early german photos

[strad]

Not the same..just similar.....

[djb]

Strad, many months ago, I asked about the 500cc cars and had some interesting responses, as well as a photo of a full bodied streamlined one.

Regarding the porsche-cisitalia. I know that pre-war there had been some front wheel drive cars, but was this car very unique in having 4 wheel drive for its time? Other than the Willys jeeps, I am not familiar with 4wd stuff, and especially not anything designed for the track.
Any ideas?

[Vitesse]

In 1933 Harry Miller built two 4-wd cars which were run at Indy by Gus Schrader and Ed McDonough. Neither finished, but in early 1934 one was brought across the Atlantic for Peter de Paolo to drive. At Tripoli it was a full nineteen seconds off the pace, but still finished sixth. It next appeared at AVUS - in the race which started this thread!! - and was running quite competitively when two con-rods let go and almost sawed the engine in two, right in front of the main stand. There is an oft-repeated story that bits of the engine flew into the stand, narrowly missing Hitler: one important detail is wrong though - Hitler wasn't actually there!

I'm not sure what happened to that car, but the other one continued to run at Indy until 1937 as the 4WD Special. Mauri Rose placed it fourth in 1936.

[Ray Bell]

Jeep? Jeep/

Did somebody mention Jeep?

Ray Mitchell, almost the winner of the 1947 Australian Grand Prix... strangely enough he was beaten by tyre wear:



Oh, it had a Ford V8 engine and drove only through the rear wheels.

But in Queensland there was a car built by Snow Sefton and raced at Strathpine and Lowood, it had front wheel drive, rear wheel drive or four wheel drive according to Snow's taste on the day, used the Ford V8 engine in a Jeep... I have a photo somewhere... but who knows where?

[djb]

Those 60's Indy turbine jobs were 4wd weren't they? When was it banned for Indy and F1 races?

[wheelie]

Can anyone tell me what kind of car is that?
http://www.pbase.com/image/955630

[TimD]

Good on yer, Ray. Great picture of a wild device. Thanks for that one. Puts me in mind of the thinking behind the old AJB-Steyr.

Wheelie, that link you've offered up is an Auto Union streamliner from about 1936/7. I haven't my Sheldon book close to hand, so I can't say who's driving it. It's presumably at Avus. Perhaps one of our experten can pin it down more closely than I can.

Good photo, too!

[Ray Bell]

I weakened... the Auto Union was identified as 1934 wasn't it?

[strad]

Wheelie;
You have caused me great consternation...I have this exact picture in one of my books (and I thought in my computer) and I'll be damned if I can find it.
Our experts echo my guess...Auto-Union @ AVUS...but I know I have more but can't find it...and thus you have driven me crazy, partly through realization of how disorganized my materials is.
I would wager that Leif knows exactly.

[Vitesse]

Strad, the reason you recognise it is because it's one of the pictures we started this thread with!!!

Wheelie - it is indeed an Auto Union, with special streamlined bodywork for high-speed circuits and record breaking. This is a C-type, chassis number 76006/42/24, being driven by the great Bernd Rosemeyer in the AVUSrennen on May 30th 1937. He finished second in his heat and fourth in the final.

[strad]

I know but I have the same photo somewhere around here with info....somewhere,,,he said looking at the mounds of material..

[stefan]

I'd be surprised if you have the photo - unless you're in my Grans' house

[strad]

The picture of the streamliner is out there...trust me.....

[strad]

I'm sorry, I think it must have been this similar pic from "The Power and the Glory"

[strad]

Jeeez, the print came out real small:
Avus banking: Luigi Fagioli at speed on the North Curve in a streamlined Auto Union May 1937.........

[oleksa]

As you can know,in 1931-1933 there was held GP in Lviv(now it's Ukraine and at that time it was under Poland).German teams also took part and Caraciolla won it twice IIRC.Besides,he said it was one of the most difficult tracks together with Monaco and Nurburgring.
Does anyone have photos of those GP?
P.S.Another variants of spelling the name of the city:Lvov(russian),Lemberg(german).

Thank you beforehand.

[oleksa]

I've forgotten one more variant of spelling:Lwow(polish)-the most probable.
The races were titled "Lemberg GP".
Winners:1931-H.Stuck(Mercedes-Benz)
1932-R.Caracciola(Alfa-Romeo)
1933-E.Bjornstad(Alfa-Romeo)

[wheelie]

Strad , sorry that i coused trouble and respect to all of you for your enormous knowledge about all those things. I was grown up in the 70's and thought that modern cars are state of the art but since i saw this pic i really have doubt about it...could it be that we gone backwards ?

[Vitesse]

Interesting thought wheelie. It's one of those what if questions which can never be answered properly. If the Auto Unions had raced on through the 1940s, I think most Grand Prix cars might have been rear-engined by 1945-50. Have a look at the pictures of the Sokol and the Cisitalia in another thread and seek out pictures of the unraced Alfa Romeo 512 and you'll see what I mean. It was 20 years before the Cooper rear-engined revolution happened - Grand Prix racing history would be very different I think!

[strad]

Very true Vitesse...very true........
But you must understand that those cars handled horribly
Dr Porsche had discovered independent suspension, but not yet how to make it work..

[Ray Bell]

It's said that the de Dion versions weren't that bad by the outbreak of the war...

[Ray Bell]

Additionally, there were some others who saw the benefit of rear engine location... here's one on the grid at Baskerville in Tasmania in the late fifties, a car that was built about 1952 in Melbourne, the Wylie Javelin.



The rear end included T-Model Ford parts, too...

[djb]

My, it really looks tiny doesn't it? A very good visual comparison beside the front engine car beside it for the height of the driver etc. The poor chap on the second row must have been really racing on a budget--no outer body shell.

[Vitesse]

Originally posted by strad
Very true Vitesse...very true........
But you must understand that those cars handled horribly
Dr Porsche had discovered independent suspension, but not yet how to make it work..

Indeed, and the Alfa was reputedly a dog as well! But Coopers had eight or nine years of experience with the rear-engined layout before they decided to take Formula 1 seruiously. Auto Union had only been racing for six years in 1939, although there is a direct link back to earlier Benz Tropfenwagen.

Experience and knowledge of the shortcomings of the Alfa were part of Enzo Ferrari's antipathy to rear-engined cars. He had access to the testing data and knew it wasn't even as fast as the 158/159 series. Once he had beaten the Alfettas with the 375 and they still didn't bring out the 512 he must have thought his theory about rear-engined cars was right.

And suspension was certainly a factor, but so too was tyre technology (or lack of it) - who knows, even in the absence of sticky compounds someone might have adapted the double-wheel idea that was so common in hillclimbs of the time. Auito Union and the rest had plenty of power available - what they lacked was the means to transmit it to the road effectively.

[strad]

""And suspension was certainly a factor, but so too was tyre technology (or lack of it) - who knows, even in the absence of sticky compounds someone might have adapted the double-wheel idea that was so common in hillclimbs of the time. Auito Union and the rest had plenty of power available - what they lacked was the means to transmit it to the road effectively."

Once again absolutely true...Man if they could have hooked up better.....