0-liter air-cooled flat-six producing approximately 130 PS.

Put the 356 Beside the 911

The visual comparison between a 356 and an early 911 may be even more revealing than the comparison between a Beetle and a 356. Look at both cars from the front three-quarter view and the family connection is immediately apparent. The headlights remain perched high in the front fenders, while the hood stays low between those two fender peaks.

That continuity is one of the reasons the Porsche 911 has remained so recognizable for more than six decades. Each generation has been allowed to change technically and stylistically, but the essential identity has never been completely discarded.

And Then There Was the 912

The Porsche 912 may provide the perfect mechanical bridge between Ferry Porsche’s 356 and Ferdinand Alexander Porsche’s new 911 body. When Porsche replaced the 356 with the significantly more powerful and more expensive 911, the company recognized that it risked losing customers who appreciated the simpler, lighter, four-cylinder character of the 356.

The solution arrived in 1965 with the Porsche 912. At its simplest, the 912 combined the new 911 body designed under Ferdinand Alexander Porsche with a 1.6-liter air-cooled four-cylinder engine descended directly from the engine used in the 356 SC. In 912 form, the engine produced approximately 90 PS.

Historically, it would not be quite accurate to say that Ferdinand Alexander Porsche independently “designed the 912.” There was no uniquely styled 912 body; instead, the automobile used the 901/911 body form he had already created. In many ways, that makes the connection even more interesting because the 912 literally joined two generations of Porsche automobiles in one car: 356 powertrain ancestry inside the new 911 body.

Because our showroom contains a 1965 356 SC, we have the very model whose engine lineage continued directly into that first-generation 912. The 912 therefore becomes the mechanical handshake between the second and third Ferdinands.

From the Original 901 to Our 1973 Carrera RS Tribute

Our third showroom automobile takes the story to another remarkable point in Porsche’s development. The 1973 Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 sits near the end of the earliest generation of the 911 that began with Ferdinand Alexander Porsche’s original 901 design.

By 1973, the fundamental form had been developed far beyond the original 2.0-liter, 130 PS automobile. The Carrera RS 2.7 was created primarily as a homologation model for competition and used a 2.7-liter flat-six producing approximately 210 PS. The lightweight Sport version weighed roughly 960 kilograms, giving the automobile extraordinary performance for its era.

Porsche initially intended to produce only 500 examples to satisfy competition requirements, but customer demand ultimately pushed production to 1,580 cars. The model also introduced the Carrera name to the production 911, linking Porsche’s road cars to the company’s racing heritage.

Perhaps the most instantly recognizable element of the Carrera RS is its famous rear ducktail spoiler. That aerodynamic device was not part of Ferdinand Alexander Porsche’s original 911 design. It resulted from later wind-tunnel and aerodynamic development carried out by Porsche engineers as they worked to control lift and improve high-speed stability on an automobile that was becoming dramatically faster than the original 901.

That progression is important because it illustrates a Porsche philosophy that had existed from the beginning. The shape was never regarded as sacred simply because it was attractive. When engineering could improve the automobile, function was allowed to influence the form.

Three Cars. Three Ferdinands. One Idea.

Now return to the PMB Performance showroom and look again at our three cars: a 1962 Volkswagen Beetle, a 1965 Porsche 356 SC, and a 1973 Porsche 911 Carrera RS tribute. They represent different brands, different markets, and dramatically different levels of performance, yet when they are placed together, the evolutionary line becomes remarkably easy to see.

With the Volkswagen, Ferdinand Porsche and his engineering team developed an unconventional automobile in which packaging, simplicity, low weight, air cooling, rear-engine traction, and aerodynamic thinking played unusually important roles. With the 356, Ferdinand “Ferry” Porsche and his team took several of those same ideas and redirected them toward an entirely different purpose: creating a lightweight and entertaining sports car.

Ferdinand Alexander Porsche then inherited the 356 and faced a different challenge. Porsche needed a larger, faster, more sophisticated sports car, but it could not afford to lose the visual identity that had made the 356 unmistakably a Porsche. His solution became the 901 and, shortly thereafter, the 911.

That is why the connection between these automobiles goes much deeper than round headlights and curved rooflines. Put the Beetle beside the 356 and the relationship becomes visible. Put the 356 beside an early 911 and the progression becomes even clearer.

Then look at a modern Porsche 911. The engine is now water-cooled, the electronics would have seemed like science fiction to Ferdinand Porsche, and its performance would be almost unimaginable to Ferry. Yet the broad design language remains remarkably familiar: prominent front fenders, a low hood between them, the flowing roofline, the fastback rear, and the unusual proportions created by placing the engine behind the occupants.

Nearly ninety years after Porsche’s Type 60 Volkswagen project began taking shape, that line can still be followed.

From the Beetle to the 356. From the 356 to the 911. From grandfather to son to grandson.

Ferdinand, Ferdinand, Ferdinand.