Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/02/20
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]<< Ferdinand Porsche was imprisoned after WW II and obviously could not take active part in constructing the first Porsche car - which was a mid engined prototype. 356 was styled by other long-time Porsche engineer Erwin Komenda. Mrs. Louise Piech was Ferry?s sister, Ferdinand Piech?s mother and owner of Porsche Salzburg. Butzi or Ferdinand Alexander Porsche is the designer and he designed the outward appearance of the 911 and the very beautiful 904. Ferdinand Piech was head of the Porsche racing department at the time of the tremendous 917 racers.>> I owned a Porsche 356 Super in 1958-59 and raced it in the SCCA 1500cc class in and around Ann Arbor, Michigan. The 356 was basically a factory built VW hot rod with a largely hand crafted body that looked like an upside down bathtub. It used many stock VW parts including the basic engine block. My car had 1500 cc finned aluminum cylinders with a chrome lining to resist wear and a roller bearing crankshaft. The engine mod ifications boosted the stock VWs measly 36 hp to nearly 100 very high strung horses. The car was wickedly fast around the haybales but had a prodigious oversteer. If you let your attention lapse for a split second you would find yourself going off the course, rear end first. As bad luck would have it, we blew the engine in the last race of the 1959 season. Repair would have cost far too much. The parts, especially the roller bearing crank, must have been made out of platinum. I replaced the engine with a stock VW power plant and used the car to tool around town. It still looked as good but the top speed was about 20 mph slower. I later added a Judson superchgarger to give it a little more oomph. Eventually I traded it in to get a used Jaguar 140XK - but that's another story. Larry Z