The Volkswagen Beetle :: essays research papers

The peoples gondola car &8211 generically, Volks pursuen in Ger gay &8211 is around as old as the automobile, and the type was familiar in Germany desire before the advent of the Volkswagen. Usually these popular cars were minimal cars, though size and simpleness did not necessarily bring them within the reach of the ordinary man in the street.Henry Ford did build a successful linguistic universal car, to sell at a low price, entirely his baffle T with its 2.9-litre engine was by no means a small car, nor was the Model A that followed it. When it was in production in the late 1920s, small proper cars in Germany ranged from the 700-cc DKW to the 1-litre Opel, with small Adlers, the BMW Dixi (a license-built Austin Seven) and the NSU-Fiats to come. These stimulated desire rather than a years wage for an average worker. This prompted motorcycle manufacturer Zundapp to commission a low-cost car creation from Dr. Ferdinand Porsches raw(a) design studio. The project did not get f ar, solely a Porsche-designed NSU that reached that prototype stage in 1933 accurately foreshadowed the Volkswagen.The estimate of a peoples car appealed to Porsche, and it fascinated Adolf Hitler. When the Nazi Party came to power in 1933, one of his pet notions was the concept of motoring for the masses, and a meeting with Porsche was to be a meeting of minds. Once again Porsche was commissioned to design a popular car, and when the first ludicrously tight financial limits were relaxed he certain the technical challenge.It is possible that Porsche received too much credit for the design of the Volkswagen, for most of the technical ele manpowerts had been seen before in the work of such men as Ledwinka, Rumpler, Rabe and Nibel. The Volkswagen reflected the Porsche Buros earlier designs, but it was to reach production and eventually accompany beyond the wildest limits of the Thirties dream.In 1931, the Porsche independent front suspension was patented. It provoke many manufactur es, and was to be important to the Volkswagen. It was devised around torsion interdict, not new as such, but in this arrangement the two transverse bars were housed in tubular cross members, with a lower trailing consociate at each end, and an upper link pivoted to the frame and combined with a friction shock absorber. This was lighter than the then-common transverse leaf spring arrangement, but it meant that the wheels rolled with the body.