VOLKSWAGEN Automobiles and Vans

VOLKSWAGEN cars – vans

VW

Volkswagen

“VW” redirects here. For other uses, see VW (disambiguation).

This article is about Volkswagen Passenger Cars. For the parent group, see Volkswagen Group. For Volkswagen vans, trucks and buses, see Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles. For the concept of a volk wagen, see People’s Car.

Volkswagen

Type	Marque
Industry	Automotive
Founded	28 May 1937; 81 years ago
Founder	German Labor Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront, DAF) Adolf Hitler
Headquarters	Wolfsburg, Germany
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Herbert Diess (Chairman of the Board of Management of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand)
Products	Automobiles Vans
Production output	6.073 million units (2016 annual report)
Revenue	€105.651 billion (2016 annual report)
Net income	€1.869 billion (2016 annual report)
Number of employees	626,715 (end of 2016)
Parent	Volkswagen Group
Website	volkswagen.com

Volk­swa­gen (Ger­man pro­nun­ci­a­tion: [ˈfɔlksˌvaːɡn̩] (lis­ten)), short­ened to VW, is a Ger­man au­tomaker founded on 28 May 1937 by the Ger­man Labour Front under Adolf Hitler and head­quar­tered in Wolfs­burg. It is the flag­ship mar­que of the Volk­swa­gen Group, the largest au­tomaker by world­wide sales in 2016.

Volk­swa­gen is Ger­man for “peo­ple’s car”, and the com­pany’s cur­rent in­ter­na­tional ad­ver­tis­ing slo­gan is just “Volkswagen”. Amer­i­can Eng­lish pro­nun­ci­a­tion is ap­prox­i­mately “volks wagon” (lis­ten(help·info)).

History

For vehicle timeline tables, see Volkswagen (timeline).

1932–1938: People’s Car project

Model of Porsche Type 12 (Zündapp), Museum of Industrial Culture, Nuremberg

Volk­swa­gen was orig­i­nally es­tab­lished in 1932 by the Ger­man Labour Front (Deutsche Ar­beits­front) in Berlin. In the early 1930s, the Ger­man auto in­dus­try was still largely com­posed of lux­ury mod­els, and the av­er­age Ger­man could rarely af­ford any­thing more than a mo­tor­cy­cle. As a re­sult, only one Ger­man out of 50 owned a car. Seek­ing a po­ten­tial new mar­ket, some car mak­ers began in­de­pen­dent “peo­ple’s car” pro­jects – the

Mer­cedes 170H,

Adler Au­to­Bahn,

Steyr 55, and

Hanomag 1.3L, among oth­ers.

The trend was not new, as Béla Barényi is cred­ited with hav­ing con­ceived the basic de­sign in the mid-1920s. Josef Ganz de­vel­oped the Stan­dard Su­pe­rior (going as far as ad­ver­tis­ing it as the “Ger­man Volk­swa­gen”). In Ger­many, the com­pany Hanomag mass-pro­duced the

2/10 PS “Kom­miss­brot”, a small, cheap rear en­gined car, from 1925 to 1928. Also, in Czecho­slo­va­kia, the Hans Led­winka‘s penned

Tatra T77, a very pop­u­lar car amongst the Ger­man elite, was be­com­ing smaller and more af­ford­able at each re­vi­sion. Fer­di­nand Porsche, a well-known de­signer for high-end ve­hi­cles and race cars, had been try­ing for years to get a man­u­fac­turer in­ter­ested in a small car suit­able for a fam­ily. He felt the small cars at the time were just stripped down big cars. In­stead he built a car he called the “Volk­sauto” from the ground up in 1933, using many of the ideas float­ing around at the time and sev­eral of his own, putting to­gether a car with an air-cooled rear en­gine, tor­sion bar sus­pen­sion, and a “bee­tle” shape, the front hood rounded for bet­ter aero­dy­nam­ics (nec­es­sary as it had a small engine).

VW logo during the 1930s, initials surrounded by a stylized cogwheel and swastika wings

Josef Ganz with his Standard Superior in 1935

In 1934, with many of the above pro­jects still in de­vel­op­ment or early stages of pro­duc­tion, Adolf Hitler be­came in­volved, or­der­ing the pro­duc­tion of a basic ve­hi­cle ca­pa­ble of trans­port­ing two adults and three chil­dren at 100 km/h (62 mph). He wanted all Ger­man cit­i­zens to have ac­cess to cars. The “Peo­ple’s Car” would be avail­able to cit­i­zens of the Third Reich through a sav­ings plan at 990 Re­ichs­mark ($396 in 1930s U.S. dol­lars)—about the price of a small mo­tor­cy­cle (the av­er­age in­come being around 32 RM a week).

1936 Volkswagen Beetle Type 60 V3 Prototype

De­spite heavy lob­by­ing in favor of one of the ex­ist­ing pro­jects, it soon be­came ap­par­ent that pri­vate in­dus­try could not turn out a car for only 990 RM. Thus, Hitler chose to spon­sor an all-new, state-owned fac­tory using Fer­di­nand Porsche’s de­sign (with some of Hitler’s de­sign con­straints, in­clud­ing an air-cooled en­gine so noth­ing could freeze). The in­ten­tion was that or­di­nary Ger­mans would buy the car by means of a sav­ings scheme (“Fünf Mark die Woche musst du spa­ren, willst du im ei­ge­nen Wagen fahren” – “Five marks a week you must put aside, if you want to drive your own car“), which around 336,000 peo­ple even­tu­ally paid into. How­ever, the en­tire pro­ject was fi­nan­cially un­sound, and only the Nazi party made it pos­si­ble to pro­vide funding.

Pro­to­types of the car called the “KdF-Wa­gen” (Ger­man: Kraft durch Freude – “Strength through Joy”), ap­peared from 1938 on­wards (the first cars had been pro­duced in Stuttgart). The car al­ready had its dis­tinc­tive round shape and air-cooled, flat-four, rear-mounted en­gine. The VW car was just one of many KdF pro­grams, which in­cluded things such as tours and out­ings. The pre­fix Volks— (“Peo­ple’s”) was not just ap­plied to cars, but also to other prod­ucts in Ger­many; the “Volk­sempfänger” radio re­ceiver for in­stance.

1937-5-28 Hitler and Ferdinand Porsche are looking at the prototype of VW Beetle on birthday VW

On 28 May 1937 The birthday of Volkswagen, Gesellschaft zur Vor­bere­itung des Deutschen Volk­swa­gens mbH (“Com­pany for the Prepa­ra­tion of the Ger­man Volk­swa­gen Ltd.”), or Gezu­vor for short, was es­tab­lished by the Deutsche Ar­beits­front in Berlin. More than a year later, on 16 Sep­tem­ber 1938, it was re­named to Volk­swa­gen­werk GmbH.

VW Type 82E

Erwin Komenda, the long­stand­ing Auto Union chief de­signer, part of Fer­di­nand Porsche’s hand-picked team, de­vel­oped the car body of

1939 vw proto 01

the pro­to­type, which was rec­og­niz­ably the Bee­tle known today. It was one of the first cars de­signed with the aid of a wind tun­nel—a method used for Ger­man air­craft de­sign since the early 1920s. The car de­signs were put through rig­or­ous tests, and achieved a record-break­ing mil­lion miles of test­ing be­fore being deemed fin­ished.

http://time.com/3877191/volkswagen-photos-from-the-wolfsburg-factory-1951/

The con­struc­tion of the new fac­tory started in May 1938 in the new town of “Stadt des KdF-Wa­gens” (mod­ern-day Wolfs­burg), which had been pur­pose-built for the fac­tory workers. This fac­tory had only pro­duced a hand­ful of cars by the time war started in 1939. None were ac­tu­ally de­liv­ered to any holder of the com­pleted sav­ing stamp books, though one Type 1 Cabri­o­let was pre­sented to Hitler on 20 April 1944 (his 55th birthday).

War changed pro­duc­tion to mil­i­tary ve­hi­cles—

the Type 82 Kübel­wa­gen (“Bucket car”) util­ity ve­hi­cle (VW’s most com­mon wartime model), and

the am­phibi­ous Schwimmwa­gen—man­u­fac­tured for Ger­man forces. As was com­mon with much of the pro­duc­tion in Nazi Ger­many dur­ing the war, slave labor was uti­lized in the Volk­swa­gen plant, e.g. from Ar­beits­dorf con­cen­tra­tion camp. The com­pany would admit in 1998 that it used 15,000 slaves dur­ing the war ef­fort. Ger­man his­to­ri­ans es­ti­mated that 80% of Volk­swa­gen’s wartime work­force was slave labor. Many of the slaves were re­ported to have been sup­plied from the con­cen­tra­tion camps upon re­quest from plant man­agers. A law­suit was filed in 1998 by sur­vivors for resti­tu­tion for the forced labor. Volk­swa­gen would set up a vol­un­tary resti­tu­tion fund.

Volkswagen factory

1945–1948: British Army intervention, unclear future

The com­pany owes its post-war ex­is­tence largely to one man, War-time British Army of­fi­cer Major Ivan Hirst, REME. In April 1945, KdF-Stadt and its heav­ily bombed fac­tory were cap­tured by the Amer­i­cans, and sub­se­quently handed over to the British, within whose oc­cu­pa­tion zone the town and fac­tory fell. The fac­to­ries were placed under the con­trol of Sad­dle­worth-born Hirst, by then a civil­ian Mil­i­tary Gov­er­nor with the oc­cu­py­ing forces. At first, one plan was to use it for mil­i­tary ve­hi­cle main­te­nance, and pos­si­bly dis­man­tle and ship it to Britain. Since it had been used for mil­i­tary pro­duc­tion, (though not of KdF-Wa­gens) and had been in Hirst’s words, a “po­lit­i­cal an­i­mal” rather than a com­mer­cial enterprise — tech­ni­cally mak­ing it li­able for de­struc­tion under the terms of the Pots­dam Agree­ment — the equip­ment could have been sal­vaged as war repa­ra­tions. Al­lied dis­man­tling pol­icy changed in late 1946 to mid-1947, though heavy in­dus­try con­tin­ued to be dis­man­tled until 1951.

One of the fac­tory’s War-time ‘KdF-Wa­gen’ cars had been taken to the fac­tory for re­pairs and aban­doned there. Hirst had it re­painted green and demon­strated it to British Army head­quar­ters. Short of light trans­port, in Sep­tem­ber 1945 the British Army was per­suaded to place a vital order for 20,000 cars. How­ever, pro­duc­tion fa­cil­i­ties had been mas­sively dis­rupted, there was a refugee cri­sis at and around the fac­tory and some parts (such as car­bu­re­tors) were un­avail­able. With strik­ing hu­man­ity and great en­gi­neer­ing and man­age­ment in­ge­nu­ity, Hirst and his Ger­man as­sis­tant Hein­rich Nord­hoff (who went on to run the Wolfs­burg fa­cil­ity after Mil­i­tary Gov­ern­ment ended in 1949) helped to sta­bi­lize the acute so­cial sit­u­a­tion while si­mul­ta­ne­ously re-es­tab­lish­ing pro­duc­tion. Hirst, for ex­am­ple, used his fine en­gi­neer­ing ex­pe­ri­ence to arrange the man­u­fac­ture of car­bu­re­tors, the orig­i­nal pro­duc­ers being ef­fec­tively ‘lost’ in the Russ­ian zone. The first few hun­dred cars went to per­son­nel from the oc­cu­py­ing forces, and to the Ger­man Post Of­fice. Some British Ser­vice per­son­nel were al­lowed to take their Bee­tles back to the United King­dom when they were de­mo­bilised.

In 1986, Hirst ex­plained how it was com­monly mis­un­der­stood that he had run Wolfs­burg as a British Army Major. The de­feated Ger­man staff, he said, were ini­tially sullen and un­re­spon­sive, hav­ing been con­di­tioned by many years of Nazism and they were some­times un­re­spon­sive to or­ders. At Nord­hoff’s sug­ges­tion, he sent back to Eng­land for his of­fi­cer’s uni­form and from then on, had no dif­fi­culty in hav­ing his in­struc­tions fol­lowed. Hirst can be seen pho­tographed at Wolfs­burg in his uni­form, al­though he was not ac­tu­ally a sol­dier at the time but a civil­ian mem­ber of the Mil­i­tary Gov­ern­ment. The title of ‘Major’ was some­times used by some­one who had left the Army as a cour­tesy title. In fact, Hirst chose not to do so.

The post-war In­dus­trial plans for Ger­many set out rules that gov­erned which in­dus­tries Ger­many was al­lowed to re­tain. These rules set Ger­man car pro­duc­tion at a max­i­mum of 10% of 1936 car production. By 1946, the fac­tory pro­duced 1,000 cars a month—a re­mark­able feat con­sid­er­ing it was still in dis­re­pair. Owing to roof and win­dow dam­age, pro­duc­tion had to stop when it rained, and the com­pany had to barter new ve­hi­cles for steel for production.

The car and its town changed their Sec­ond World War-era names to “Volk­swa­gen” and “Wolfs­burg” re­spec­tively, and pro­duc­tion in­creased. It was still un­clear what was to be­come of the fac­tory. It was of­fered to rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Amer­i­can, Aus­tralian, British, and French motor in­dus­tries. Fa­mously, all re­jected it. After an in­spec­tion of the plant, Sir William Rootes, head of the British Rootes Group, told Hirst the pro­ject would fail within two years, and that the car “…​is quite un­at­trac­tive to the av­er­age mo­tor­car buyer, is too ugly and too noisy … If you think you’re going to build cars in this place, you’re a bloody fool, young man.” The of­fi­cial re­port said “To build the car com­mer­cially would be a com­pletely un­eco­nomic enterprise.” In an ironic twist of fate, Volk­swa­gen man­u­fac­tured a lo­cally built ver­sion of Rootes’s Hill­man Avenger in Ar­gentina in the 1980s, long after Rootes had gone bank­rupt at the hands of Chrysler in 1978—the Bee­tle out­liv­ing the Avenger by over 30 years.

Ford rep­re­sen­ta­tives were equally crit­i­cal. In March 1948, the British of­fered the Volk­swa­gen com­pany to Ford, free of charge. Henry Ford II, the son of Edsel Ford, trav­eled to West Ger­many for dis­cus­sions. Heinz Nord­hoff was also pre­sent, and Ernest Breech, chair­man of the board for Ford Motor Com­pany. Henry Ford II looked to Ernest Breech for his opin­ion, and Breech said, “Mr. Ford, I don’t think what we’re being of­fered here is worth a dime!” Ford passed on the offer, leav­ing Volk­swa­gen to re­build it­self under Nord­hoff’s leadership.

1948–1961: Icon of post war West Germany

1949 Volkswagen “split rear window” Sedan

Volkswagen Cabriolet (1953)

Volkswagen Type 2 (T1)

An original 1300 Deluxe, circa 1966.

In the later 1960s, as worldwide appetite for the Beetle finally began to diminish, a variety of successor designs were proposed and, in most cases, rejected by management.

From 1948, Volk­swa­gen be­came an im­por­tant el­e­ment, sym­bol­i­cally and eco­nom­i­cally, of West Ger­man regeneration. Hein­rich Nord­hoff (1899–1968), a for­mer se­nior man­ager at Opel who had over­seen civil­ian and mil­i­tary ve­hi­cle pro­duc­tion in the 1930s and 1940s, was re­cruited to run the fac­tory in 1948. In 1949, Major Hirst left the com­pany—now re-formed as a trust con­trolled by the West Ger­man gov­ern­ment and gov­ern­ment of the State of Lower Sax­ony. The “Bee­tle” sedan or “peo­ples’ car” Volk­swa­gen is the Type 1. Apart from the in­tro­duc­tion of

the Volk­swa­gen Type 2com­mer­cial ve­hi­cle (van, pick-up and camper), and

the VW Kar­mann Ghia sports car, Nord­hoff pur­sued the one-model pol­icy until shortly be­fore his death in 1968.

Volk­swa­gens were first ex­hib­ited and sold in the United States in 1949, but sold only two units in Amer­ica that first year. On entry to the U.S. mar­ket, the VW was briefly sold as a Vic­tory Wagon. Volk­swa­gen of Amer­ica was formed in April 1955 to stan­dard­ise sales and ser­vice in the United States. Pro­duc­tion of the Type 1 Volk­swa­gen Bee­tle in­creased dra­mat­i­cally over the years, the total reach­ing one mil­lion in 1955.

The UK’s first of­fi­cial Volk­swa­gen Im­porter, Col­borne Garages of Rip­ley, Sur­rey, started with parts for the mod­els brought home by sol­diers re­turn­ing from Germany.

Cana­dian Mo­tors, Lim­ited brought in Canada’s first ship­ment of Volk­swa­gens on 10 July 1952 (ship­ping order 143075). The order con­sisted of 12 ve­hi­cles, (3) model 11C, a black, green, and sand­color (3) 11GS, a chest­nut brown and two azure blue, (2) 24A-M51 in red, (1)21A in blue, (1) 23A in blue, (1) 22A beige color, and one ambulance. Volk­swa­gens were seen in Canada for the first time at the Cana­dian Na­tional Ex­hi­bi­tion in Au­gust 1952 and were ac­cepted en­thu­si­as­ti­cally. (At least one Type 2 bus from this order still ex­ists, and is cur­rently in France un­der­go­ing restoration). The first ship­ment for Volk­swa­gen Canada reached Toronto in early De­cem­ber 1952. (At least one Type 1 from this first ship­ment still ex­ists, and was dri­ven on a na­tion­wide tour for Volk­swa­gen Canada’s 60th year of busi­ness fes­tiv­i­ties in 2012).

By 1955, sales were on a basis that war­ranted the build­ing of the Volk­swa­gen plant on a 32-acre (130,000 m²) site on Scar­boro’s Golden Mile. To this, a 60,000-square-foot (5,600 m²) build­ing with ad­min­is­tra­tion, show­rooms, ser­vice, re­pairs and parts was built in 1957, with stor­age for $4,000,000 of parts.

In 1959, VW started pro­duc­tion at a plant near São Paulo in Brazil. Volk­swa­gen do Brasil was ac­cused of spy­ing on work­ers dur­ing the time of the mil­i­tary dic­ta­tor­ship in the 1970´s and in­form­ing po­lice on op­po­si­tional ac­tiv­i­ties. In 1976, mass ar­rests oc­curred and some VW em­ploy­ees were tor­tured. In 1979, Brazil­ian VW work­ers trav­eled to Wolfs­burg to in­form the CEO in per­son. In 2015, ac­tivists and for­mer VW em­ploy­ees in Brazil spoke out in pub­lic ac­cused the com­pany´s si­lence about per­se­cu­tion of its work­ers. In fall 2016, VW com­mis­sioned an ex­pert re­view of the sit­u­a­tion due end of 2017.

On 22 Au­gust 1960, Volk­swa­gen­werk GmbH was re­named to Volk­swa­gen­werk AG.

Sales soared, through­out the 1960s, peak­ing at the end of the decade, thanks in part to the fa­mous ad­ver­tis­ing cam­paigns by New York ad­ver­tis­ing agency Doyle, Dane Bern­bach. Led by art di­rec­tor Hel­mut Krone, and copy­writ­ers Ju­lian Koenig and Bob Levin­son, Volk­swa­gen ad­ver­tise­ments became as pop­u­lar as the car, using crisp lay­outs and witty copy to lure the younger, so­phis­ti­cated con­sumers with whom the car be­came associated. Even though it was al­most uni­ver­sally known as the Bee­tle (or the Bug), it was never of­fi­cially la­belled as such by the man­u­fac­turer, in­stead re­ferred to as the Type 1.

Al­though the car was be­com­ing out­dated, dur­ing the 1960s and early 1970s, Amer­i­can ex­ports, in­no­v­a­tive ad­ver­tis­ing, and a grow­ing rep­u­ta­tion for re­li­a­bil­ity helped pro­duc­tion fig­ures sur­pass the lev­els of the pre­vi­ous record holder, the Ford Model T. On 17 Feb­ru­ary 1972 the 15,007,034th Bee­tle was sold. Volk­swa­gen could now claim the world pro­duc­tion record for the most-pro­duced, sin­gle make of car in his­tory. By 1973, total pro­duc­tion was over 16 mil­lion.

To com­mem­o­rate its pass­ing the Ford Model T’s record sales mark and its vic­to­ries in the Baja 1000 Mex­i­can races from 1967 to 1971, Volk­swa­gen pro­duced its first lim­ited-edi­tion Bee­tle. It was mar­keted as the “Baja Cham­pion SE” in the United States and the “Marathon” Su­per­bee­tle in the rest of the world. It fea­tured unique “Marathon Blau” metal­lic blue paint, steel-pressed 10-spoke 15-inch (38 cm) mag­ne­sium-al­loy wheels, a com­mem­o­ra­tive metal plate mounted on the glove­box and a cer­tifi­cate of au­then­tic­ity pre­sented to the orig­i­nal pur­chaser. Dealer-in­stalled op­tions for this lim­ited-edi­tion Su­per­bee­tle in­cluded the fol­low­ing: white stripes run­ning the length of the rocker-panel, a spe­cial shifter knob, bumper over­rid­ers, ta­pered ex­haust tips, fake wal­nut in­serts in the dash­board (be­hind the steer­ing wheel and the glove­box cover) as well as Bosch fog lights mounted on the front bumper.

1961–1973: Beetle to Golf

A 1963 VW Type 3 Notchback

The 1961 Type 1 Bee­tle had a 36 hp 1200cc four cylin­der air-cooled flat-four op­posed OHV en­gine made of alu­minum alloy block and heads. By 1966, the Type 1 came with a 1300 en­gine. By 1967 the Type 1 had a 1500 en­gine, and 1600 in 1970. The air-cooled en­gine lost favor in the USA mar­ket with the ad­vent of non-leaded gaso­line and smog con­trols. These air-cooled en­gines were com­monly tuned to be fuel rich in order to con­trol en­gine over-heat­ing, and this led to ex­ces­sive car­bon monox­ide emis­sions. VW Pro­duc­tion equip­ment was even­tu­ally moved to Mex­ico where ve­hi­cle emis­sions were not reg­u­lated. Bee­tles were pop­u­lar on the USA West Coast where the lim­ited-ca­pac­ity cabin heat­ing was less in­con­ve­nient. Bee­tles were pop­u­lar­ized on the USA West Coast as beach bug­gies and dune bug­gies.

VW ex­panded its prod­uct line in 1961 with the in­tro­duc­tion of four Type 3 mod­els (Kar­mann Ghia, Notch­back, Fast­back, and Vari­ant) based on the new Type 3 me­chan­i­cal un­der­pin­nings. The name ‘Square­back’ was used in the U.S.A for the Vari­ant.

In 1969 the larger Type 4 (411 and 412) mod­els were in­tro­duced. These dif­fered sub­stan­tially from pre­vi­ous ve­hi­cles, with the no­table in­tro­duc­tion of mono­coque/uni­body con­struc­tion, the op­tion of a fully au­to­matic trans­mis­sion, elec­tronic fuel in­jec­tion, and a stur­dier pow­er­plant.

Volk­swa­gen added a “Super Beetle” (the Type 131) to its lineup in 1971. The Type 131 dif­fered from the stan­dard Bee­tle in its use of a MacPher­son strut front sus­pen­sion in­stead of the usual tor­sion bars. The Super Bee­tle fea­tured a new hooded, padded dash and curved wind­shield (from 1973 model year on up). Rack and pin­ion steer­ing re­placed re­cir­cu­lat­ing ball steer­ing gears in model year 1975 and up. The front of the car was stretched 2 inches (51 mm) to allow the spare tire to lie flat, and the com­bi­na­tion of these two fea­tures in­creased the us­able front lug­gage space.

In 1973, Volk­swa­gen in­tro­duced the mil­i­tary-themed Type 181, or “Trekker” in Eu­rope, “Thing” in Amer­ica, re­call­ing the wartime Type 82. The mil­i­tary ver­sion was pro­duced for the NATO-era Ger­man Army dur­ing the Cold War years of 1970 to 1979. The U.S. Thing ver­sion only sold for two years, 1973 and 1974.

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage 412

Volkswagen Type 4 assembly line in Wolfsburg as of 1973

1969 VW Squareback (Type III)

In 1964, Volk­swa­gen ac­quired Auto Union, and in 1969, NSU Mo­toren­werke AG (NSU). The for­mer com­pany owned the his­toric Audi brand, which had dis­ap­peared after the Sec­ond World War. VW ul­ti­mately merged Auto Union and NSU to cre­ate the mod­ern Audi com­pany, and would go on to de­velop it as its lux­ury ve­hi­cle mar­que. The pur­chase of Auto Union and NSU was a piv­otal point in Volk­swa­gen’s his­tory, as both com­pa­nies yielded the tech­no­log­i­cal ex­per­tise that proved nec­es­sary for VW to sur­vive when de­mand for its air-cooled mod­els went into de­cline.

By late 1972, Volk­swa­gen had de­cided to can­cel the nearly fin­ished typ 266, a pro­ject for a mid-en­gined car to re­place the Bee­tle, and to focus on front-wheel-drive, wa­ter-cooled cars. Rudolf Lei­d­ing, re­cently made head of Volk­swa­gen, cited noise, heat, and ser­vic­ing prob­lems with the mid-en­gine lay­out, as well as the dif­fi­culty of mak­ing it a sta­tion wagon.

Volkswagen Passat (1973–1977 model)

Volk­swa­gen was in se­ri­ous trou­ble by 1973. The Type 3 and Type 4 mod­els had sold in much smaller num­bers than the Bee­tle and the NSU-based K70 also failed to woo buy­ers. Bee­tle sales had started to de­cline rapidly in Eu­ro­pean and North Amer­i­can mar­kets. The com­pany knew that Bee­tle pro­duc­tion had to end, but faced a co­nun­drum of how to re­place it. VW’s own­er­ship of Audi/Auto Union proved ben­e­fi­cial. Its ex­per­tise in front-wheel drive, and wa­ter-cooled en­gines would help Volk­swa­gen pro­duce a cred­i­ble Bee­tle suc­ces­sor. Audi in­flu­ences paved the way for this new gen­er­a­tion of Volk­swa­gens: the Pas­sat, Scirocco, Golf, and Polo.

First in the se­ries was the Volk­swa­gen Pas­sat (Dasher in the US), in­tro­duced in 1973, a fast­back ver­sion of the Audi 80, using many iden­ti­cal body and me­chan­i­cal parts. Es­tate/wagon ver­sions were avail­able in many mar­kets. In Eu­rope, the es­tate/wagon ver­sion dom­i­nated in mar­ket share for many years.

In spring 1974, the Scirocco fol­lowed. The coupe was de­signed by Gior­getto Giu­giaro. Based on the plat­form of the not yet re­leased Golf, it was built at Kar­mann due to ca­pac­ity con­straints at Volk­swa­gen.

The piv­otal model emerged as the Volk­swa­gen Golf in 1974, mar­keted in the United States and Canada as the Rab­bit for the 1st gen­er­a­tion (1975–1985) and 5th gen­er­a­tion (2006–2009). Its an­gu­lar styling was de­signed by the Ital­ian Gior­getto Giu­giaro). Its de­sign fol­lowed trends for small fam­ily cars set by the 1959 Mini – the Golf had a trans­versely mounted, wa­ter-cooled en­gine in the front, dri­ving the front wheels, and had a hatch­back, a for­mat that has dom­i­nated the mar­ket seg­ment ever since. Bee­tle pro­duc­tion at Wolfs­burg ended upon the Golf’s in­tro­duc­tion. It con­tin­ued in smaller num­bers at other Ger­man fac­to­ries (Hanover and Emden) until 1978, but main­stream pro­duc­tion shifted to Brazil and Mex­ico.

In 1975, the Volk­swa­gen Polo fol­lowed. It was a re-badged Audi 50, which was soon dis­con­tin­ued in 1978. The Polo be­came the base of

the Volk­swa­gen Derby, which was in­tro­duced 1977. The Derby was for all in­tents and pur­poses a three-box de­sign of the Polo. After a sec­ond model gen­er­a­tion, the Derby was dis­con­tin­ued in 1985, al­though the bodystyle lived on in the form of the polo clas­sic/polo sa­loon until 1991.

Pas­sat, Scirocco, Golf, and Polo shared many char­ac­ter defin­ing fea­tures, as well as parts and en­gines. They built the basis for Volk­swa­gen’s turn-around.

1974–1990: Product line expansion

Volkswagen Polo (1975–1979 model)

While Volk­swa­gen’s range of cars soon be­came sim­i­lar to that of other large Eu­ro­pean au­tomak­ers, the Golf has been the main­stay of the Volk­swa­gen lineup since its introduction, and the me­chan­i­cal basis for sev­eral other cars of the com­pany. There have been seven gen­er­a­tions of the Volk­swa­gen Golf, the first of which was pro­duced from the sum­mer of 1974 until the au­tumn of 1983 (sold as the Rab­bit in the United States and Canada and as the Caribe in Latin Amer­ica). Its chas­sis also spawned the Volk­swa­gen Scirocco sport coupe, Volk­swa­gen Jetta sa­loon/sedan, Volk­swa­gen Golf Cabri­o­let con­vert­ible, and Volk­swa­gen Caddy pick-up. North Amer­i­can pro­duc­tion of the Rab­bit com­menced at the Volk­swa­gen West­more­land As­sem­bly Plant near New Stan­ton, Penn­syl­va­nia in 1978. It would be pro­duced in the United States as the Rab­bit until the spring of 1984.The sec­ond-gen­er­a­tion Golf hatch­back/Jetta sedan ran from Oc­to­ber 1983 until the au­tumn of 1991, and a North Amer­i­can ver­sion pro­duced at West­more­land As­sem­bly went on sale at the start of the 1985 model year. The pro­duc­tion num­bers of the first-gen­er­a­tion Golf has con­tin­ued to grow an­nu­ally in South Africa as

the Citi Golf, with only minor mod­i­fi­ca­tions to the in­te­rior, en­gine and chas­sis, using tool­ing re­lo­cated from the New Stan­ton, Penn­syl­va­nia plant when that site began to build the Sec­ond Gen­er­a­tion car.

In the 1980s, Volk­swa­gen’s sales in the United States and Canada fell dra­mat­i­cally, de­spite the suc­cess of mod­els like the Golf else­where. The Japan­ese and the Amer­i­cans were able to com­pete with sim­i­lar prod­ucts at lower prices. Sales in the United States were 293,595 in 1980, but by 1984 they were down to 177,709. The in­tro­duc­tion of the sec­ond-gen­er­a­tion Golf, GTI and Jetta mod­els helped Volk­swa­gen briefly in North Amer­ica. Motor Trend named the GTI its Car of the Year for 1985, and Volk­swa­gen rose in the J.D. Power buyer sat­is­fac­tion rat­ings to eighth place in 1985, up from 22nd a year earlier. VW’s Amer­i­can sales broke 200,000 in 1985 and 1986 be­fore re­sum­ing the down­ward trend from ear­lier in the decade. Chair­man Carl Hahn de­cided to ex­pand the com­pany else­where (mostly in de­vel­op­ing coun­tries), and the New Stan­ton, Penn­syl­va­nia fac­tory closed on 14 July 1988. Mean­while, four years after sign­ing a co­op­er­a­tion agree­ment with the Span­ish car maker SEAT in 1982, Hahn ex­panded the com­pany by pur­chas­ing a ma­jor­ity share of SEAT up to 75% by the end of 1986, which VW bought out­right in 1990. On 4 July 1985, Volk­swa­gen­werk AG was re­named to Volk­swa­gen AG.

Volk­swa­gen en­tered the su­per­mini mar­ket in 1975 with the Volk­swa­gen Polo, a styl­ish and spa­cious three-door hatch­back de­signed by Bertone. It was a strong seller in West Ger­many and most of the rest of West­ern Eu­rope, being one of the first for­eign small cars to prove pop­u­lar in Britain. It had started out in 1974 as the Audi 50, which was only avail­able in cer­tain mar­kets and was less pop­u­lar. The Polo en­tered a mar­ket sec­tor al­ready being dom­i­nated by the Fiat 127 and Re­nault 5, and which be­fore long would also in­clude the Austin Metro and Ford Fi­esta.

In 1981, the sec­ond-gen­er­a­tion Polo launched and sold as a hatch­back and “coupe” (with the hatch­back re­sem­bling a small es­tate car and the coupe being sim­i­lar to a con­ven­tional hatch­back), was an even greater suc­cess for Volkswagen. Its prac­ti­cal­ity, de­spite the lack of a five-door ver­sion, helped en­sure even stronger sales than its pre­de­ces­sor, and it con­tin­ued to sell well after a makeover in 1990, fi­nally being re­placed by an all-new ver­sion in 1994. Also ar­riv­ing in 1981 were the sec­ond gen­er­a­tion of the larger Pas­sat and a sec­ond gen­er­a­tion of the Volk­swa­gen Scirocco coupe. The orig­i­nal Scirocco had been launched in 1974 to com­pete with af­ford­able four-seater coupes like the Ford Capri.

In 1983 the MK2 Golf was launched. At the be­gin­ning of 1988, the third gen­er­a­tion Pas­sat was the next major car launch and Volk­swa­gen did not pro­duce a hatch­back ver­sion of this Pas­sat, de­spite the ris­ing pop­u­lar­ity of the hatch­back bodystyle through­out Eu­rope. Just after launch­ing the B3 Pas­sat, Volk­swa­gen launched the Cor­rado, re­place­ment for the Scirocco, al­though the Scirocco re­mained in pro­duc­tion until 1992.

1991–1999

Volkswagen Golf, in North American form

In 1991, Volk­swa­gen launched the third-gen­er­a­tion Golf, which was Eu­ro­pean Car of the Year for 1992. The Golf Mk3 and Jetta ar­rived in North Amer­ica in 1993. The sedan ver­sion of the Golf was badged Vento in Eu­rope, but re­mained Jetta in the U.S. The Scirocco and the later Cor­rado were both Golf-based coupés.

The Volkswagen New Beetle

In 1994, Volk­swa­gen un­veiled the J Mays-de­signed Con­cept One, a “retro”-themed con­cept car with a re­sem­blance to the orig­i­nal Bee­tle, based on the plat­form of the Polo. Due to a pos­i­tive re­sponse to the con­cept, a pro­duc­tion ver­sion was de­vel­oped as the New Bee­tle, based on the Golf’s larger platform.

In 1995 the Sha­ran was launched in Eu­rope, the re­sult of a joint ven­ture with Ford, which also re­sulted in the Ford Galaxy and SEAT Al­ham­bra.

The com­pany’s evo­lu­tion of its model range was con­tin­ued with the Golf Mk4, in­tro­duced at the end of 1997 (and in North Amer­ica in 1999), its chas­sis spawned a host of other cars within the Volk­swa­gen Group; the Volk­swa­gen Bora (the sedan called Jetta in the U.S.), SEAT Toledo, SEAT León, Audi A3, Audi TT, and Škoda Oc­tavia. Other main mod­els dur­ing the decade in­clude the Polo, a smaller car than the Golf, and the larger Pas­sat for the seg­ment above the Golf.

In 1998 the com­pany launched the new Lupo city car. In 1999 they an­nounced the first “3-litre” car, a light­weight ver­sion of the Lupo that could travel 100 km with only 3-litres of diesel—mak­ing it the world’s most fuel ef­fi­cient car at the time.

2000–present: Further expansion

The fifth generation Volkswagen Jetta

Volk­swa­gen began in­tro­duc­ing an array of new mod­els after Bernd Pis­chet­srieder be­came Volk­swa­gen Group CEO (re­spon­si­ble for all Group brands) in 2002. The sixth-gen­er­a­tion VW Golf was launched in 2008, came run­ner-up to the Opel/Vaux­hall In­signia in the 2009 Eu­ro­pean Car of the Year, and has spawned sev­eral cousins: VW Jetta, VW Scirocco, SEAT León, SEAT Toledo, Škoda Oc­tavia and Audi A3 hatch­back ranges, as well as a new mini-MPV, the SEAT Altea. The GTI, a “hot hatch” per­for­mance ver­sion of the Golf, boasts a 2.0 L Tur­bocharged Fuel Strat­i­fied In­jec­tion (FSI) di­rect in­jec­tion en­gine. VW began mar­ket­ing the Golf under the Rab­bit name once again in the U.S. and Canada in 2006.

The sixth-gen­er­a­tion Pas­sat and the fifth-gen­er­a­tion Jetta both de­buted in 2005, and VW an­nounced plans to ex­pand its lineup fur­ther by bring­ing back the Scirocco by 2008. Other mod­els in Wolf­gang Bern­hard‘s (Volk­swa­gen brand CEO) “prod­uct of­fen­sive” in­clude the Tiguan mid-sized SUV in 2008 and a Pas­sat Coupé. In No­vem­ber 2006 Bernd Pis­chet­srieder an­nounced his res­ig­na­tion as Volk­swa­gen Group CEO, and was re­placed by Audi world­wide CEO Mar­tin Win­terkorn at the be­gin­ning of 2007.

The third generation Volkswagen Scirocco

Volk­swa­gen in 2005 main­tained North Amer­i­can sales of 224,195. Mo­men­tum con­tin­ued for fis­cal 2006, as VW’s North Amer­i­can sales for the year were 235,140 ve­hi­cles, a 4.9 per­cent in­crease over 2005, de­spite a slump in do­mes­tic North Amer­i­can man­u­fac­turer’s sales. In con­junc­tion with the in­tro­duc­tion of new mod­els, pro­duc­tion lo­ca­tion of Volk­swa­gen ve­hi­cles also un­der­went great change. The 2007 Eos, a hard­top con­vert­ible, is pro­duced in a new fa­cil­ity in Por­tu­gal. All Golfs/Rab­bits and GTIs as of 2006 are man­u­fac­tured in Wolfs­burg, Ger­many, rather than VW’s Mex­i­can fac­tory in Puebla, where Golfs and GTIs for the North Amer­i­can mar­ket were pro­duced from 1989 to 1998, and the Brazil­ian fac­tory in Cu­ritiba, where Golfs and GTIs were pro­duced from 1999 to 2006 (the Jetta has pri­mar­ily been made in Mex­ico since 1989). VW is also in the process of re­con­fig­ur­ing an au­to­mo­tive as­sem­bly plant in Bel­gium. The new mod­els and in­vest­ments in man­u­fac­tur­ing im­prove­ments were no­ticed im­me­di­ately by au­to­mo­tive crit­ics. Fa­vor­able re­views for VW’s newest cars in­clude the GTI being named by Con­sumer Re­ports as the top sporty car under $25,000, one of Car and Dri­ver mag­a­zine’s “10 Best” for 2007, Au­to­mo­bile Mag­a­zine’s 2007 Car of the Year, as well as a 2008 Motor Trend com­par­i­son rank­ing the mid-size Pas­sat first in its class.

The seventh generation Volkswagen Golf

Volk­swa­gen part­nered with Daim­ler AG and other com­pa­nies to mar­ket the BlueTec clean dieseltech­nol­ogy on cars and trucks from Mer­cedes-Benz, Volk­swa­gen, and other com­pa­nies and brands. Ac­cord­ing to the United States En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency, four of the ten most fuel-ef­fi­cient ve­hi­cles avail­able for sale in the U.S. are pow­ered by Volk­swa­gen diesel engines. Volk­swa­gen has of­fered a num­ber of its ve­hi­cles with a TDI (Tur­bocharged Di­rect In­jec­tion) en­gine, which lends class-lead­ing fuel econ­omy to sev­eral mod­els. They were a three-way tie for 8th (TDI Bee­tle, TDI Golf, TDI Jetta) and ninth, the TDI Jetta Wagon. In ad­di­tion, all Volk­swa­gen TDI diesel en­gines pro­duced from 1996 to 2006 can be dri­ven on 100% biodiesel fuel. For the 2007 model year, how­ever, strict U.S. gov­ern­ment emis­sions reg­u­la­tions have forced VW to drop most diesels from their U.S. en­gine lineup, but a new lineup of diesel en­gines com­pat­i­ble to U.S. stan­dards re­turned to the Amer­i­can mar­ket start­ing with Model Year 2009. These post-2009 Clean Diesel en­gines are lim­ited to run­ning on 5% (B5) biodiesel only to main­tain Volk­swa­gen’s war­ranty. Volk­swa­gen long re­sisted adding a SUV to its lineup, but re­lented with the in­tro­duc­tion of

the Touareg, made in part­ner­ship with Porsche, while they worked on the Porsche Cayenne and later the Audi Q7. Though ac­claimed as a fine han­dling ve­hi­cle, the Touareg has been a mod­est seller at best, and it has been crit­i­cised by auto re­view­ers for its ab­sence of a third-row seat, the rel­a­tively poor fuel econ­omy, and the high ve­hi­cle mass. VW set plans to add a com­pact SUV with styling in­flu­ences from the “Con­cept A” con­cept ve­hi­cle in­tro­duced at the 2006 Geneva Auto Show, and on 20 July 2006, VW an­nounced that the new ve­hi­cle, called

the Tiguan.

Since the dis­con­tin­u­ance of the T4 in 2003 and de­ci­sion not to bring the T5 to the US mar­ket, Volk­swa­gen, iron­i­cally, lacked a van in its North Amer­i­can lineup. To change this, Volk­swa­gen launched the Volk­swa­gen Routan, a badge-en­gi­neered Dodge Grand Car­a­van made for the Amer­i­can and Cana­dian mar­kets, in 2008.

In Sep­tem­ber 2006, Volk­swa­gen began of­fer­ing the City Golf and City Jetta only for the Cana­dian mar­ket. Both mod­els were orig­i­nally the Mk4 Golf and Jetta but were later re­placed with the Brazil­ian ver­sions of the Golf Mk4 and Bora. Volk­swa­gen’s in­tro­duc­tion of such mod­els is seen as a test of the mar­ket for a sub­com­pact and, if suc­cess­ful, may be the be­gin­nings of a thriv­ing sub­com­pact mar­ket for Volk­swa­gen.

The Volkswagen Passat (3C)

In May 2011, Volk­swa­gen com­pleted Chat­tanooga As­sem­bly in the US state of Ten­nessee. The fa­cil­ity has pro­duced Volk­swa­gen cars and SUVs specif­i­cally de­signed for North Amer­i­can mar­kets, be­gin­ning with the Pas­sat B7 in 2011. The com­pany re­cently an­nounced plans to ex­pand fur­ther by in­vest­ing $900 mil­lion to add floor space to the factory.

The VW XL1 began a lim­ited pro­duc­tion run in 2013. The XL1 is a light­weight and fuel ef­fi­cient two-per­son ve­hi­cle (only 795 kg).

The Volk­swa­gen Atlas (a large crossover SUV) be­gins pro­duc­tion in late 2016, and aims to help end sev­eral years of losses for Volk­swa­gen in the US, the world’s sec­ond-largest auto market.

On 14 Sep­tem­ber 2016, Volk­swa­gen an­nounced its part­ner­ship with three Is­raeli cy­ber­se­cu­rity ex­perts to cre­ate a new com­pany, Cy­mo­tive, ded­i­cated to au­to­mo­tive security.

VW calls their shift to­wards elec­tric ve­hi­cles “Trans­form 2025+”. As part of the strat­egy, VW aims to launch more than 30 elec­tric ve­hi­cles until 2025, and is an­tic­i­pat­ing yearly sales of 2 to 3 mil­lion elec­tric VW cars by 2025, which would make up 20 to 25 per­cent of their total yearly sales volume. In Sep­tem­ber 2017, CEO Matthias Mueller an­nounced plans to have elec­tric ver­sion of all of VW’s 300 au­to­mo­tive mod­els by 2030. The com­pany vows to spend 20 bil­lion euros by 2030 to roll out the cars and des­ig­nated an­other 50 bil­lion euros to buy the bat­ter­ies needed to power the vehicles.

In April 2018, Volk­swa­gen has fi­nally whipped the cov­ers of its first all-elec­tric race car, the I.D. R Pikes Peak, which has been built to con­quer the road race of the same name. The I.D. R Pikes Peak was un­veiled in Alès, France, and should be ready to roll in two short months. It will be pow­ered by twin en­gines, though this time around they’ll be strictly elec­tric. With a lithium-ion bat­tery sys­tem on board, the car gen­er­ates 680 hp and 479 lb-ft of torque.

Operations

Volk­swa­gen is the found­ing and name­sake mem­ber of the Volk­swa­gen Group, a large in­ter­na­tional cor­po­ra­tion in charge of mul­ti­ple car and truck brands, in­clud­ing Audi, SEAT, Porsche, Lam­borgh­ini, Bent­ley, Bugatti, Sca­nia, MAN, and Škoda. Volk­swa­gen Group’s global head­quar­ters are lo­cated in Volk­swa­gen’s his­toric home of Wolfs­burg, Germany.

Volk­swa­gen Group, as a unit, is Eu­rope’s largest automaker. For a long time, Volk­swa­gen has had a mar­ket share over 20 percent.

In 2010, Volk­swa­gen posted record sales of 6.29 mil­lion ve­hi­cles, with its global mar­ket share at 11.4%. In 2008, Volk­swa­gen be­came the third largest au­tomaker in the world, and, as of 2012, Volk­swa­gen is the sec­ond largest man­u­fac­turer worldwide. Volk­swa­gen has aimed to dou­ble its US mar­ket share from 2% to 4% in 2014, and is aim­ing to be­come, sus­tain­ably, the world’s largest car maker by 2018. Volk­swa­gen Group’s core mar­kets in­clude Ger­many and China.

Worldwide presence

Volk­swa­gen has fac­to­ries in many parts of the world, man­u­fac­tur­ing or as­sem­bling ve­hi­cles for local mar­kets. In ad­di­tion to plants in Ger­many, Volk­swa­gen has man­u­fac­tur­ing or as­sem­bly fa­cil­i­ties in Mex­ico, the US, Slo­va­kia, China, India, Indonesia, Rus­sia, Malaysia, Brazil, Ar­gentina, Por­tu­gal, Spain, Poland, the Czech Re­pub­lic, Bosnia and Herze­gov­ina, Kenya and South Africa. In 2011, Volk­swa­gen was named in the top 25 largest com­pa­nies in the world by the Forbes Global 2000.

Volk­swa­gen is set­ting up a new fac­tory in West Java, In­done­sia, which started con­struc­tion in mid-2013. The in­vest­ment into the new plant, which will pro­duce large trans­porters and mul­ti­vans, is val­ued at $140 mil­lion.

As of May 2014, Volk­swa­gen is plan­ning to start as­sem­bling cer­tain en­gines in India to in­crease lo­cal­i­sa­tion from 70% to 90%.

In Jan­u­ary 2016, Volk­swa­gen an­nounced launch­ing a new fac­tory in Al­ge­ria dur­ing a sum­mit be­tween An­gela Merkel and Al­ger­ian prime min­is­ter Ab­del­malek Sel­lal.

Work–life balance

Volk­swa­gen agreed in De­cem­ber 2011 to im­ple­ment a rule passed by the com­pany’s works coun­cil aimed at im­prov­ing work–life bal­anceby re­strict­ing com­pany email func­tion­al­ity on the firm’s Black­Berry smart­phones from 6:30 pm to 7:30 am. The change was a re­sponse to em­ploy­ees’ com­plaints about high stress lev­els at work and the ex­pec­ta­tion that em­ploy­ees would im­me­di­ately an­swer af­ter-hours email from home. About 1,150 of Volk­swa­gen’s more than 190,000 em­ploy­ees are af­fected by the email restriction.

Relationship with Porsche and the Volkswagen Law

Volk­swa­gen has al­ways had a close re­la­tion­ship with Porsche, the Zuf­fen­hausen-based sports car man­u­fac­turer founded in 1931 by Fer­di­nand Porsche, the orig­i­nal Volk­swa­gen de­signer and Volk­swa­gen com­pany co-founder, hired by Adolf Hitler for the pro­ject. The first Porsche car, the Porsche 64 of 1938, used many com­po­nents from the Volk­swa­gen Bee­tle. The 1948 Porsche 356 con­tin­ued using many Volk­swa­gen com­po­nents, in­clud­ing a tuned en­gine, gear­box and sus­pen­sion.

The two com­pa­nies con­tin­ued their col­lab­o­ra­tion in 1969 to make the VW-Porsche 914 and Porsche 914-6. (The 914-6 had a 6-cylin­der Porsche en­gine, and the stan­dard 914 had a Volk­swa­gen en­gine.) Volk­swa­gen and Porsche would col­lab­o­rate again in 1976 on the Porsche 912-E (USA only) and the Porsche 924, which used many Audi com­po­nents and was built at Audi’s Neckar­sulm fa­cil­i­ties. The 924 was orig­i­nally des­ig­nated for AUDI. Most Porsche 944 mod­els were built there, al­though they used far fewer VW com­po­nents.

The Porsche Cayenne, in­tro­duced in 2002, shares its en­tire chas­sis with the Volk­swa­gen Touareg and Audi Q7, and is built at the same Volk­swa­gen fac­tory in Bratislava that the other SUV’s are built.

In Sep­tem­ber 2005, Porsche an­nounced it would in­crease its 5% stake in Volk­swa­gen to 20% at a cost of €3 bil­lion, with the in­ten­tion that the com­bined stakes of Porsche and the gov­ern­ment of Lower Sax­ony would en­sure that any hos­tile takeover by for­eign in­vestors would be impossible. Spec­u­lated suit­ors in­cluded Daim­ler­Chrysler, BMW, and Re­nault. In July 2006, Porsche in­creased their own­er­ship again to 25.1%.

On 4 March 2005, the Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion brought an ac­tion against the Fed­eral Re­pub­lic of Ger­many be­fore the Eu­ro­pean Court of Jus­tice, claim­ing that the Volk­swa­gen Law, which pre­vents any share­holder in Volk­swa­gen from ex­e­cut­ing more than 20% of the total vot­ing rights in the firm, was il­le­gally re­strict­ing the flow of cap­i­tal in Europe. On 13 Feb­ru­ary 2007, Ad­vo­cate Gen­eral Dámaso Ruiz-Jarabo Colomer sub­mit­ted an opin­ion to the court in sup­port of the action. This again opened the pos­si­bil­ity of a hos­tile takeover of VW and so on 26 March of the same year Porsche took its hold­ing of Volk­swa­gen shares to 30.9%. Porsche for­mally an­nounced in a press state­ment that it did not in­tend to take over Volk­swa­gen, but in­tended the move to avoid a com­peti­tor’s tak­ing a large stake and to stop hedge funds from dis­man­tling VW. As ex­pected, on 22 Oc­to­ber 2007, the Eu­ro­pean Court of Jus­tice ruled in agree­ment with Ruiz-Jarabo and the law was struck down. In Oc­to­ber 2007, the Eu­ro­pean Court of Jus­tice ruled that the VW law was illegal be­cause it was pro­tec­tion­ist. At that time, Porsche held 31% of VW shares — al­though a smaller pro­por­tion of vot­ing rights, due to the Volk­swa­gen Law — and there had been spec­u­la­tion that Porsche would be in­ter­ested in tak­ing over VW if the law did not stand in its way. The court also pre­vented the gov­ern­ment from ap­point­ing Volk­swa­gen board members. The Ger­man gov­ern­ment then rewrote the Volk­swa­gen law, only to be sued again. In Oc­to­ber 2013, the EU Court of Jus­tice in Lux­em­bourg ruled that the rewrit­ten Volk­swa­gen law “com­plied in full” with EU rules.

On 26 Oc­to­ber 2008, Porsche re­vealed its plan to as­sume con­trol of VW. As of that day, it held 42.6% of Volk­swa­gen’s or­di­nary shares and stock op­tions on an­other 31.5%. Com­bined with the state of Lower Sax­ony’s 20.1% stake, this left only 5.8% of shares on the mar­ket—mostly with index funds that could not legally sell. Hedge funds des­per­ate to cover their short po­si­tions forced Volk­swa­gen stock above one thou­sand euros per share, briefly mak­ing it the world’s largest com­pany by mar­ket cap­i­tal­i­sa­tion on 28 Oc­to­ber 2008. By Jan­u­ary 2009, Porsche had a 50.76% hold­ing in Volk­swa­gen AG, al­though the “Volk­swa­gen Law” pre­vented it from tak­ing con­trol of the company.

On 6 May 2009, the two com­pa­nies de­cided to join to­gether, in a merger.

On 13 Au­gust, Volk­swa­gen Ak­tienge­sellschaft’s Su­per­vi­sory Board signed the agree­ment to cre­ate an in­te­grated au­to­mo­tive group with Porsche led by Volk­swa­gen. The ini­tial de­ci­sion was for Volk­swa­gen to take a 42.0% stake in Porsche AG by the end of 2009, and it would also see the fam­ily share­hold­ers sell­ing the au­to­mo­bile trad­ing busi­ness of Porsche Hold­ing Salzburg to Volkswagen. In Oc­to­ber 2009 how­ever, Volk­swa­gen an­nounced that its per­cent­age in Porsche would be 49.9% for a cost of €3.9 bil­lion (the 42.0% deal would have cost €3.3 bil­lion). On 1 March 2011, Volk­swa­gen has fi­nal­ized the pur­chase of Porsche Hold­ing Salzburg (PHS), Aus­tria’s lead­ing spe­cialty au­to­mo­bile dis­trib­u­tor, for €3.3 bil­lion ($4.55 bil­lion).

AutoMuseum

Since 1985, Volk­swa­gen has run the Volk­swa­gen Au­to­Mu­seum in Wolfs­burg, a mu­seum ded­i­cated specif­i­cally to the his­tory of Volkswagen. In ad­di­tion to vis­it­ing ex­hibits in per­son, own­ers of vin­tage Volk­swa­gens any­where in the world may order what the mu­seum refers to as a “Birth Cer­tifi­cate” for a set fee of €50—this for­mal “Zer­ti­fikat” in­di­cates basic in­for­ma­tion known at the time of man­u­fac­ture (col­ors, op­tions, port of des­ti­na­tion, etc.).

Global sales figures, 2006-2016

Year	Global sales (in millions)
2006	5.7
2007	6.2
2008	6.3
2009	6.3
2010	7.3
2011	8.4
2012	9.3
2013	9.7
2014	10.2
2015	10.0
2016	10.3

Current models

2012 Volkswagen up! (AA MY13) 5-door hatchback (2015-11-11) 01

Up!           City Car        Hatchback

2014-present Volkswagen Gol Mk6 Sedan

Gol        City Car       Hatchback  –  Sedan  –  Coupé Utility

2017 VW Ameo rear view

Ameo       City Car      Sedan

2015 Volkswagen Fox in Punta del Este 01

Fox (South America)      Supermini        Hatchback  –  Estate

2005-2010 Volkswagen Polo IV (9N3) GTI 3-door hatchback

Polo       Supermini       Hatchback  –  Coupé  –  Estate

2015 Vento Highline

Vento      Subcompact car     Sedan

2012 Volkswagen Beetle

Beetle       Small family car        Hatchback  –  Convertible

2017 VW Golf Variant 1.4 TSI BlueMotion Technology Highline (VII, Facelift)

Golf     Small family car     Hatchback  –  Estate  –  Convertible

2018 VW Jetta VII P4220677

Jetta     Small family car    Sedan

2017 Volkswagen Arteon SCR 4MOTION R-Line 2.0 Front

Arteon     Large family car      Sedan2014 VW Passat B8 Limousine 2.0 TDI Highline

Passat      Large family car     Sedan

GTI models

2011 VW Polo GTI (V)

Polo GTI     Supermini      Hatchback

2015 Volkswagen Golf GTi (16460156619)

Golf GTI     Small family car     Hatchback

Electric models

GTE models

See also: Volkswagen XL1

GTE are plug-in hy­brid elec­tric ve­hi­cles The GTE’s en­gine, elec­tric motor, and trans­mis­sion are fully shared with the Audi A3 Sport­back e-tron:

2015 Black VW Golf GTE charging

Golf GTE     Small family car    Hatchback     1.4l and an electric motor can travel for a full 50km on electricity only

2014 Volkswagen Passat GTE Variant – Mondial de l’Automobile de Paris

Passat GTE     Large family car     Estate

e-models

VW e-mod­els are all-elec­tric ve­hi­cles.

Volkswagen e-up! at Hannover Messe

e-up!

2013 VW e-Golf LA Auto Show

e-Golf

R models

R mod­els are ex­otic and sport ve­hi­cles.

2014 VW Golf R (VII)

Golf R     Small sports car     Hatchback

2015 Volkswagen Scirocco R (15977639104)

Scirocco R      Small sports car      Coupé

Historic models

Kübelwagen         1940–1945

Schwimmwagen         1942-1944

Sedan, ”Beetle, Bug”           1938 – 2003

Karmann Ghia          1955–1974

1500/1600          1961–1973

181         1969–1983

Country Buggy          1967–1969

411          1968–1972

K70        1970–1974

412           1972–1974

Scirocco         1974–1981

Derby          1977–1981

2010 VW Corrado 16 V (2010-04-12)

Corrado        1988–1995

Vw lupo v sst

Lupo          1998–2004

2006-2007 Volkswagen New Beetle

New Beetle          1998–2010

2010 VW Golf Plus 2.0 TDI Facelift front-1 20100710

Golf +         2004-2009

2009 Volkswagen Routan SE

Routan           2009-2013

2012 Volkswagen Eos — 04-01-2011 1

Eos          2006-2015

2011 VW Phaeton 3.0 V6 TDI 4MOTION (2. Facelift)

Phaeton          2003-2016

2010 Volkswagen Passat CC 2.0 TSi 2010

CC         2008-2017

Electric and alternative fuel vehicles

Neat ethanol vehicles

Industriemesse Hannover 1978
Staatssekretär Erwin Stahl besichtigt den Innovationsmarkt

VW neat ethanol prototype car developed by Volkswagen do Brasil in 1978.

Volk­swa­gen do Brasil pro­duced and sold neat ethanol-pow­ered, (E100 only), ve­hi­cles in Brazil, and pro­duc­tion was dis­con­tin­ued only after they were sup­planted by more mod­ern Flex Fuel tech­nol­ogy. As a re­sponse to the 1973 oil cri­sis, the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment began pro­mot­ing bioethanol as a fuel, and the Na­tional Al­co­hol Pro­gram –Pró-Álcool– (Por­tuguese: Pro­grama Na­ci­onal do Álcool) was launched in 1975. Com­pelled by the 1979 en­ergy cri­sis, and after de­vel­op­ment and test­ing with gov­ern­ment fleets by the CTA at São José dos Cam­pos, and fur­ther test­ing of sev­eral pro­to­types de­vel­oped by the four local car­mak­ers, in­clud­ing Volk­swa­gen do Brasil, neat ethanol ve­hi­cles were launched in the Brazil­ian market. Gaso­line en­gines were mod­i­fied to sup­port hy­drous ethanol char­ac­ter­is­tics and changes in­cluded com­pres­sion ratio, amount of fuel in­jected, re­place­ment of ma­te­ri­als that would get cor­roded by the con­tact with ethanol, use of colder spark plugs suit­able for dis­si­pat­ing heat due to higher flame tem­per­a­tures, and an aux­il­iary cold-start sys­tem that in­jects gaso­line from a small tank in the en­gine com­part­ment to help start­ing when cold. Within six years, around 75% of all Brazil­ian pas­sen­ger cars were man­u­fac­tured with ethanol engines.

Pro­duc­tion and sales of neat ethanol ve­hi­cles tum­bled be­gin­ning in 1987 owing to sev­eral fac­tors, in­clud­ing a sharp de­cline in gaso­line prices as a re­sult of the 1980s oil glut, and high sugar prices in the world mar­ket, shift­ing sug­ar­cane ethanol pro­duc­tion from fuel to sugar. By mid-1989, a short­age of ethanol fuel sup­ply in the local mar­ket left thou­sands of ve­hi­cles in line at gas sta­tions or out of fuel in their garages, forc­ing con­sumers to aban­don ethanol vehicles.

Flexible-fuel vehicles

The 2003 VW Gol 1.6 Total Flex was the first full flex­i­ble-fuel ve­hi­cle launched in Brazil, ca­pa­ble of run­ning on any blend of gaso­line and E100. In March of that year, on its fifti­eth an­niver­sary, Volk­swa­gen do Brasil launched in the local mar­ket the Gol 1.6 Total Flex, the first Brazil­ian com­mer­cial flex­i­ble fuel ve­hi­cle ca­pa­ble of run­ning on any mix of E20-E25 gaso­line and up to 100% hy­drousethanol fuel (E100). After the neat ethanol fi­asco, con­sumer con­fi­dence in ethanol-pow­ered ve­hi­cles was re­stored, al­low­ing a rapid adop­tion of the flex tech­nol­ogy. This was fa­cil­i­tated by the fuel dis­tri­b­u­tion in­fra­struc­ture al­ready in place through­out Brazil, with more than 30 thou­sand fu­el­ing sta­tions, a her­itage of the Pró-Álcool pro­gram

Owing to the suc­cess and rapid con­sumer ac­cep­tance of the flex-fuel ver­sions, by 2005 VW had sold 293,523 flex-fuel cars and light-duty trucks, and only 53,074 gaso­line-only automobiles, jump­ing to 525,838 flex-fuel ve­hi­cles and only 13,572 gaso­line-only cars and 248 gaso­line-only light trucks in 2007, and reach­ing new car sales of 564,959 flex-fuel ve­hi­cles in 2008, rep­re­sent­ing 96% of all new cars and light-duty trucks sold in that year. VW do Brasil stopped man­u­fac­tur­ing gaso­line-only ve­hi­cles mod­els for the local mar­ket in 2006, and all of the re­main­ing gaso­line-only Volk­swa­gen mod­els sold in Brazil are im­ported. The flex-fuel mod­els cur­rently pro­duced for the local mar­ket are the Gol, Fox, Cross­Fox, Parati, Polo Hatch, Polo Sedan, Saveiro, Golf, and Kombi. By March 2009, Volk­swa­gen do Brasil had at­tained the mile­stone mark of two mil­lion flex-fuel ve­hi­cles pro­duced since 2003.

Hybrid vehicles

The Volkswagen Jetta Hybrid gets 48 mpg highway.

Volk­swa­gen and Sanyo have teamed up to de­velop a bat­tery sys­tem for hy­brid cars. Volk­swa­gen head Mar­tin Win­terkorn has con­firmed the com­pany plans to build com­pact hy­brid elec­tric ve­hi­cles. He has stated “There will def­i­nitely be com­pact hy­brid mod­els, such as Polo and Golf, and with­out any great delay”, with gaso­line and diesel power. For ex­am­ple, Golf is the ideal model to go hy­brid as the Golf 1.4 TSI was re­cently awarded the “Auto En­vi­ron­ment Cer­tifi­cate” by the Oko-Trend In­sti­tute for En­vi­ron­men­tal Re­search, and was con­sid­ered as one of the most en­vi­ron­men­tally friendly ve­hi­cles of 2007. Also un­der­way at Volk­swa­gen’s Braun­schweig R&D fa­cil­i­ties in North­ern Ger­many is a hy­brid ver­sion of the next-gen­er­a­tion Touareg.

VW in­tends all fu­ture mod­els to have the hy­brid op­tion. “Fu­ture VW mod­els will fun­da­men­tally also be con­structed with hy­brid con­cepts,” VW head of de­vel­op­ment Ul­rich Hack­en­berg told Au­to­mo­bil­woche in an in­ter­view. Hack­en­berg men­tioned that the car based on the Up! con­cept seen at Frank­furt Motor Show, as well as all fu­ture mod­els, could be of­fered with ei­ther full or par­tial hy­brid op­tions. The rear-en­gine up! will go into pro­duc­tion in 2011. Noth­ing has been said about plug-in hy­brid op­tions.

Volk­swa­gen an­nounced at the 2010 Geneva Motor Show the launch of the 2012 Touareg Hy­brid, sched­uled for 2011. VW also an­nounced plans to in­tro­duce diesel-elec­tric hy­brid ver­sions of its most pop­u­lar mod­els in 2012, be­gin­ning with the new Jetta, fol­lowed by the Golf Hy­brid in 2013 to­gether with hy­brid ver­sions of the Pas­sat. In 2012, the Volk­swa­gen Jetta Hy­brid set the world record to be­come the fastest hy­brid car at 187 mph.

Plug-in electric vehicles

In No­vem­ber 2009, Volk­swa­gen an­nounced it has hired Karl-Thomas Neu­mann as its group chief of­fi­cer for elec­tric trac­tion. VW’s Chief of re­search, Jürgen Leo­hold, said in 2010 the com­pany has con­cluded hy­dro­gen fuel-cell cars are not a vi­able option.

Volkswagen Golf GTE plug-in hybridcharging.

As of May 2016, the Volk­swa­gen Group of­fers for re­tails cus­tomers nine plug-in elec­tric cars, of which, three are all-elec­tric cars: the Volk­swa­gen e-Up!, e-Golf and Audi R8 e-tron, and six are plug-in hy­brids: the Volk­swa­gen Golf GTE, Pas­sat GTE, Audi A3 Sport­back e-tron, Q7 e-tron quat­tro, Porsche Panam­era S E-Hy­brid and Cayenne S E-Hy­brid. Also two lim­ited pro­duc­tion plug-in hy­brids were man­u­fac­tured be­gin­ning in 2013, the Volk­swa­gen XL1 (250 units) and the Porsche 918 Spy­der (918 units). Total cu­mu­la­tive sales of all Volk­swa­gen brand elec­tri­fied cars since the start of their re­spec­tive pro­duc­tion is ex­pected to reach about 103,000 by the end of 2016.

In order to com­ply with in­creas­ingly strict car­bon diox­ide emis­sion lim­its in major mar­kets, the VW Group ex­pects to sell about one mil­lion all-elec­tric and plug-in hy­brid ve­hi­cles a year world­wide by 2025. The Group plans to ex­pand its plug-in range with 20 new pure elec­tric and plug-in hy­brid cars, in­clud­ing two cars to com­pete with Tesla Mo­tors, the Porsche Mis­sion E all-elec­tric car and the Audi e-tron quat­tro, which is ex­pected to be­come the brand’s first mass pro­duc­tion elec­tric ve­hi­cle. Ac­cord­ing to Thomas Ul­brich, VW brand pro­duc­tion chief, the car­maker has ca­pacitty to build as many as 75,000 bat­tery elec­tric and plug-in hy­brids a year if de­mand rises. Volk­swa­gen an­nounced in Oc­to­ber 2015 that “it will de­velop a mod­u­lar ar­chi­tec­ture for bat­tery elec­tric cars, called the MEB. The stan­dard­ized sys­tem will be de­signed for all body struc­tures and ve­hi­cle types and will allow the com­pany to build emo­tion­ally ap­peal­ing EVs with a range of up to 310 mi (500 km).” In June 2016, VW launched a pro­gram to de­velop 30 all-elec­tric cars in 10 years, and sell 2-3 mil­lion elec­tric cars per year by 2025. Due to lower man­power re­quire­ments for elec­tric mo­tors than for pis­ton en­gines, VW ex­pects a grad­ual work­force re­duc­tion as num­bers of elec­tric cars increase. VW con­sid­ers bat­tery fac­tory own­er­ship as too expensive.

Environmental record

The Volkswagen XL1, with potential mileage as high as 261 mpg, is the most fuel-efficient car in the world

In 1974 Volk­swa­gen paid a $120,000 fine to set­tle a com­plaint filed by the En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency over the use of so-called “de­feat de­vices” that dis­abled cer­tain pol­lu­tion-con­trol sys­tems. The com­plaint said the use of the de­vices vi­o­lated the U.S. Clean Air Act.

In 1996, Volk­swa­gen first im­ple­mented its seven en­vi­ron­men­tal goals in Tech­ni­cal De­vel­op­ment with themes in­volv­ing cli­mate pro­tec­tion, re­source con­ser­va­tion, and health­care, through ob­jec­tives such as re­duc­ing green­house emis­sions and fuel con­sump­tion, en­abling al­ter­na­tive fuels, and avoid­ing haz­ardous materials. The goals have been re­vised in 2002 and 2007. Volk­swa­gen was the first car man­u­fac­turer to apply ISO 14000, dur­ing its draft­ing stage and was re-cer­ti­fied under the stan­dards in Sep­tem­ber 2005.

In 2011, Green­peace began crit­i­cis­ing Volk­swa­gen’s op­po­si­tion to leg­is­la­tion re­quir­ing tighter con­trols on CO2 emis­sions and en­ergy ef­fi­ciency, and launched an ad­ver­tis­ing cam­paign par­o­dy­ing VW’s se­ries of Star Wars-based commercials.

In 2013, the Volk­swa­gen XL1 be­came the most fuel-ef­fi­cient pro­duc­tion car in the world, with a claimed com­bined fuel con­sump­tion of 261 mpg (0.90 liter/100 km). Dri­ving style has huge im­pact on this re­sult – “nor­mal” dri­ving pro­duces mileage in the 120 mpg range (1.96 liter/100 km).

As of 2014, VW is reg­is­tered with a Cor­po­rate Av­er­age Fuel Econ­omy (CAFE) of 34-38 mpg in USA.

Diesel emission violations

Main article: Volkswagen emissions scandal

On 18 Sep­tem­ber 2015, the United States En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency (EPA) said be­gin­ning in 2008 the au­tomaker im­prop­erly in­stalled en­gine con­trol unit (ECU) soft­ware de­ter­mined to be a “de­feat de­vice”, in vi­o­la­tion of the Clean Air Act to cir­cum­vent en­vi­ron­men­tal reg­u­la­tions of NO_xemis­sions by diesel en­gine 2009-2015 model year Volk­swa­gen and Audi cars. The soft­ware de­tects when the cars were being sub­ject to emis­sions test­ing, and then fully en­abled ECU emis­sion con­trols to suc­cess­fully pass. How­ever, dur­ing nor­mal dri­ving con­di­tions, emis­sion con­trol soft­ware was shut off in order to at­tain greater fuel econ­omy and ad­di­tional power, re­sult­ing in as much as 40 times more pol­lu­tion than al­lowed by law. Con­sumer Re­ports tested a 2011 Jetta Sport­Wa­gen TDI and found in emis­sions mode its 0-60 mph time in­creased by 0.6 sec­onds and its high­way fuel econ­omy dropped from 50 mpg to 46 mpg. Volk­swa­gen ad­mit­ted to using the de­feat de­vice, and has been or­dered to re­call ap­prox­i­mately 482,000 cars with four-cylin­der 2.0-liter TDI en­gines. United States fed­eral penal­ties may in­clude fines rang­ing up to US$18bil­lion, and pos­si­bly crim­i­nal charges. On 28 June 2016, Volk­swa­gen agreed to pay a set­tle­ment of $15.3 bil­lion, the largest auto-re­lated con­sumer class-ac­tion law­suit in the United States history.

In May 2014, the EPA was first alerted to the issue by the In­ter­na­tional Coun­cil on Clean Trans­porta­tion (ICCT), re­port­ing results of re­search com­mis­sioned for them by West Vir­ginia Uni­ver­sity‘s Cen­ter for Al­ter­na­tive Fuels, En­gines and Emis­sions (CAFEE). After 15 months of deny­ing the emis­sions con­trol sys­tems were de­lib­er­ately gamed and in­stead claim­ing dis­crep­an­cies due to “tech­ni­cal” rea­sons, on Au­gust 21 Volk­swa­gen ac­knowl­edged to the EPA and Cal­i­for­nia Air Re­sources Board (CARB) their emis­sion con­trols sys­tems were rigged. This was fol­lowed by a for­mal an­nounce­ment of ad­mis­sion to reg­u­la­tors on Sep­tem­ber 3 which took place im­me­di­ately after the EPA threat­ened to with­hold ap­proval for their 2016 cars. Volk­swa­gen’s ini­tial pub­lic re­sponse came on 20 Sep­tem­ber, when a spokesman said they would stop all US sales of the diesel mod­els af­fected. Chair­man Mar­tin Win­terkorn is­sued an apol­ogy and said Volk­swa­gen would co­op­er­ate with investigators. Since emis­sion stan­dards in Canada are close to those in the US, Volk­swa­gen Canada also halted sales of the af­fected diesel models. on 22 Sep­tem­ber 2015, Volk­swa­gen spokesman ad­mit­ted that the de­feat de­vice is in­stalled in ~11 mil­lion ve­hi­cles with Type EA 189 diesel en­gines worldwide.

On the first busi­ness day after the news, Volk­swa­gen’s stock price de­clined 20% and de­clined an­other 17% the fol­low­ing day, the same day a so­cial media ad­ver­tise­ment with Wired about “how diesel was re-en­gi­neered” was re­moved as well as a se­ries of YouTube ads ti­tled “Diesel Old Wives’ Tales”. On Wednes­day, 23 Sep­tem­ber, Volk­swa­gen chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Mar­tin Win­terkorn re­signed. Volk­swa­gen hired Kirk­land & Ellis law firm for de­fense, the same firm that de­fended BP dur­ing the Deep­wa­ter Hori­zon oil spill.

On 2 No­vem­ber 2016, the EPA is­sued a sec­ond no­tice of vi­o­la­tion (NOV) per­tain­ing to cer­tain diesel 3.0-liter V6 equipped Audis, Volk­swa­gen Touaregs and Porsche Cayennes. The EPA found be­gin­ning with the 2009 model year all ve­hi­cles pow­ered by the V6 were non-compliant. Dur­ing test­ing the EPA, CARB and Trans­port Canada dis­cov­ered soft­ware that ac­ti­vates pol­lu­tion re­duc­tion sys­tems when the au­to­mo­biles are being dri­ven under fed­eral test con­di­tions, oth­er­wise dur­ing real world dri­ving these de­vices are inactive. Volk­swa­gen dis­puted the EPA’s find­ings stat­ing their soft­ware was legally permitted, how­ever shortly after Volk­swa­gen is­sued a stop-sale for the EPA’s dis­puted ve­hi­cles and ad­di­tional mod­els the EPA did not question.

In March 2016, the US Fed­eral Trade Com­mis­sion sued Volk­swa­gen for false ad­ver­tis­ing, be­cause Volk­swa­gen’s “clean diesel” ve­hi­cles were less en­vi­ron­men­tally friendly than advertised.

In No­vem­ber 2016, Volk­swa­gen and its labour unions agreed to re­duce the work­force by 30,000 peo­ple until 2021 as a re­sult of the costs from the vi­o­la­tions. How­ever, 9,000 new jobs would come by pro­duc­ing more elec­tric cars. Volk­swa­gen also an­nounced plans to be­come the world leader in elec­tric cars, pro­duc­ing 1 mil­lion VW-EVs by 2025 and 3 mil­lion by the group, and a VW man­ager stated that its diesel cars would not be­come avail­able in USA.

On 11 Jan­u­ary 2017, Volk­swa­gen agreed to plead guilty to the emis­sions-cheat­ing scan­dal and to pay $4.3 bil­lion in penal­ties. Six Volk­swa­gen ex­ec­u­tives were charged. The fol­low­ing day, one of the in­dicted ex­ec­u­tives was or­dered to be held with­out bail pend­ing trial as it was feared that he would flee to Ger­many and ex­tra­di­tion would be impossible. Se­nior VW man­age­ment staff were warned not to travel to the US. On 23 Jan­u­ary 2017, a US judge ap­proved a $1.2 bil­lion set­tle­ment in which 650 Amer­i­can deal­ers, “who, like con­sumers, were blind­sided by the brazen fraud that VW per­pe­trated,” would re­ceive an av­er­age of $1.85 million.

Awards

The Volkswagen Polo in Christchurch, New Zealand. The Volkswagen Polo won the 2010 World Car of the Year

The Volkswagen up! won the 2012 World Car of the Year

Volk­swa­gen was named the fourth most in­flu­en­tial car of the 20th cen­tury in the 1999 Car of the Cen­tury com­pe­ti­tion, for its Volk­swa­gen Type 1 ’Bee­tle” model. It trailed only the Ford Model T, BMC Mini, and Citroën DS.

Volk­swa­gen has pro­duced three win­ners of the 50-year-old Eu­ro­pean Car of the Year award.

• 1992 – Volkswagen Golf
• 2010 – Volkswagen Polo
• 2013 – Volkswagen Golf

Volk­swa­gen has pro­duced five win­ners of the United States Motor Trend Car of the Year award — the orig­i­nal Car of the Year des­ig­na­tion, which began in 1949.

• 1985 – Volkswagen GTI
• 1999 – Volkswagen New Beetle (Import COTY subgroup)
• 2004 – Volkswagen Touareg (Sport Utility Vehicle COTY subgroup)
• 2012 – Volkswagen Passat
• 2015 – Volkswagen Golf line-up

Volk­swa­gen has al­ready pro­duced four win­ners of the re­cently de­vel­oped World Car of the Year award.

• 2009 – Volkswagen Golf
• 2010 – Volkswagen Polo
• 2012 – Volkswagen up!
• 2013 – Volkswagen Golf

Motorsport

Main article: Volkswagen Motorsport

Formula racing

• In 1963, Formula Vee circuit racing, with cars built from easily available Beetle parts, started in the United States. It quickly spread to Europe and other parts of the world. It proved very popular as a low-cost route into formula racing.
• In 1971, Volkswagen of America started the more powerful Formula Super Vee, which became famous for hothousing new talent. In the 11 years it ran, until 1982, it produced a stable of world-famous Formula One drivers—names like Niki Lauda, Jochen Mass, Nelson Piquet, Jochen Rindt and Keke Rosberg. Volkswagen also notched up several victories, and the championship in Formula Three.
• In July 2011 Wolfgang Dürheimer, the director of Bugatti and Bentley, told German magazine Auto, Motor und Sport that “if [the VW group] is at the forefront of the auto industry, I can imagine us competing in Formula 1 in 2018. We have enough brands to pull it off.” They did not compete in F1 in 2018.

World Rally Championship

• In 1981, now based in Hanover, VW took a new direction into rallying, with the launch of the first-generation Golf, and Sweden’s Per Eklund, Frenchman Jean-Luc Thérier, and the Finn Pentti Airikkala. The final chapters in Volkswagen Racing UK’s rallying story were the ‘one-make’ Castrol Polo Challenge, and the Polo GTI ‘Super 1600’ in 2001.
• Volkswagen Motorsport won the World Rally Championship with Sébastien Ogier and co-driver Julien Ingrassia four years in a row from 2013 to 2016 in the Volkswagen Polo R WRC.

Dakar Rally

• In 1980, Volkswagen competed with the Audi-developed Iltis, placing 1st, 2nd, 4th and 9th overall.
• In 2003, the Hanover-based team entered with a 2WD buggy named Tarek, finishing 6th overall and 1st in the 2WD and Diesel class.
• In 2005, an updated Race-Touareg with slightly more power entered, with driver Bruno Saby finishing 3rd overall and 1st in the Diesel class.
• In 2006, the revised Race-Touareg entered, with driver Giniel de Villiers finishing 2nd overall and 1st in the Diesel class.
• Volkswagen won the 2009, 2010 and 2011 Dakar Rally, held in South America.

Volkswagen motorsport worldwide

• Europe: In 1998 the company founded the ADAC Volkswagen Lupo Cup, founded in 1998 (renamed Polo Cup in 2003, and Volkswagen Scirocco R-Cup from 2010 to 2014), and started the ADAC New Beetle Cup in 2000. In 2004, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles entered the European Truck Racing series with the Volkswagen Titan truck – it became a back-to-back champion for the 2004 and 2005 series.
• United States: In 1976, Volkswagen entered the under-2000-cc Trans-Am Series, with the Scirocco, and they won their class outright. Beginning in 2008 Volkswagen introduced the Jetta TDI Cup. The Jetta TDI Cup is a SCCA sanctioned race series that features 25 drivers between the ages of 16 and 26 driving slightly modified 2009 Jetta TDIs. The series features 10 events at 8 different road courses across North America. There is $50,000 prize money at stake over the course of the series in addition to the $100,000 prize awarded to the champion of the series at the conclusion of the last race.
• Argentina: Many Volkswagen models have competed in TC 2000, including the 1980 to 1983 champion Volkswagen 1500 and the 1994 champion Volkswagen Gol.
• In 1999 and 2000, VW won the F2 Australian Rally Championship with the Golf GTI.
• Finland: In 2002, VW won the Finnish Rally Championship in a7/(F2), with a Golf Mk4 KitCar, with Mikko Hirvonen. In 1999 and 2000, VW won the Finnish Rally Championship in a7/(F2) with a Golf Mk3 KitCar. In 2000, 2001 and 2002, VW won the Finnish Racing Championship in Sport 2000 with a Golf Mk4.
• Austria: From 1967 until 1974, the Austrian sole distributor Porsche Salzburg entered the VW Beetle (1500, 1302S and 1303S) in Europe-wide rallies. Victories were achieved in 1972 and 1973 in the overall Austrian championship, on Elba, in the Acropolis rally (first in class). Top drivers were Tony Fall (GB), Achim Warmbold (D), Günter Janger (A), Harry Källström(S).

• 
  1939 Berlin to Rome. Porsche Type 64 racer based on Bee­tle plat­form
• 1967 Volkswagen Beetle Fittipaldi-Baldahl 1967

  Twin-en­gine rac­ing Bee­tle de­vel­oped by Wil­sonand Emer­son Fit­ti­paldi broth­ers

  
  Bora in TC 2000, a na­tional cham­pi­onship of Ar­gentina
• 2006 Volkswagen Bora V8 Stock Car V8 Brasil Amir Nasr Racing

  Bora in Stock Car Brasil

  

  Edi­tion 2007 Race Touareg 2 at Essen Motor Show 2006
• 2006 Formula Truck 2006 Interlagos Ford leads

  Con­stel­la­tion in the 2006 Brazil­ian Fórmula Truck Cham­pi­onship

Literature

• Jonas Kiefer: VW Typenatlas, Serienfahrzeuge. 2. Auflage. Delius Klasing, Bielefeld 2002, ISBN 3-7688-1271-5.
• Rudi Heppe: VW Personenwagen. Podszun, Brilon 2001, ISBN 3-86133-209-4.
• Halwart Schrader: VW Personenwagen seit 1945, Band 1, Typenkompass. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-613-02105-6.
• Halwart Schrader: VW Personenwagen seit 1945, Band 2, Typenkompass. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-613-02186-2.
• Werner Oswald: Deutsche Autos, Band 2, 1920–1945. 2. Auflage. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-613-02170-6.
• Werner Oswald: Deutsche Autos, Band 3, 1945–1990, Ford, Opel und Volkswagen. 1. Auflage. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-613-02116-1.

The pictures I collected the last years, my own pictures and the ones from the worldwideweb:

Zentralbild Junge 20.3.1957 Ehemalige Botschaft der USA, Berlin Blick auf die Ruine der ehemaligen Botschaft der USA in Berlin, Pariser Platz 2 Ecke Friedrich-Ebert-Straße 21. (Aufgenommen am 18. März 1957)

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
End-Montage

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage 412

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Forschung und Entwicklungsabteilung

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Forschung und Entwicklungsabteilung

VW-Werk Salzgitter
Salzgitter Endmontage 412 und K70

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage 412

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage-Käfer

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage 412

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Forschung und Entwicklungsabteilung

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Forschung und Entwicklung
PKW-Versuch/Abt. Sicherheit, Prüfgerät zur Belastung von Fahrzeugbauteilen mit Kräften, wie sie bei einem Crash auftreten.
1. März 1973

VW-Werk Wolfsburg
Endmontage Passat

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Forschung und Entwicklung
Fahrzeug im Klimawindkanal, Messungen des aerodynamischen Verhaltens, Heizungs- und Belüftungseigenschaften bei unterschiedlichen Klimabedingungen

Volkswagen e-up! at Hannover Messe

VW-Werk, Wolfsburg
Montage 412

Industriemesse Hannover 1978
Staatssekretär Erwin Stahl besichtigt den Innovationsmarkt

Scanned by Darren Walsh

volkswagen lt camper occasions in Inspirerend Foto van VW LT28 Volkswagen LT 28

That’s it what my collection has to show. There are some pictures double, I got them out so far as possible, but it was extremely hot today, so forgive. I hope you have a lot off pleasure.

Greetings Jeroen, your host!!

See also

• Baja bug
• Cal Look
• Fahrvergnügen
• List of German cars
• List of automobile manufacturers
• Punch buggy
• Standard Superior – a previous attempt to produce a “Volkswagen”
• Steyr 50
• Twin Drive
• VDub – tagline for the recent VWoA Golf GTI TV advertisemen*
• Volksflugzeug
• Volksrod
• Volkswagen advertising history
• VW 276 Schlepperfahrzeug, military use 1944

Notes

1. ^ Tooze notes: “Even if the war had not intervened, developments up to 1939 made clear that the entire conception of the ‘people’s car’ was a disastrous flop.” Tooze (2006) p.156).

References

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Further reading

• William Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (50th Anniversary Edition) (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1990)
• Andrea Hiott, Thinking Small (New York: Ballantine Books, 2012)

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Volkswagen and Volkswagen vehicles.

• Volkswagen.com Volkswagen Cars Worldwide portal
• Volkswagen Classic (in German)
• Volkswagen Cars Technical Information

Volkswagen Group
Ownership	Porsche SE State of Lower Saxony Qatar Holding LLC Capital Group Companies
Divisions and subsidiaries	Passenger cars Audi (99.55%) Audi Sport Bentley Motors Bugatti Lamborghini Porsche SEAT Škoda Volkswagen Commercial vehicles MAN Truck & Bus Navistar International (16.6%) Scania Volkswagen Caminhões e Ônibus Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles Motorcycles Ducati Engines MAN Diesel & Turbo Services Italdesign Giugiaro Geographic Volkswagen Group of America(Electronics Research Laboratory) Volkswagen do Brasil Volkswagen Group China Volkswagen Group Sales India
Shareholdings	FAW-Volkswagen (40%) Here (33.3%) IAV (50%) MAN(75.56%) Navistar International (16.6%) SAIC Volkswagen(50%)
Products and technologies	Platforms Vehicles Engines Diesel: current / discontinued Petrol:current / discontinued North America Technologies BlueMotion Digifant DSG ETKA FSI Pumpe Düse SDI TDI VAG-COM
Discontinued brands	Auto Union DKW Horch NSU Wanderer
Places	Autostadt Ehra-Lessien Factories
People	Ferdinand Porsche (founder) Carl Hahn (Chairman Emeritus) Ivan Hirst (former Managing Director) Rudolf Leiding (former CEO) Kurt Lotz (former CEO) Heinrich Nordhoff (former Managing Director) Ferdinand Piëch (Chairman of the Supervisory Board) Bernd Pischetsrieder (former CEO) Toni Schmücker (former CEO) Martin Winterkorn (former Chairman of the Board of Management) Porsche family (owner)
Motorsport	Teams: Rally teams Series: Formula Volkswagen Germany Jetta TDI Cup Scirocco R-Cup
Other	Volkswagen emissions testing scandal
Category  Commons

Volkswagen passenger cars
A marque of the Volkswagen Group
Current	Cars Ameo Arteon/CC Beetle Bora Fox Gol Golf Jetta Lamando Lavida Santana Passat B8/Magotan Passat NMS Phideon Polo Up Vento Voyage SUVs/Crossovers Atlas/Teramont CrossFox CrossPolo CrossGolf/Golf AllTrack CrossTouran Passat AllTrack T-Roc Tiguan Touareg Vans Caddy Sharan Suran Touran Pick-up trucks/Utilities Amarok Saveiro
Discontinued vehicles	Aircooled 181 411/412 (Type 4) 1500/1600 (Type 3) Beetle (Type 1) Brasília Country Buggy (Sakbayan) Hebmüller Cabriolet Karmann Ghia Kommandeurswagen Kübelwagen Schwimmwagen SP2 Voyage Type 18A Type 147 (Fridolin) VW-Porsche 914 Watercooled Apollo Citi Golf Corrado Gol Eos Iltis K70 Lupo New Beetle Parati Phaeton Pointer/Logus Routan Saveiro Scirocco Voyage
Concept vehicles	1-Litre/L1/XL1 Concept Alltrack Concept ARVW Bio Runner BUDD-e Bulli Concept C Coupe GTE Chico Concept A Concept BlueSport Concept D Concept R CrossBlue Concept Cross Coupe concept EcoRacer EDAG Biwak (New Beetle estate) GTI Roadster/Supersport Vision Gran Turismo GX3 I.D. I.D. Buzz I.D. Crozz Iroc Microbus Concept Milano Taxi New Beetle Ragster New Compact Coupé Stanley Taigun Concept Touran HyMotion W12 Coupe/Roadster (Nardò)
VW-based kit-cars/ racing cars	Polo R WRC Formula Vee Baja Bug Meyers Manx EMPI Imp
Engines	Petrol engines Discontinued petrol engines G40 / G60 Diesel engines Discontinued diesel engines North American engines Air-cooled engine Wasserboxer
Factories	Bratislava Chattanooga Transparent Factory
Other	Emissions scandal 4Motion Advertising Fahrvergnügen AutoMuseum Volkswagen BlueMotion Deutsche Arbeitsfront G-Lader Herbie Platforms Westfalia Camper
Category

« previous — Volkswagen Passenger Cars, a marque of the Volkswagen Group, car timeline, European market, 1980s–present
Type	1980s										1990s										2000s										2010s
	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Economy car	Beetle
City car																			Lupo							Fox							Up
Supermini	Polo / Derby I		Polo / Derby II												Polo III								Polo IV							Polo V
Small family car	Golf I				Golf II							Golf III							Golf IV					Golf V						Golf VI				Golf VII
	Jetta I					Jetta II							Vento							Bora						Jetta V					Jetta VI
																			New Beetle													Beetle
Large family car	Passat I	Passat II / Santana							Passat III						Passat IV				Passat V							Passat VI					Passat VII				Passat VIII
																													Passat CC					CC				Arteon
Luxury car																							Phaeton
Coupé	Scirocco I		Scirocco II																										Scirocco III
									Corrado
Convertible	Golf I Cabriolet															Golf III Cabriolet																Golf VI Cabriolet
																							New Beetle Cabriolet										Beetle Cabriolet
																											Eos
Compact MPV																												Golf Plus									Golf Sportsvan
																							Touran I												Touran II
Large MPV																Sharan I															Sharan II
SUV																																						T-Roc
																												Tiguan I									Tiguan II
																									Touareg I						Touareg II
Deutsche Arbeitsfront (founder) A marque of the Volkswagen Group 4motion G40 / G60

« previous — Volkswagen Passenger Cars, a marque of the Volkswagen Group, car timeline, United States/Canada market, 1980–present
Type	1980s										1990s										2000s										2010s
	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Subcompact								Fox
Compact	Rabbit I					Golf II								Golf III						Golf IV							Rabbit V				Golf VI					Golf VII
	Jetta I					Jetta II								Jetta III						Jetta IV						Jetta V						Jetta VI
	Dasher																		New Beetle														Beetle
Mid-size			Quantum								Passat III				Passat IV				Passat V							Passat VI							Passat VII
Full-size																									Phaeton
Coupé	Scirocco I		Scirocco II								Corrado																			CC
Convertible	Rabbit Convertible					Cabriolet										Cabrio											Eos
																								New Beetle Convertible										Beetle
Van	Vanagon													Eurovan																Routan
Pickup	Rabbit Pickup
Crossover																														Tiguan									Tiguan
Mid-sizeSUV																									Touareg							Touareg II							Atlas
Deutsche Arbeitsfront (founder) A marque of the Volkswagen Group 4motion Volkswagen Group of America, Inc. Electronics Research Laboratory North American Volkswagen engines

Volkswagen Passenger Cars, a marque of the Volkswagen Group, car timeline, South American market, 1980–present
Type	1980s										1990s										2000s										2010s
	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4
Economy car	Fusca (Type 1)													Fusca (Type 1)																					up!
	Gol / Parati I							Gol / Parati IF								Gol / Parati II				Gol / Parati / Gol Country III						Gol / Parati / Gol Country IV
	Brasilia / Variant II																												Gol V
		Voyage / Gacel I						Voyage / Amazon / Senda IF										Polo Classic (Polo III)												Voyage V
Supermini																								Fox / CrossFox
																											SpaceFox / Suran
																							Polo IV					Polo IVF
Small family car															Pointer			Golf III		Golf IV									Golf IVF						Golf VII
											Apollo			Logus						Bora / Clásico							Bora / Vento / Jetta V					Vento / Jetta VI
Large family car	Passat I															Passat IV			Passat V							Passat VI							Passat VII
					Santana / Corsar / Carat / Quantum I(Passat II)							Santana / Corsar / Carat / Quantum IF (Passat II)
Van																	Caddy III
Pickup truck					Saveiro I				Saveiro IF									Saveiro II			Saveiro III						Saveiro IV			Saveiro V
																																Amarok
Panel van	Kombi (Type 2)
Deutsche Arbeitsfront (founder) A marque of the Volkswagen Group 4motion Volkswagen do Brasil

Automotive industry in Germany
Automotive industry Economy of Germany Transport in Germany
Companies	Active vehicle producers BMW BMW i BMW Motorrad Borgward Group Daimler Mercedes-Benz Setra/EvoBus Smart Maybach Apollo Automobil Krauss-Maffei Rheinmetall RMMV Volkswagen Group Audi MAN RMMV Porsche Volkswagen Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles Foreign owned Ford of Europe Ford-Werke Iveco Magirus Opel Hyundai Europe Defunct vehicle producers Auto Union Borgward Brütsch DKW Horch NSU Wanderer Trabant Hansa Goliath North German Automobile and Engine Artega Automobile Fuldamobil Goggomobil Components ATR Behr Bosch ETAS Group BBS Bühler Motor Continental Dräxlmaier Group Dürr AG Getrag Hella Hermann Peters KSPG Löwe Automobil Mahle Mann+Hummel Petri Schaeffler Voith ZF Friedrichshafen ZF Sachs Motorsport and tuners Abt Sportsline AC Schnitzer Alpina Audi Sport AMG Bitter Brabus BMW M Carlsson G-Power Gemballa Hamann Motorsport Hartge Je Design Koenig Specials Mansory Opel Performance Center PPI Automotive Design Rieger Tuning Ruf Automobile Steinmetz Opel Tuning Services Daimler Financial Services Mercedes-Benz Bank Sixt
Related topics	ADAC AMI Leipzig ASAM DTM Frankfurt Motor Show German Association of the Automotive Industry Nürburgring
Defunct companies and marques above are shown in italics

 This page was last edited on 7 July 2018, at 01:14

AMBULANCES + HEARSES part XIX on Alphabet beginning with V(olga) till A

VOLGA

Rostov-on-Don, Russia – May 21,2017:Old car GAZ-22 “Volga” in the parking lot

Volga Ambulances and Hearses

VOLVO

Volvo Ambulances Hearses and ex-Hearses

SAMSUNG DIGIMAX 420

Digital StillCamera

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Digital StillCamera

All Volkswagen (ex) Ambulances and Hearses

Wanderer Ambulances – Krankenwagen

Wartburg Ambulance (and models)

Weller Brothers Coachbuilders of Ambulances

 White Motor Company Ambulances between 1904-1920

Kaiser WILLYS Overland Siebert Ambulances and Hearses

Wolseley Ambulances and (ex) Hearses

ZIL ambulances and hearses

ZIS Ambulances and Hearses

As far I know that were almost all ambulances and hearses that I could find on de WWW. Do you know more, let me please know.

Thanks for your interest. Greetings Jeroen

Trucks SCANIA – VABIS (1911-1968) and SCANIA 1891- 2015…..

Scania-Vabis

Scania-Vabis B3243 Bus 1927

Scania-Vabis 2122 1929

Scania-Vabis was a Swedish truck and car manufacturer that existed from 1911 to 1968. The company was formed when Scania merged with Vabis. Car production ended in 1929. Ultimately, the name Vabis was dropped in 1968.

History

Scania-Vabis L71 1957

Scania-Vabis Capitol 1962

The company’s name resulted from the merger of Maskinfabriksaktiebolaget Scania, which started out by manufacturing bicycles, and Vabis (Vagnfabriks Aktiebolaget iSödertälje), in 1911. Until 1929 the company manufactured cars in Södertälje, as well as trucks and buses in Malmö. Over the succeeding years, the company, based in Södertälje, developed a reputation for the toughness, comfort and reliability of its commercial vehicles. The 1963 forward-control LB76 forged Scania-Vabis’s reputation outside Sweden, being one of the first exhaustively crash-tested truck cabs.

Scania-Vabis LS5646 1967

Because there were many inexpensive, imported cars in Sweden at the time, Scania-Vabis decided to build high-class, luxury cars, for instance the type III limousine from 1920 that had a top hat holder in the roof. Prince Carl of Sweden owned a 1913 Scania-Vabis 3S, a type which was fitted with in-car buttons so the passenger could communicate with the driver. Scania-Vabis also built two-seat sports cars (or “sportautomobil”).

The company was involved in bus production from its earliest days, producing mail buses in the 1920s. Post-war the company introduced their B-series of buses, followed by the BF-series in the late 1950s.

Scania-Vabis at some point in their history also manufactured trucks in Argentina, Botswana, Brazil, South-Korea, Tanzania, the Netherlands, Zimbabwe and the United States.

For some time Daimler-Benz waged a ‘logo war’ with Scania-Vabis, claiming a possible confusion between the Scania-Vabis ‘pedal crank’ design featuring on Scania bicycles around 1900 and the Mercedes ‘three-pointed star’. In 1968 Daimler-Benz won and the Scania-Vabis logo changed to a simple griffin’s head on a white background, and ‘Vabis’ was dropped from the name.

Trucks

• Scania-Vabis CLb/CLc (1911–1927)
• Scania-Vabis DLa (1911–1926)
• Scania-Vabis ELa (1912–1926)
• Scania-Vabis FLa (1911–1924)
• Scania-Vabis GLa (1914–1923)
• Scania-Vabis 314/324/325 (1925–1936)
• Scania-Vabis 335/345/355 (1931–1944)
• Scania-Vabis L10/L40/L51 (1944–1959)
• Scania-Vabis L20/L60/L71 (1946–1958)
• Scania-Vabis L75/L76 (1958–1968)
• Scania-Vabis L55/L56/L66 (1959–1968)
• Scania-Vabis L36 (1964–1968)

Many historical Scania-Vabis vehicles (and also Vabis and Scania vehicles) are on display in the Marcus Wallenberg-hallen (the Scania Museum) in Södertälje.

Scania

Scania
Rechtsvorm	Naamloze vennootschap
Oprichting	1891
Eigenaar	Volkswagen AG
Sleutelfiguren	Martin Lundstedt (CEO)
Land	Zweden
Hoofdkantoor	Södertälje
Werknemers	42.019 (2014)
Producten	vrachtwagens
Sector	Transport
Industrie	Kapitaalgoederen
Omzet	SEK 92.051 miljoen (2014)
Winst	SEK 6.009 miljoen (2014)
Website	– Officiële website – Nederlandse website
Portaal Economie

SKF (waaruit later Volvo ontstond) test een nieuwe kogellager op een Scania in 1909.

Klassieke Scania

Moderne Scania

Nieuwe R500 serie

Scania-fabriek in Zwolle

Scania is een Zweeds merk van (motor)voertuigen, opgericht in 1891 in Malmö. Eerst bouwde het bedrijf fietsen, maar vanaf 1903 ook automobielen en in 1905 produceerde het zijn eerste vrachtwagen. In 1911 is het bedrijf samengegaan met Vagen Aktien Bolaget I Södertälje (Vabis) uit Södertälje.

Van 1969 tot 1995 maakte Scania samen met Saab deel uit van Saab-Scania AB.

Scania is een toonaangevende producent van zware bedrijfsauto’s, autobussen en motoren voor industrie en scheepvaart. De onderneming telt wereldwijd ruim 40.000 medewerkers, heeft meerdere productievestigingen in Europa en Latijns-Amerika en is vertegenwoordigd in meer dan 100 landen. De omzet over 2014 bedroeg ruim 90 miljard Zweedse kronen en de winst 6 miljard kronen. Er werden ruim 80.000 voertuigen verkocht. Het hoofdkantoor is gevestigd in Södertälje.

Geschiedenis

Vroege geschiedenis

In 1896 had de Engelse rijwielfabriek Humber & Co in Malmö een dochteronderneming opgericht, de Svenska Aktiebolaget Humber & Co. Rond 1900 werd deze overgenomen door een nieuw bedrijf Maskinfabrikaktiebolaget Scania i Malmö. Naast rijwielen werden andere producten geïntroduceerd waaronder ook de auto. Eerst assembleerde Scania vooral buitenlandse wagens, maar vanaf ongeveer 1905 kwamen er motoren en personen- en vrachtwagens van eigen ontwerp.

Het ontbrak aan financiële middelen om door te groeien en in 1910 ging de directie praten met concurrent Vabis, om tot een fusie te komen. Op 18 maart 1911 werd de fusie een feit. Het bedrijf kreeg de naam Scania-Vabis AB. De productie van vrachtwagens werd geconcentreerd in Malmö en Södertälje richtte zich op personenwagens. In 1913 verhuisde het hoofdkantoor naar Södertälje.

Tussen beide wereldoorlogen

Na het einde van de Eerste Wereldoorlog werd de markt overspoeld met oude militaire voertuigen. De verkoop van nieuwe voertuigen zakte in, Scania-Vabis kwam in financiële problemen en ging failliet. Onder Gunnar Lindmark maakte het bedrijf een doorstart en trad enig herstel op, maar de financiële draagkracht was beperkt en noodzaakte tot rationalisatie en specialisatie. In 1925 werd de productie van personenwagens beëindigd en in 1927 werd de fabriek in Malmö gesloten. Het accent werd ook verlegd van vrachtwagens naar autobussen. In de jaren dertig werden meer bussen dan vrachtwagens verkocht. In 1936 werden, in samenwerking met het Duitse bedrijf Magirus, de eerste eigen dieselmotoren uitgebracht. In de tweede helft van de jaren dertig was de familie Wallenberg de belangrijkste aandeelhouder van het bedrijf geworden. Carl-Bertel Nathhorst werd benoemd tot directeur en hij legde een ambitieus plan op tafel met focus op zware vrachtwagens, autobussen, standaardisering en export. Zijn plannen werden direct aanvaard maar door het uitbreken van de Tweede Wereldoorlog werd de uitvoering sterk vertraagd. De fabriek kreeg defensie opdrachten omdat Zweden neutraal was en geen wapens in het buitenland kon kopen. In juni 1941 kreeg Scania-Vabis opdracht voor de productie van 116 stuks Stridsvagn m/41. Deze tanks waren in licentie gebouwd en werden tussen december 1942 en juni 1943 geleverd.

Internationale expansie

In de jaren vijftig werd het bedrijf actiever buiten Zweden. In 1957 werd meer dan de helft van de productie geëxporteerd en 10 jaar later lag dit zelfs boven de 70%. Met de oprichting van de Europese Economische Gemeenschap in 1957 wilde het bedrijf ook binnen de unie actief zijn. In 1965 werd een assemblagebedrijf in Zwolle gevestigd, maar in 1962 was al een fabriek bij São Paulo in Brazilië geopend. In 1968 fuseerde Scania-Vabis met Saab, een bedrijf wat ook in handen was van de grootaandeelhouder Wallenberg. De combinatie ging verder onder de naam Saab-Scania. Het bedrijf werd in 1995 weer gesplitst en Scania ging zelfstandig verder. In het jaar 2000 rolde de 1 miljoenste vrachtwagen van Scania uit de fabriek. Verder verkocht Investor AB in datzelfde jaar twee derde van haar belang, 37 miljoen aandelen, in Scania aan Volkswagen AG. Volkswagen kreeg hiermee 18,7% van het kapitaal en 34% van het stemrecht in handen en werd daarmee de grootste aandeelhouder.

Overname

In augustus 2000 bracht Volvo een bod uit van ruim 13 miljard gulden op Scania. Volvo had al inmiddels 45% procent van de Scania aandelen in handen.Europees commissaris Mario Monti blokkeerde de transactie. Hij vond dat de twee producenten een te grote macht zouden krijgen in een aantal Europese markten. In Zweden zou de combinatie 93% van de markt verkrijgen en ook in Denemarken, Finland, Engeland en Ierland waren de marktaandelen tussen de 40% en 50% te groot.

Concurrent MAN AG deed in september 2006 een overnamebod op Scania van 9,6 miljard euro. Dit bod werd afgewezen door het bedrijf en door de familie Wallenberg, met 30% grootaandeelhouder. In oktober 2006 had MAN al 14% van de aandelen in handen en bracht een nieuw bod uit van meer dan 10 miljard euro. Volkswagen AG nam een belang van 15,1% in MAN om de overname te ondersteunen. Als de overname was doorgegaan zou de combinatie de grootste vrachtwagenproducent van Europa zijn geweest. De vijandelijke overname door het Duitse MAN stuitte niet op weerstand van de Europese Commissie, dit tot ongenoegen van de Zweden. Uiteindelijk trok MAN het bod in. Op 9 november 2011 kreeg Volkswagen een meerderheidsbelang in MAN. De belangen van MAN en Volkswagen in Scania mochten bij elkaar opgeteld worden. Volkswagen had nu – direct en middellijk via MAN – 89,2% van het stemrecht en 62,6% van het aandelenkapitaal van Scania in handen. Volkswagen streefde naar een driehoeksfusie met MAN en Scania.

In februari 2014 deed Volkswagen een bod van 6,7 miljard euro op de aandelen Scania die het nog niet bezat. De Duitsers boden 200 kronen per aandeel. Medio mei 2014 heeft Volkswagen 90,5% van de aandelen Scania verworven en kan nu via een uitrookprocedure de Zweedse vrachtwagenfabrikant van de beurs te halen en volledig eigenaar worden. De bedoeling is Scania nauwer te laten samenwerken met de eigen vrachtwagenactiviteiten van VW en met MAN.

Scaniaproductie in Nederland

Scania Production Zwolle B.V. is het belangrijkste Europese productiecentrum voor Scania vrachtauto‘s. In de fabriek te Zwolle worden de Scania’s volgens specificatie ‘op maat’ gebouwd en geassembleerd, zowel voor de Nederlandse distributeur als voor klanten in meer dan 60 andere landen.

Scania Production Zwolle B.V. werd in 1964 opgericht en is met ca. 1600 medewerk(st)ers thans de grootste industriële werkgever in de wijde regio. In 2002 werden door de Zwolse fabriek meer dan 20.000 trucks afgeleverd. Wereldwijd leverde Scania in 2002 bijna 44.000 trucks en bussen. Scania Production Zwolle B.V. produceert uitsluitend op order. Dat houdt in dat alle vrachtauto’s specifiek volgens de klanteneisen worden gebouwd. Op 25 september 2006 kwam de 400.000e in Zwolle geproduceerde vrachtwagen van de productielijn en in december 2010 de 500.000e.

In Meppel werden tussen 1963 en 2002 ruim 300.000 Scania-cabines geproduceerd. Die activiteit werd in 2002 geconcentreerd in Oskarshamn. Scania heeft sinds 2005 een nieuwe lakstraat in Meppel, waar vrachtwagencabines van bedrijfsspecifieke kleuren kunnen worden voorzien.

In april 2015 opende Scania een fabriek in Hasselt, waar de in Zwolle afgebouwde vrachtwagens klaar gemaakt worden voor de export.

Trucks

Bedrijfswagens

De bedrijfswagens van Scania bestaan uit trucks voor het transport. De typen trucks die Scania levert onderscheiden zich vooral ten aanzien van het transportdoel; zo zijn er trucks voor bijvoorbeeld de algemene lading en het voertuigtransport. Verder zijn er trucks bedoeld voor volumineuze ladingen die maximale laadruimte bieden. Voor de specifieke transportdoelen zoals de distributie, produceert Scania ook bakwagens, platforms, tankwagens en andere complete voertuigen. Scania heeft in 2004 een nieuw modellen lijn geïntroduceerd. Hierbij werd de benaming veranderd; voorheen werd het model aangeduid met een cijfer. Voor de R-serie en P-serie worden de cabines gebruikt van de voorganger, de 4-serie. Het interieur is compleet nieuw, het exterieur is licht gewijzigd.

R-serie en P-serie

De R-serie is voor de lange afstand, met een hooggeplaatste cabine ten behoeve van veel en functionele cabineruimte. De P-serie heeft in grote lijnen dezelfde cabine, deze is lager geplaatst wat ten goede komt aan een makkelijke instap, en is daar door meer geschikt voor het distributiewerk waarbij veel in- en uitgestapt wordt.

De letters R en P werden in de voorgaande modellen ook al gebruikt maar waren niet zichtbaar op de cabine aanwezig als een typebenaming.

In 2009 introduceerde Scania een facelift voor de cabine van de R en de G serie. Hierbij veranderde onder andere het aangezicht van de grille, bumper, sideskirts en werd onder andere de accubak verplaatst. Met de aankondiging van de nieuwe V8 motoren in 2010 waren ook weer enkele minieme aanpassingen in het uiterlijk te zien.

In 2013 werd het uiterlijk opnieuw aangepast met de introducering van de nieuwe “Streamline” cabine. Deels als eerbetoon aan de voorloper uit eind jaren 80, deels als poging de stroomlijn en het verbruik te reduceren. Waar het Streamline pakket ooit een optie was op de Scania 3-serie, zullen de aanpassingen aan de R-serie cabines standaard zijn.

Motoren

• 9 liter vijf cilinder lijnmotor: 230pk/1050Nm, 280pk/1400Nm en 320pk/1600Nm. (euro 5 motoren)
• 11 liter zes cilinder lijnmotor: 340pk/1600Nm
• 12 liter zes cilinder lijnmotor: 380pk/1900Nm,420pk/2100Nm en 470pk/2200Nm.
• 13 liter zes cilinder lijnmotor: 360pk/1850Nm,400pk/2100Nm,440pk/2300Nm en 480pk/2500Nm
• 16 liter acht cilinder V-motor: 500pk/2500Nm, 560pk/2700Nm en 620pk/3000Nm.
• 16,4 liter acht cilinder V-motor: 730pk/3.500Nm, ook al als EEV-motor leverbaar.

De 16 liter motor is voorbehouden aan de R-serie, vanwege ruimtegebrek in de motorruimte van de P-serie.

Cabines

Voor de P-serie is er een dagcabine, een slaapcabine met een plat dak en een slaapcabine met normaal dak. Voor de R-serie komt daarbij een slaapcabine met een verhoogd dak, de Highline, en een slaapcabine met een extra verhoogd dak, de Topline. Er zijn ook speciale cabine’s beschikbaar voor de dienstensector waaronder huisvuilwagens en brandweerwagens. De cabine’s worden gemaakt in de fabriek in Zweden, dit gebeurde voorheen in Meppel. Daarna gaan ze op transport naar Zwolle waar ze worden afgebouwd.

Bussen

Zescilinder Scania-Vabis /Medema uit 1953 van de DAM, nummer 119.

Viercilinder Scania-Vabis /Hainje uit 1956 van de NACO, nummer 2570.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Scania OmniLink van Arriva, nummer 7870.

Nederland

Scania Vabis-bussen hielpen direct na 1945 mee aan de wederopbouw van het Nederlands openbaar vervoer. Grote aantallen bussen van dit merk hebben in Nederland dienstgedaan. De vroegste exemplaren waren compleet opgebouwd in Zweden met carrosserieën van Hägglund; andere hadden een Nederlandse carrosserie, waarvan enkele honderden gebouwd waren door de vliegtuigfabriek Fokker naar een ontwerp van Verheul.

Ook in de jaren vijftig bleef Scania Vabis een geliefd merk voor bussen in het streekvervoer. Het ging daarbij zowel om het trambusmodel (BF-series) als om voorbesturingsbussen (B-series). Er werden motoren van 4, 5 en 6 cilinders toegepast. Carrosserieën werden vooral geleverd door Berkhof te Valkenswaard, Hainje, Den Oudsten en Verheul, maar ook door tal van kleinere carrosseriebedrijven.

In de jaren zestig raakte Scania in het Nederlandse openbaar vervoer buiten beeld. Pas in de jaren negentig ging Scania weer een (eerst nog bescheiden) rol spelen. In het eerste decennium van de 21ste eeuw begon Arriva weer op grotere schaal gebruik te maken van dit merk.

Via importeur Beers hebben touringcars van het merk Scania (Vabis) eveneens aftrek gevonden in Nederland.

N-serie en K-serie

De N-serie is de vervanger van de N94, waar de K-serie de L94/K94/K114 en K124 vervangt. Beide zijn geïntroduceerd in 2005. Hiermee werd de 60 graden gekanteld in de lengte richting geplaatste motor configuratie (L94) uit productie genomen. Tevens is bij de N-serie de motor rechtop geplaatst terwijl deze bij de N94 ook 60 gekanteld was.

De bussen werden op L94 en N94 chassis gebouwd, tegenwoordig op serie N en serie K chassis. De carrosserieën werden vroeger vervaardigd door Scania Katrineholm te Katrineholm en geasembleerd bij DAB te Silkeborg, Denemarken.

De carrosserieën worden vervaardigd door OMNI te Słupsk, Polen, Sint-Petersburg, Rusland en te Katrineholm, Sweden. Scania bouwt carrosserieën onder de naam Scania OmniCity, Scania OmniLink en Scania OmniExpress. Hiervoor worden de chassis N230, N270, N310, K230, K270 en K310 gebruikt. Producten voor zowel het stadsbus– als het streekbus-segment zijn verkrijgbaar.

Motoren

• 9 liter vijf cilinder lijnmotor: 230pk/1050Nm, 270pk/1250Nm en 310pk/1550Nm (N en K-serie).
• 12 liter zes cilinder lijnmotor: 340pk/1700Nm, 380pk/1900Nm, 420pk/2100Nm en 470pk/2200Nm (K-serie).

Motorfietsen

Scania motorfiets uit 1903

Scania produceerde in 1902 en 1903 een kleine motorfiets met een 143 cc Clement-Garrard–clip-on motor. Vanwege het geringe succes duurde de productie slechts ruim een jaar.

Resultaten

Scania produceert de laatste jaren zo’n 80.000 vrachtwagen en autobussen. In 2009 daalden de verkopen en winst scherp als een gevolg van de financieel economische crisis. Europa is de grootste afzetmarkt en vertegenwoordigt ongeveer de helft van de omzet van het bedrijf.

Hieronder een overzicht van de productie en financiële resultaten van het bedrijf sinds 2005:

Jaar	Vrachtwagen productie	Bus productie	Omzet (x SEK miljoen)	Nettoresultaat (x SEK miljoen)	Aantal werknemers
2005	53.368	6.141	63.328	4.665	30.765
2006	60.867	5.870	70.738	5.939	32.820
2007	71.017	7.314	84.486	8.554	35.096
2008	72.656	7.709	88.977	8.890	34.777
2009	29.573	6.236	62.074	1.129	32.330
2010	60.963	6.700	78.168	9.103	35.514
2011	75.349	8.708	87.686	9.422	37.496
2012	60.647	6.283	79.603	6.640	38.597
2013	75.957	6.897	86.847	6.194	40.953
2014	75.287	6.921	92.051	6.009	42.129

Scania AB

Scania Aktiebolag (publ)

Type	Publicly traded Aktiebolag
Industry	Automotive
Founded	Malmö, Sweden (1900)
Founder	Gustaf Erikson
Headquarters	Södertälje, Sweden
Number of locations	10
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Martin Winterkorn (Chairman), Martin Lundstedt (President and CEO), Jan Ytterberg (CFO)
Products	Commercial vehicles, diesel engines
Services	Financial services
Revenue	SEK 94.880 billion (2014)
Operating income	SEK 8.72 billion (2014)
Profit	SEK 6.009 billion (2014)
Total assets	SEK 133.037 billion(2014)
Total equity	SEK 41.801 billion (2014)
Number of employees	42,129 (2014)
Parent	Volkswagen Group
Website	scania.com

Scania Aktiebolag (publ), commonly referred to as Scania AB or just Scania, is a major Swedish automotive industry manufacturer of commercial vehicles – specifically heavy trucks and buses. It also manufactures diesel engines for motive power of heavy vehicles, marine, and general industrial applications.

Founded in 1891 in Malmö, in the Swedish province of Skåne, the company’s head office has been in Södertälje, in the province of Södermanland, since 1912. Today, Scania has production facilities in Sweden, France,Netherlands, Argentina, Brazil, Poland, and Russia. In addition, there are assembly plants in ten countries in Africa, Asia and Europe. Scania’s sales and service organisation and finance companies are worldwide. In 2012, the company employed approximately 42,100 people around the world. Scania was listed on the NASDAQ OMX Stockholm stock exchange from 1996 to 2014.

Scania’s logo shows a Griffin, from the coat of arms of the province of Scania (Swedish: Skåne).

History

Scania A1 1901

Scania Type A Tonneau 1903

A vintage Scania truck (L80 successor to the Scania-Vabis L56)

Scania AB (Scania is Latin for the province of Skåne) came from a merger between the two companies; Vabis and Scania.

Vabis and Scania

Main article: Scania-Vabis

Vabis (Vagnsfabriksaktiebolaget i Södertälje) was founded in 1891 as a subsidiary of Södertälje based steel company Surahammars Bruk, manufacturing railway carriages. In 1902, engineer Gustaf Erikson designed the company’s first truck, powered by a petrol engine and two-speed gearbox. A year later, the first order was placed for a Vabis commercial vehicle. By 1907, the company had developed a 3-ton truck, however, though it won a Swedish Royal Automobile Club award in 1909, the new range was a financial disaster for the company, failing to attract more than a handful of orders.

Maskinfabriks-aktiebolaget Scania was founded in 1900 in Malmö in the south of Sweden, and was in the beginning a manufacturer of bicycles, but by 1903 the first cars left the factory. Two years later, Scania built their first truck.

Following the financial problems at Vabis, the companies merged in 1911, creating AB Scania-Vabis. Engine and car production was moved to Södertälje, and truck production took place in Malmö.

First World War and 1920s

For the next few years the company’s profits stagnated, with around a third of their orders coming from abroad. The outbreak of the First World War, however, changed the company, with almost all output being diverted to the Swedish Army. By 1916, Scania-Vabis was making enough profit to invest in redeveloping both of their production facilities.

Following the war, in 1919, Scania decided to focus completely on building trucks, abandoning other outputs including cars and buses. However, they were hurt by the swamping of the market with decommissioned military vehicles from the war, and by 1921 the company was bankrupt.

After some economic difficulties in 1921, new capital came from Stockholms Enskilda Bank owned by the Wallenberg family, and Scania-Vabis became a solid and technically, high standing, company.

Denmark

Towards the end of 1913, the company established a subsidiary in Denmark. The following year the first Danish-built car, a four-seater Phaeton, was built at the company’s Frederiksberg factory in Copenhagen. In 1914, the factory produced Denmark’s first Scania-Vabis truck, and following this developed a V8 engine, one of the first in the world. In 1921, having sold around 175 trucks, and 75 cars, the Danish operation was closed down.

1930s and 1940s

During the Second World War Scania produced a variety of military vehicles for the Swedish Army, including Stridsvagn m/41 light tanks produced under license.

1950s and 1960s

During the 1950s, the company expanded its operations into new customer segments, becoming agents for the Willys Jeep and the Volkswagen Beetle, the latter being very profitable for Scania-Vabis. It also started to become a genuine competitor to Volvo with their new Regent truck which was introduced in 1954.

During this period, Scania-Vabis expanded its dealer network and country-wide specialist workshop facilities. By the end of the 1950s, their market-share in Sweden was between 40 to 50%, and was achieving 70% in the heaviest truck sector – helped by the entrepreneurial efforts of their dealers into the haulier market.

Probably their largest impact was in export markets. Before 1950, exports accounted for only 10 percent of production output, but a decade later, exports were now at 50% of output. Beers in the Netherlands became a very important partner. Beers became official importers for Scania-Vabis in the Netherlands, and established a dealer network, along with training programmes for both mechanics and drivers. Beers also offered free twice-yearly overhauls of their customers vehicles, and offered a mobile service throughout the Netherlands with their custom-equipped service trucks. Due to Beers concerted efforts, Scania-Vabis market share in the country remained at a consistent 20% throughout this period. Scania-Vabis were to adopt the business model of Beers in their own overseas sales operations.

NCA001000398, 13-08-2007, 16:24, 8C, 7336×8262 (662+884), 100%, NCAD, 1/80 s, R42.6, G11.4, B8.9

The 1960s saw Scania-Vabis expanding its production operations into overseas locations. Until now, all Scania-Vabis production had been carried out solely at Södertälje, but the 1960s saw the need to expand production overseas. Brazil was becoming a notable market for heavy trucks, and was also dependent on inter-urban buses, with particular requirement for Brazil’s mountainous roads which became nigh-on impassable at times. Scania-Vabis products had already been assembled in Brazil by a local company called Vemag, but Scania Vabis do Brasil, S.A. became an independent operation in July 1960. Scania-Vabis established its first production plant outside Södertälje, by building a new facility at São Bernardo do Campo in Brazil, which was completed in 1962, and this was to set the standard for Scania-Vabis international operations.

Closer to home, the recently formed European Economic Community (EEC) offered further opportunities. Based on their now strong presence in the Dutch markets, Scania-Vabis constructed a new plant in Zwolle, which was completed in 1964. This new Dutch facility provided Scania-Vabis with a stepping stone into the other five EEC countries, particularly the German and French markets.

In 1966, Scania-Vabis acquired ownership of a then valuable competitor – Be-Ge Karosserifabrik, who were based in Oskarshamn. Be-Ge had been making truck cabs since 1946, and had been supplying cabs not only to Scania-Vabis, but also to their Swedish competitors Volvo. It was normal practice for truck manufacturers to outsource production of cabs to independent bodybuilders, so their acquisition by Scania-Vabis seemed a good move. Be-Ge owner Bror Göthe Persson had also established an additional cab factory at Meppel.

Scania-Vabis continued their expansion of production facilities through acquisitions. In 1967, they acquired Katrineholm based coachwork company Svenska Karosseri Verkstäderna, and created a new subsidiary, Scania-Bussar. A year later, all bus production, along with R&D was moved to Katrineholm. Further production locations were added at Sibbhult and Falun, and Scania’s employee numbers rose, particularly at Södertälje, which was to help double the town’s population.

Saab-Scania AB (1969–1995)

In 1969, Scania-VABIS merged with Saab AB, and formed Saab-Scania AB. When Saab-Scania was split in 1995, the name of the truck and bus division changed simply to Scania AB. One year later, Scania AB was introduced on the stock exchange, which resulted in a minor change of name to Scania AB (publ).

Many examples of Scania, Vabis and Scania-Vabis commercial and military vehicles can be seen at the Marcus Wallenberg-hallen (the Scania Museum) in Södertälje.

Ownership

Aborted Volvo takeover

On 7 August 1999, Volvo announced it had agreed to acquire a majority share in Scania. Volvo was to buy the 49.3% stake in Scania that was owned by Investor AB, Scania’s then main shareholder. The acquisition, for $7.5 billion (60.7 billion SEK), would have created the world’s second-largest manufacturer of heavy trucks, behind DaimlerChrysler. The cash for the deal came from Volvo selling its car division to Ford Motor Company in January 1999, but the deal had yet to be approved by the European Union.

The deal eventually failed, after the European Union had disapproved of the affair, saying it would create a company with almost 100% market share in the Nordic markets.

Aborted MAN takeover

In September 2006, the German truckmaker MAN AG launched a €10.3bn hostile offer to acquire Scania AB. Scania’s CEO Leif Östling was forced to apologise for comparing the bid of MAN to a “Blitzkrieg“. MAN AG later dropped its hostile offer, but in January 2008, MAN increased their voting rights in Scania up to 17%.

Scania ownership today

The two major stockholders of Scania AB (publ) are:

• The German automotive company Volkswagen AG is Scania’s biggest shareholder, with a 70.94% voting stake (equity) in Scania. It gained this by first buying Volvo’s stake in 2000, after the latter’s aborted takeover attempt, increasing it to 36.4% in the first quarter 2007, and then buying the remainder from Investor AB in March 2008. The deal was approved by regulatory bodies in July 2008. Scania then became the ninth marque in the Volkswagen Group.
• The German truck manufacturer MAN SE holds a 17.37% voting stake in Scania. Notably, Volkswagen AG also owns 75.03% of MAN.

Current shareholders

Scania AB (publ) has a total issue of 400 million ‘A shares’ and 400 million ‘B shares’, with a total capitalised value of SEK 72,880 million. In terms of voting rights, one ‘A share’ is eligible for one vote, whereas 10 ‘B shares’ are required for one vote.

As of 29 January 2010, these shares, as published by Swedish Central Securities Depository and Clearing Organisation (“Euroclear“), are allocated to 119,973 owners, and the table below details the top ten shareholders.

Scania AB (publ) principal shareholders

shareholder name	A shares	B shares	% of capital	% of votes
Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft *	306,232,239	59,037,822	45.66	70.94
MAN SE	73,047,179	33,718,857	13.35	17.37
Clearstream Banking	1,170,514	32,973,450	4.27	1.02
JP Morgan Chase Bank	461,584	36,220,219	4.59	0.93
Swedbank Robur Fonder	0	29,043,665	3.63	0.66
Skandia Liv	974,374	9,646,318	1.33	0.44
Alecta Pensionsförsäkring	0	19,085,000	2.39	0.33
AMF Försäkring och fonder	650,000	9,678,411	1.23	0.36
Handelsbanken fonder	0	7,202,362	0.90	0.16
The Government Pension Fund of Norway	0	6,937,665	0.87	0.16
largest 10 owners	382,535,890	243,021,708	78.19	92.46
Others	17,464,110	156,978,292	21.81	7.54
total ownership	400,000,000	400,000,000	100.00	100.00

* Further to the shares listed above, Volkswagen AG also holds shares in trust by a credit institution of Scania, which gives additional voting rights amounting to 0.87 percent and an equity interest of 3.63 percent attributable to Volkswagen AG, as disclosed in January 2009.

Products

Scania develops, manufactures and sells trucks with a gross vehicle weight of more than 16 tonnes (Class 8), intended for long-distance haulage, regional, and local distribution of goods, as well as construction haulage.

Scania’s bus range is concentrated on bus chassis, intended for use in tourist coaches, as well as urban and intercity traffic.

Scania’s industrial and marine engines are used in generator sets and in earthmoving and agricultural machinery, as well as on board ships and pleasure crafts.

Scania also designs and manufacture clothes especially designed for truckers under the label Scania Truck Gear.

Current

Scania R470 truck

The new Scania R500

Scania P270 Fire Engine, Dublin Fire Brigade, Ireland

Scania K230UB owned by SBS Transit Pte Ltd.

Trucks and special vehicles

• P-series – typical applications are regional and local distribution, construction, and various specialised operations associated with locally based transportation and services. P-series trucks have the new P cabs, which are available in three variations: a single-berth sleeper, a spacious day cab and a short cab
• G-series – the G-series models offer an enlarged range of options for operators engaged in national long haul and virtually all types of construction applications. All models have a G cab, and each is available as a tractor or rigid. The G-series truck comes with five cab variants: three sleepers, a day cab and a short cab. There are different axle configurations, and in most cases a choice of chassis height and suspension
• R-series – the R-series model range debuted in 2004, and won the prestigious International Truck of the Year award in 2005 and again in 2010. The range offers various trucks optimised for long haulage. All models have a Scania R cab, and each vehicle is available as a tractor or rigid. There are different axle configurations and a choice of chassis height and suspension. The Scania R730 is the most powerful variant of the R-series. Its 16.4 Liter DC16 Turbo Diesel V8 engine produces 730 PS (540 kW; 720 hp) at 1,900 rpm and 3,500 N·m (2,600 lb·ft) of torque at 1,000–1,350 rpm.

The R series also came as a limited edition ‘+’ the most common being the R420+ with 100 being sold across Europe. This came with a newer opti-cruise gearbox with a trial gear ratio. It also came with an added microwave from the dealer. It’s believed the sales were mainly in Sweden, but as many as 10 per country elsewhere.

• T-series – the T-series is the R-series with nose, and have the same engine.

Buses

Main article: Scania buses

• F-series – front engine bus chassis with Euro III and Euro V compliant engines
• K-series – rear engine bus chassis (longitudinal mounted) with Euro III – Euro VI compliant engines
• N-series – rear engine bus chassis (transversal mounted) with Euro III – Euro VI compliant engines
• OmniLink (CK-series) – citybus using the K-series chassis
• OmniCity (CN-series) – citybus using the N-series chassis
• OmniExpress (LK-series) – intercity coach using the K-series chassis
• Citywide LE/Citywide LF – new citybus range superseded the OmniCity and OmniLink in left-hand-drive markets, using respectively the N-series and K-series chassis

Diesel engines

Scania’s involvement with internal combustion engine production dates back to 1897, when engineer Gustav Erickson designed the engine for the company’s first motor car. Over the subsequent years, Scania has grown to be one of the world’s most experienced engine manufacturers, building engines not only for trucks and buses, but also for marine and general industrial applications, which are exported across the globe.

Historical

http://myntransportblog.com/2014/05/27/buses-scania-vabis-sweden/

Scania K113TRBL 14.5m quad-axle coach

Ikarus E99 on Scania K124EB chassis

Buses

• BF80 series
• BF110/CF110 series
• BR110/CR110 series
• BF111 series
• BR111/CR111 series (BR111DH was built as Metropolitan in UK)
• BR112/CR112 series
• BR85/CR85 series
• BR145/CR145 series
• BF86 series
• BR86 series
• BR116 series
• 2-series: S82, F82, K82, K92, S112, F112, N112, K112
• 3-series: F93, K93, S113, F113, N113, L113, K113
• 4-series: F94, N94, L94, K94, K114, K124
• OmniLine (IL94IB) – intercity bus
• OmniLink (CL94UA/CL94UB) – rear inclined engined citybus
• OmniCity (CN94UA/CN94UB) – transverse engined citybus
• OmniCity (CN94UD) – transverse engined double-deck citybus

Trucks and special vehicles

• 0-series: 110, 140 (1968–74)
• 1-series: 111, 141 (1974–81)
• 2-series: 82, 92, 112, 142 (1981–88)
• 3-series: 93, 113, 143 (1987–95)
• 4-series: 94, 114, 124, 144, 164 (1995–2004)
• T-series (2004–5) – successor of 4-series T-models

Diesel engines

• DS11/DSC11 inline 6
• DS14/DSC14 V8 engine

Production sites

The table below shows the locations of the current and former production facilities of Scania AB. As Scania is now majority owned by Volkswagen AG, making it part of Volkswagen Group, the table also includes Volkswagen Group references.

Notes: the second column of the table, the ‘factory VIN ID code’, is indicated in the 11th digit of the vehicles’ 17 digit Vehicle Identification Number, and this factory code is only assigned to plants which produce actual vehicles. Component factories which do not produce complete vehicles do not have this factory ID code.

Next follows my collection of photographs:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

scania T-143

NCA001000398, 13-08-2007, 16:24, 8C, 7336×8262 (662+884), 100%, NCAD, 1/80 s, R42.6, G11.4, B8.9

NSU Motorenwerke AG Neckarsulm Germany

NSU Motorenwerke   

NSU Motorenwerke AG, normally just NSU, was a German manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles and pedal cycles, founded in 1873. It was acquired by Volkswagen Group in 1969. VW merged the company with Auto Union, to eventually evolve into Audi as it is known today.

History

 NSU 6/18 PS Doppelphaeton 1913

NSU 6/30 (1928)

NSU Max Standard

NSU originated as the “Mechanische Werkstätte zur Herstellung von Strickmaschinen”, a knitting machine manufacturer established in 1873 by Christian Schmidt, a technically astute entrepreneur, in the town of Riedlingen on the Danube. The business relocated in 1880 to Neckarsulm, where the river Sulm flows into the Neckar. There followed a period of rapid growth and in 1886 the company began to produce bicycles, the first of them branded as the “Germania”. By this time, the company was named Neckarsulm Strickmaschinen Union. By 1892, bicycle manufacturing had completely replaced knitting machine production. At about this time, the name NSU appeared as a brand name.

The first NSU motorcycle appeared in 1901, followed by the first NSU car in 1905.

In 1932, under pressure from the bank, NSU recognised the failure of their attempt to break into volume automobile production, and their recently built car factory in Heilbronn was sold to Fiat, who used the plant to assemble Fiat models for the German market.

During World War II NSU produced the Kettenkrad, the NSU HK101, a half-tracked motorcycle with the engine of the Opel Olympia. They also made the 251 OSL motorcycle during the war.

After WW II

In December 1946 Das Auto reported the company had resumed the manufacture of bicycles and motor-bicycles at Neckarsulm. For Germany this was a time of new beginnings: in July 1946, a new board had been appointed, headed up by General Director Walter Egon Niegtsch, who earlier in his career had spent 17 years with Opel.

NSU motorbike production restarted, in a completely destroyed plant, with pre-war designs like the Quick, OSL and Konsul motorbikes; furthermore, the HK101 continued to be sold by NSU as an all-terrain vehicle in a civilian version. The first post-war model was the NSU Fox in 1949, available in a 2-stroke and a 4-stroke version. In 1953 the NSU Max followed, a 250 cc motorbike with a unique overhead camdrive with connecting rods. All these new models had an innovative monocoque frame of pressed steel and a central rear suspension unit. Albert Roder, the chief engineer behind the success story, made it possible that in 1955 NSU became the biggest motorcycle producer in the world. NSU also holds four world records for speed: 1951, 1953, 1954, and 1955. In August 1956 Wilhelm Herz at the Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, became the first man to ride a motorcycle faster than 200 mph (322 km/h).

In 1957 NSU re-entered the car market with the new Prinz (Prince), a small car with a doubled NSU Max engine, an air-cooled two-cylinder engine of 600 cc (37 cu in) and 20 hp (15 kW). Motorbike production continued until 1968. NSU’s last production motorcycle was the Quick 50.

In 1964 NSU offered the world’s first Wankel engined car: the Wankelspider. In development of the project, NSU built the Sport Prinz, with a 129 hp (96 kW) 995 cc (60.7 cu in) 2-rotor. In the same year Prinz 1000 and derivatives like the TT and TT/S followed. The Typ 110 (later called 1200SC) was launched in 1965 as a family car with a more spacious body design. The last NSU cars with a conventional four-stroke engine had the air-cooled OHC four-cylinder engine in common. The car was marketed in the U.K. as “NSU TYP 110”, and Karobes, a major supplier of car accessories, provided a head rest specially for this car: “A new one which can be fitted without a screw, and may be adjusted forwards and backwards.”

In 1967, the four-door NSU Ro 80, with a 115 hp (86 kW) version of the same 2-rotor, was presented to public. Weighing 2,600 lb (1,200 kg), it had a C_d of 0.36, disc brakes, independent suspension, and front wheel drive by Fichtel & Sachs Saxomatic three-speed transmission. It soon gained several design awards such as “car of the year 1967”, while drivers liked its performance. Virtually all the world’s major motor manufacturers purchased licenses from NSU to develop and produce the rotary engine, with the notable exception of BMW.

Despite its public acclaim, sales of the Ro 80 were disappointing. The transmission drew complaints and the engine suffered numerous failures even at low mileage. Competitor automakers, apart from Mazda, held back from taking a lead in developing and marketing the Wankel technology, and anticipated income associated with those royalty deals failed to materialize.

Volkswagen Group takeover

The development of the rotary engine was very cost-intensive for the small company. Problems with the tip seals of the engine rotor significantly damaged the brand’s reputation amongst consumers. In 1969, the company was taken over by Volkswagenwerk AG, who merged NSU with Auto Union. The new company was called Audi NSU Auto Union AG and represented the effective end of the NSU marque with all future production to bear the Audi badge (although retaining the four interlocking circles of Auto Union). The management of the Neckarsulm plant moved to Audi’s headquarters in Ingolstadt. When the small rear-engined NSU models (Prinz 4, 1000, 1200) were phased out in 1973, the Ro 80 was the last car still in production carrying the NSU badge. Audi never made use of the brand name NSU again after April 1977, when the last Ro 80 was sold.

Even as production of the Ro 80 continued in the Neckarsulm plant, production of larger Audi models like 100 and 200 was started. The Porsche 924 and later Porsche 944 were also assembled at Neckarsulm. Those models were joint venture projects of Porsche and VW, but Porsche did not have the internal capacity to build the 924 and 944. Currently, Neckarsulm is the production plant for Audi’s topline vehicles like A6, A8 and R8. It is also the home of the “Aluminium- und Leichtbauzentrum” where Audi’s aluminium-made space frame bodies are designed and engineered.

NSU is primarily remembered today as the first licensee and one of only three automobile companies to produce cars for sale with rotary Wankel engines. NSU invented the principle of the modern Wankel engine with an inner rotor. The NSU Ro 80 was the second mass-produced two-rotor Wankel-powered vehicle after the Mazda Cosmo. In 1967, NSU and Citroën set up a common company, Comotor, to build engines for Citroën and other car makers. Norton made motorcycles using Wankel engines. Only Mazda has continued developing the Wankel engine and made several more cars with the Wankel Engine.

A museum in Neckarsulm, the Deutsches Zweirad- und NSU-Museum, has many of NSU’s products on display.

Lawn mower engine

In the early 1970s, NSU manufactured a vertical-crankshaft small engine for use as a lawn mower power unit.

NSU cars

1958 NSU Prinz 30 (Audi Forum Neckarsulm)

NSU Wankel Spider 1964 – 1967

1961 NSU Prinz 4

 1970 NSU P10, made by Nordex S.A. in Uruguay

NSU produced the following post – war cars:

• NSU Prinz I, II, 30 and III (1957–1962)
• NSU Sport Prinz (1959–1967)
• NSU Prinz 4, 4L (1961–1972)
• NSU Prinz 1000, NSU 1000 (1964–1972)
• NSU 1000 TT, NSU TT, NSU TTS (1965–1972)
• NSU Typ 110, NSU 1200 (1965–1972)
• NSU Spider (1964–1967)
• NSU Ro 80 (1967–1977)
• NSU K70, produced after VW/Audi takeover as the Volkswagen K70 (1970–1975)

NSU motorcycles

Neckarsulm 1,25 HP 1908

NSU 3 PS 1911

NSU 1913

NSU Fox (1952)

NSU Lux (1952)

NSU Quickly 50 c.c. T/S MOPED(1953)

NSU Rennmax G.P. 250 O.H.C. TWIN (1953)

NSU Rennfox G.P. 125 O.H.C. TWIN (1954)

NSU Rennmax G.P. 250 O.H.C. TWIN (1954)

NSU Superlux 250 c.c. T/S SINGLE(1955)

NSU Sportmax G.P. 250 O.H.C. SINGLE(1956)

Sidecar (Germany, 2002)

NSU 1000

NSU 500

NSU 2000

In 1907, British manager Martin Geiger rode an NSU in the inaugural Isle of Man TT, placing fifth. NSU had several successes in the Isle of Man TT races in the 1950s. NSU holds 4 World records for speed: 1951, 1953, 1954 and 1955. During the 1930s, and in the mid 1950s NSU was the largest motorcycle producer of the world.

The NSU Quickly was the most popular moped of its time. It was produced between 1953 and 1966 in over 1,000,000 examples and still can be found today all over the world as more than 60% were exported.

NSU bicycles

Bicycle production began in 1900 and continued into the early 1960s.

NSU (fabrikant)

Neckarsulmer Motorrad 5 ½ pk met 670 cc V-twin kop/zijklepmotor met snuffelklepen uit 1907

Deze (Australische) NSU 3½ pk (410 cc) eencilinder kop/zijklepper uit 1908 heeft al een gecommandeerde inlaatklep. Hier blijkt ook de reden voor de naamswijziging: “Neckarsulm” is voor een Australiër moeilijk uit te spreken

NSU Heere-Modell (500 cc) uit 1917

NSU 501 (500 cc) uit 1928

NSU 501 T (500 cc) uit 1930

Het blok van deze NSU 500 SS uit 1932 is eigenlijk gewoon een Norton CS 1

NSU Rennfox uit 1952

NSU Lux uit 1952

NSU Max Standard uit 1955/56

NSU Hercules W2000 uit 1975

NSU was een Duitse fabrikant van breimachines, en later auto‘s en motorfietsen. Het bedrijf werd in 1873 opgericht, en in 1969 door Volkswagen AG overgenomen.

Historie

In 1873 gingen Christian Schmidt (1845-1884) en Heinrich Stoll een samenwerkingsverband aan. Schmidt was vaardig in mechanica. Het duo begon in Riedlingen an der Donau in een watermolen met de Mechanische Werkstätte zur Herstellung von Strickmaschinen (mechanische werkplaats voor de vervaardiging van breimachines). Toen de fabriek naar een nieuwe, grotere locatie zocht, kwam men in Neckarsulm terecht, waar de waterkracht van Neckar en Sulm kon worden gebruikt. De naam van de nieuwe fabriek werd Neckarsulmer Strickmaschinen-Fabrik AG.

Na het overlijden van Schmidt in 1884 kwam de fabriek in handen van zijn zwager Gottlob Banzhaf (1858-1930) die in 1886 besloot over te stappen op de fabricage van tweewielers. Banzhaf zag potentieel in het nieuwe vervoermiddel, en verwachtte met fietsen meer geld te kunnen verdienen dan met breimachines. De “Germania”, een vélocipède, was het eerste product na de omschakeling, en vanaf 1888 legde men zich toe op de fabricage van lagere fietsen.

De bedrijfsnaam was Neckarsulmer Fahrradwerke AG, later NSU Vereinigte Fahrzeugwerke, NSU Werke Aktiengesellschaft en NSU Motorenwerke AG.

In 1901 produceerde men de eerste motorfiets met 1½ pk Zedel–clip-on motor. Al snel werden eigen motorblokken ontwikkeld. De machines werden aanvankelijk onder de naam Neckarsulm of Neckarsulmer Motorrad verkocht, maar deze naam was met name voor de Engelse klanten niet uit te spreken, daarom werd het al snel NSU, waarvoor de letters genomen werden uit de naam van de standplaats: NeckarSUlm. In 1905 werd de eerste auto gefabriceerd, in licentie van het Belgische merk Pipe.
Met haar motofietsen behaalde NSU grote racesuccessen en veel wereldberoemde coureurs reden ooit op een NSU. Na de overgang van Walter William Moore van Norton naar NSU gingen de motoren er erg “Engels” uitzien.

Tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog produceerde NSU uiteraard militair materieel, waaronder het bekende Kettenkrad dat tot 1949 werd geproduceerd. In 1949 begon men weer civiele motorfietsen te bouwen, maar al eerder, in 1947 werd een contract gesloten met Innocenti om de Lambretta–scooters in licentie te produceren. Aanvankelijk waren dit in Italië geproduceerde scooters die licht aangepast werden, maar in 1951 werden ze geheel in Duitsland gebouwd. Deze scooter-productie eindigde in 1959.

In de jaren vijftig vierde NSU triomfen op de racecircuits met de revolutionaire 125 cc en 250 cc racemotoren. Het revolutionaire was gelegen in de nokkenasaandrijving door middel van twee excentrische drijfstangen. In 1957 deed NSU de motorfietsproductie gedeeltelijk over naar deJoegoslavische Pretis-fabriek om zich meer op de automarkt te kunnen concentreren. Wel werden er nog een tijdje Lambretta–scooters gebouwd, en daarna nog de NSU Prima-scooter. In 1965 werd de motorfietsenproductie beëindigd.

De grootste bekendheid genoot NSU met de NSU Ro 80 (1967). Deze auto was voorzien van een dubbelschijfs wankelmotor. Aanvankelijk hadden de motoren echter veel problemen. Omdat NSU een garantie van vijf jaar op de motoren gaf zorgde dit voor hoge kosten. In 1969 werd NSU overgenomen door Volkswagen, waarna het merk werd samengevoegd met Auto-Union. De combinatie ging verder als Audi NSU Auto Union AG en werd in 1985 omgedoopt in Audi.

Automodellen

NSU Prinz 4

NSU Wankel Spider

NSU Prinz 30

NSU 6/30 uit 1928

• NSU Prinz (IV) (1958-1962)
• NSU Prinz 1000 (1965-1972)
• NSU Sport-Prinz (op basis van de Prinz IV – Carrossier Bertone)
• NSU 1200
• NSU Ro 80 (1967-1977)

Trivia

• NSU gebruikte de slagzin Vorsprung durch Technik (“Voorsprong door Techniek”), die tegenwoordig doorAudi wordt gebezigd.

Spot- en bijnamen

“Blauwe Walvis”: NSU Rennfox

NSU Rennfox 125 R 11 1954: De Blauwe Walvis (deze racemotor was voorzien van een grote blauwe stroomlijn die ook het voorwiel omsloot).

NSU (algemeen): Na Starten Uitgeput, Nooit Slechter Uitgevonden, Nooit Sneller Uitgevonden, NortonSpareparts Used (GB). (De laatste spotnaam ontstond toen ontwerper Walter William Moore van Norton naar NSU ging).

Maar natuurlijk is er ook een positieve afkorting als bijnaam: Nooit Sukkelt U.

Externe links

• Das NSU-Museum, Deutsches Zweirad- und NSU-Museum Neckarsulm
• NSU site van J Rijkers
• NSU Club Nederland
• NSU Vrienden website

VOLKSWAGEN BUSES, COACHES, TRUCKs and VANS GERMANY + world

Volkswagen 

Buses, Coaches, Trucks and Vans

VW Argentina, VW Australia, VW Brazil, VW Mexico.

Volkswagen Type 2
Overview
Manufacturer	Volkswagen
Also called	Volkswagen Bus Volkswagen Camper Volkswagen Delivery Van Volkswagen Kombi Volkswagen Microbus Volkswagen Pick-up Volkswagen Transporter
Production	Nov 1949–Dec 2013
Body and chassis
Class	Van (Minibus)
Body style	4-door panel van 4-door minibus 2-door pickup (regular cab) 3-door pickup (crew cab)
Layout	Longitudinal rear engine, rear-wheel drive
Platform	Volkswagen Group T platform
Chronology
Successor	Volkswagen Type 2 (T3)

 A “Camper” at The Henry Ford

 Custom-painted art bus

 T1 Panel Van

 1964 T1 Panel Van

The Volkswagen Type 2, known officially (depending on body type) as the Transporter, Kombi or Microbus, or, informally, as the Bus (US) or Camper (UK), is a panel van introduced in 1950 by the German automaker Volkswagen as its second car model. Following – and initially deriving from Volkswagen’s first model, the Type 1 (Beetle) – it was given the factory designation Type 2.

As one of the forerunners of the modern cargo and passenger vans, the Type 2 gave rise to forward control competitors in the United States in the 1960s, including the Ford Econoline, the Dodge A100, and the Chevrolet Corvair 95 Corvan, the latter adopting the Type 2’s rear-engine configuration. European competition included the 1960s FF layout Renault Estafette and the FR layout Ford Transit.

Like the Beetle, the van has received numerous nicknames worldwide, including the “microbus”, “minibus”, and, because of its popularity during the counterculture movement of the 1960s, “Hippie van”.

Brazil contained the last factory in the world that produced the T2. Production in Brazil ceased on December 31, 2013, due to the introduction of more stringent safety regulations in the country. This marks the end of an era with the rear-engine Volkswagens manufactured (after the 2002 termination of its T3 successor in South Africa), which first originated in 1935 with their Type 1 prototypes.

History

The concept for the Type 2 is credited to Dutch Volkswagen importer Ben Pon. (It has similarities in concept to the 1920s Rumpler Tropfenwagen and 1930s Dymaxion car by Buckminster Fuller, neither of which reached production.) Pon visited Wolfsburg in 1946, intending to purchase Type 1s for import to the Netherlands, where he saw an improvised parts-mover and realized something better was possible using the stock Type 1 pan. He first sketched the van in a doodle dated April 23, 1947, proposing a payload of 690 kg (1,520 lb) and placing the driver at the very front. Production would have to wait, however, as the factory was at capacity producing the Type 1.

When capacity freed up, a prototype known internally as the Type 29 was produced in a short three months. The stock Type 1 pan proved to be too weak so the prototype used a ladder chassis with unit body construction. Coincidentally the wheelbase was the same as the Type 1’s. Engineers reused the reduction gear from the Type 81, enabling the 1.5 ton van to use a 25 hp (19 kW) flat four engine.

Although the aerodynamics of the first prototypes were poor (with an initial drag coefficient of Cd=0.75), engineers used the wind tunnel at the Technical University of Braunschweig to optimize the design. Simple changes such as splitting the windshield and roofline into a “vee” helped the production Type 2 achieve Cd=0.44, exceeding the Type 1’s Cd=0.48. Volkswagen’s new chief executive officer Heinz Nordhoff (appointed 1 January 1948) approved the van for production on 19 May 1949 and the first production model, now designated Type 2, rolled off the assembly line to debut 12 November. Only two models were offered: the Kombi (with two side windows and middle and rear seats that were easily removable by one person), and the Commercial. The Microbus was added in May 1950, joined by the Deluxe Microbus in June 1951. In all 9,541 Type 2s were produced in their first year of production.

An ambulance model was added in December 1951 which repositioned the fuel tank in front of the transaxle, put the spare tire behind the front seat, and added a “tailgate“-style rear door. These features became standard on the Type 2 from 1955 to 1967. 11,805 Type 2s were built in the 1951 model year. These were joined by a single-cab pickup in August 1952, and it changed the least of the Type 2s until all were heavily modified in 1968.

Unlike other rear engine Volkswagens, which evolved constantly over time but never saw the introduction of all-new models, the Transporter not only evolved, but was completely revised periodically with variations retrospectively referred to as versions “T1” to “T5” (a nomenclature only invented after the introduction of the front-drive T4 which replaced the T25). However only generations T1 to T3 (or T25 as it is still called in Ireland and Great Britain) can be seen as directly related to the Beetle (see below for details).

The Type 2, along with the 1947 Citroën H Van, are among the first ‘forward control’ vans in which the driver was placed above the front roadwheels. They started a trend in Europe, where the 1952 GM Bedford CA, 1958 RAF-977, 1959 Renault Estafette, 1960 BMC Morris J4, and 1960 Commer FC also used the concept. In the United States, the Corvair-based Chevrolet Corvan cargo van and Greenbrier passenger van went so far as to copy the Type 2’s rear-engine layout, using the Corvair’s horizontally opposed, air-cooled engine for power. Except for the Greenbrier and various 1950s–70s Fiat minivans, the Type 2 remained unique in being rear-engined. This was a disadvantage for the early “barndoor” Panel Vans, which could not easily be loaded from the rear because the engine cover intruded on interior space, but generally advantageous in traction and interior noise.

Variants

Volkswagen Samba bus

Example of a 1961 Volkswagen Type II flatbed pickup truck.

Rail-going draisine

The Type 2 was available as a:

• Panel van, a delivery van without side windows or rear seats.
• Double-door Panel Van, a delivery van without side windows or rear seats and cargo doors on both sides.
• High Roof Panel Van (German: Hochdach), a delivery van with raised roof.
• Kombi, from German: Kombinationskraftwagen (combination motor vehicle), with side windows and removable rear seats, both a passenger and a cargo vehicle combined.
• Bus, also called a Volkswagen Caravelle, a van with more comfortable interior reminiscent of passenger cars since the third generation.
• Samba-Bus, a van with skylight windows and cloth sunroof, first generation only, also known as a Deluxe Microbus. They were marketed for touring theAlps.
• Flatbed pickup truck, or Single Cab, also available with wider load bed.
• Crew cab pick-up, a flatbed truck with extended cab and two rows of seats, also called a Doka, from German: Doppelkabine.
• Westfalia camping van, “Westy”, with Westfalia roof and interior. Included optional “pop up” top.
• Adventurewagen camping van, with high roof and camping units from Adventurewagen.
• Semi-camping van that can also still be used as a passenger car and transporter, sacrificing some camping comforts. “Multivan” or “Weekender”, available from the third generation on.

Apart from these factory variants, there were a multitude of third-party conversions available, some of which were offered through Volkswagen dealers. They included, but were not limited to, refrigerated vans, hearses, ambulances, police vans, fire engines and ladder trucks, and camping van conversions by companies other than Westfalia. There were even 30 Klv 20 rail-going draisines built for Deutsche Bundesbahn in 1955.

In South Africa, it is known as a well-loved variation of the ice cream van (first, second and third generations). The mere sight of one (in South Africa) sparks the familiar rhyme: I scream, We scream, We all scream for Ice-Cream!

First generation (T1; 1950–1967)

Volkswagen Type 2 (T1)
Overview
Production	1950–1967 (Europe and US) 1950–1975 (Brazil)
Assembly	Wolfsburg, Germany Hanover, Germany São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil Melbourne, Australia
Body and chassis
Platform	Volkswagen Group T1 platform
Powertrain
Engine	1.1 L B4 (petrol) 1.2 L B4 (petrol) 1.5 L B4 (petrol)
Dimensions
Wheelbase	2,400 mm (94.5 in)
Length	4,280 mm (168.5 in)
Width	1,720 mm (67.7 in)
Height	1,940 mm (76.4 in)

The first generation of the Volkswagen Type 2 with the split windshield, informally called the Microbus, Splitscreen, or Splittie among modern fans, was produced from 8 March 1950 through the end of the 1967 model year. From 1950 to 1956, the T1 (not called that at the time) was built in Wolfsburg; from 1956, it was built at the completely new Transporter factory in Hanover. Like the Beetle, the first Transporters used the 1100 Volkswagen air-cooled engine, an 1,131 cc (69.0 cu in),DIN-rated 18 kW (24 PS; 24 bhp), air-cooled flat-four-cylinder ‘boxer’ engine mounted in the rear. This was upgraded to the 1200 – an 1,192 cc (72.7 cu in) 22 kW (30 PS; 30 bhp) in 1953. A higher compression ratio became standard in 1955; while an unusual early version of the 30 kW (41 PS; 40 bhp) engine debuted exclusively on the Type 2 in 1959. This engine proved to be so uncharacteristically troublesome that Volkswagen recalled all 1959 Transporters and replaced the engines with an updated version of the 30 kW engine. Any 1959 models that retain that early engine today are true survivors. Since the engine was totally discontinued at the outset, no parts were ever made available.

The early versions of the T1 until 1955 were often called the “Barndoor” (retrospectively called T1a since the 1990s), owing to the enormous rear engine cover, while the later versions with a slightly modified body (the roofline above the windshield is extended), smaller engine bay, and 15″ roadwheels instead of the original 16″ ones are nowadays called the T1b (again, only called this since the 1990s, based on VW’s restrospective T1,2,3,4 etc. naming system.). From the 1963 model year, when the rear door was made wider (same as on the bay-window or T2), the vehicle could be referred to as the T1c. 1964 also saw the introduction of an optional sliding door for the passenger/cargo area instead of the outwardly hinged doors typical of cargo vans.

In 1962, a heavy-duty Transporter was introduced as a factory option. It featured a cargo capacity of 1,000 kg (2,205 lb) instead of the previous 750 kg (1,653 lb), smaller but wider 14″ roadwheels, and a 1.5 Le, 31 kW (42 PS; 42 bhp) DIN engine. This was so successful that only a year later, the 750 kg, 1.2 L Transporter was discontinued. The 1963 model year introduced the 1500 engine – 1,493 cc (91.1 cu in) as standard equipment to the US market at 38 kW (52 PS; 51 bhp) DIN with an 83 mm (3.27 in) bore, 69 mm (2.72 in) stroke, and 7.8:1 compression ratio. When the Beetle received the 1.5 L engine for the 1967 model year, its power was increased to 40 kW (54 PS; 54 bhp) DIN.

1966 Volkswagen Kombi (North America)

German production stopped after the 1967 model year; however, the T1 still was made in Brazil until 1975, when it was modified with a 1968–79 T2-style front end, and big 1972-vintage taillights into the so-called “T1.5” and produced until 1996. The Brazilian T1s were not identical to the last German models (the T1.5 was locally produced in Brazil using the 1950s and 1960s-era stamping dies to cut down on retooling, alongside the Beetle/Fusca, where the pre-1965 body style was retained), though they sported some characteristic features of the T1a, such as the cargo doors and five-stud 205 mm (8.1 in) PCD rims. Wheel tracks varied between German and Brazilian production and with 14″,15″ and 16″ wheel variants but commonly front track varied from 1290mm to 1310mm and rear track from 1370mm to 1390mm.

VW Bus Type 2 (T1),hippie colors

Among American enthusiasts, it is common to refer to the different models by the number of their windows. The basic Kombi or Bus is the 11-window(a.k.a. three-window bus because of three side windows) with a split windshield, two front cabin door windows, six rear side windows, and one rear window. The DeLuxe model featured eight rear side windows and two rear corner windows, making it the 15-window (not available in Europe). Meanwhile, the sunroof DeLuxe with its additional eight small skylight windows is, accordingly, the 23-window. From the 1964 model year, with its wider rear door, the rear corner windows were discontinued, making the latter two the 13-window and 21-window respectively. The 23- and later 21-window variants each carry the nickname ‘Samba’, or in Australia, officially ‘Alpine’.

US Chicken Tax

Main article: Chicken tax

 U.S. sales of Volkswagen vans in pickup and commercial configurations were curtailed by the Chicken tax

Certain models of the Volkswagen Type 2 played a role in a historic episode during the early 1960s, known as theChicken War. France and West Germany had placed tariffs on imports of U.S. chicken. Diplomacy failed, and in January 1964, two months after taking office, President Johnson imposed a 25% tax (almost ten times the average U.S. tariff) on potato starch, dextrin, brandy, and light trucks. Officially, the tax targeted items imported from Europe as approximating the value of lost American chicken sales to Europe.

In retrospect, audio tapes from the Johnson White House, revealed a quid pro quo unrelated to chicken. In January 1964, President Johnson attempted to convince United Auto Workers‘ president Walter Reuther not to initiate a strike just before the 1964 election, and to support the president’s civil rights platform. Reuther, in turn, wanted Johnson to respond to Volkswagen‘s increased shipments to the United States.

The Chicken Tax directly curtailed importation of German-built Type 2s in configurations that qualified them as light trucks – that is, commercial vans (panel vans) and pickups. In 1964, U.S. imports of automobile trucks from West Germany declined to a value of $5.7 million – about one-third the value imported in the previous year. After 1971, Volkswagen cargo vans and pickup trucks, the intended targets, “practically disappeared from the U.S. market”. While post-1971 Type 2 commercial vans and single-cab and double-cab pickups can be found in the United States today, they are exceedingly rare. Any post-1971 specimen found ostensibly has had its import tariff paid. As of 2013, the “chicken tax” remains in effect.

Second generation (T2; 1967–1979)

Volkswagen Type 2 (T2)
Overview
Production	Aug 1967–Jul 1979 (Europe and US) 1971–1996 (Mexico) 1976–Dec 2013 (Brazil) 1981–1986 (Argentina)
Assembly	Hanover, Germany Emden, Germany General Pacheco, Argentina São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil Puebla, Puebla, Mexico Melbourne, Australia
Body and chassis
Platform	Volkswagen Group T2 platform
Powertrain
Engine	1.6 L B4 (petrol) 1.7 L B4 (petrol) 1.8 L B4 (petrol) 1.8 L I4 (petrol) 2.0 L B4 (petrol)
Transmission	4-speed manual 3-speed automatic
Dimensions
Wheelbase	2,400 mm (94.5 in)
Length	4,505 mm (177.4 in)
Width	1,720 mm (67.7 in)
Height	1,940 mm (76.4 in)

In late 1967, the second generation of the Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) was introduced. It was built in Germany until 1979. In Mexico, the Volkswagen Kombi and Panel were produced from 1970 to 1994. Models before 1971 are often called the T2a (or “Early Bay”), while models after 1972 are called the T2b (or “Late Bay”).

1978 Volkswagen Transporter Pickup (The Netherlands)

1973–1980 Volkswagen Kombi (T2) van (Australia)

T2 used as an ambulance in Brazil

This second-generation Type 2 lost its distinctive split front windshield, and was slightly larger and considerably heavier than its predecessor. Its common nicknames are Breadloaf and Bay-window, orLoaf and Bay for short. At 1.6 L and 35 kW (48 PS; 47 bhp) DIN, the engine was also slightly larger. The new model also did away with the swing axle rear suspension and transfer boxes previously used to raise ride height. Instead, half-shaft axles fitted with constant velocity joints raised ride height without the wild changes in camber of the Beetle-based swing axle suspension. The updated Bus transaxle is usually sought after by off-road racers using air-cooled Volkswagen components.

The T2b was introduced by way of gradual change over three years. The first models featured rounded bumpers incorporating a step for use when the door was open (replaced by indented bumpers without steps on later models), front doors that opened to 90° from the body, no lip on the front guards, unique engine hatches, and crescent air intakes in the D-pillars (later models after the Type 4 engine option was offered, have squared off intakes). The 1971 Type 2 featured a new, 1.6 L engine with dual intake ports on each cylinder head and was DIN-rated at 37 kW (50 PS; 50 bhp). An important change came with the introduction of front disc brakes and new roadwheels with brake ventilation holes and flatter hubcaps. Up until 1972, front indicators are set low on the nose rather than high on either side of the fresh air grille – giving rise to their being nicknamed “Low Lights”. 1972’s most prominent change was a bigger engine compartment to fit the larger 1.7- to 2.0-litre engines from the Volkswagen Type 4, and a redesigned rear end which eliminated the removable rear apron and introduced the larger late tail lights. The air inlets were also enlarged to accommodate the increased cooling air needs of the larger engines.

In 1971 the 1600cc Type 1 engine as used in the Beetle, was supplemented with the 1700cc Type 4 engine – as it was originally designed for the Type 4 (411 and 412) models. European vans kept the option of upright fan Type 1 1600 engine but the 1700 Type 4 became standard for US spec models.

Pre-facelift (left) and facelifted (right)Volkswagen Kombi (T2) vans (Australia)

In the Type 2, the Type 4 engine was an option for the 1972 model year onward. This engine was standard in models destined for the US and Canada. Only with the Type 4 engine did an automatic transmission become available for the first time in the 1973 model year. Both engines displaced 1.7 L, DIN-rated at 49 kW (67 PS; 66 bhp) with the manual transmission and 46 kW (63 PS; 62 bhp) with the automatic. The Type 4 engine was enlarged to 1.8 L and 50 kW (68 PS; 67 bhp) DIN for the 1974 model year and again to 2.0 L and 52 kW (71 PS; 70 bhp) DIN for the 1976 model year. The 1978 2.0 L now featured hydraulic valve lifters, eliminating the need to periodically adjust the valve clearances as on earlier models. The 1975 and later U.S. model years received Bosch L-Jetronic electronic fuel injection as standard equipment; 1978 was the first year for electronic ignition, utilizing a hall effect sensor and digital controller, eliminating maintenance-requiring contact-breaker points. As with all Transporter engines, the focus in development was not on power, but on low-end torque. The Type 4 engines were considerably more robust and durable than the Type 1 engines, particularly in Transporter service.

In 1972, for the 1973 model year, exterior revisions included relocated front turn indicators, squared off and set higher in the valance, above the headlights. Also, square-profiled bumpers, which became standard until the end of the T2 in 1979, were introduced in 1973. Crash safety improved with this change because of a compressible structure behind the front bumper. This meant that the T2b was capable of meeting US safety standards for passenger cars of the time, though not required of vans. The “VW” emblem on the front valance became slightly smaller.

Later model changes were primarily mechanical. By 1974, the T2 had gained its final shape. Very late in the T2’s design life, during the late 1970s, the first prototypes of Type 2 vans with four-wheel drive (4WD) were built and tested.

1979 Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) “Silverfish” last-edition bus. These were a limited edition model to mark the final production of T2 models in Europe

1968 Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) Hard-Top Westfalia “Cream” bus

Brazilian Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) – 2005 Limited Edition

Brazilian water-cooled Volkswagen Type 2 (T2)

• Brazilian water-cooled Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) – Interior

  

• Brazilian Volkswagen Type 2 (T2) – 1.4 L engine bay

  

• 1977 Volkswagen Kombi Westfalia (North America)

  

• Volkswagen Kombi Westfalia (North America)

  

• Air cooled model used as an airport van at São Paulo Airport, Brazil

  

• VW Kombi, turned into a party bar in Thailand

T2c

 T2c in Brazil

The T2c, which has a slightly raised roof – by about 10 cm (3.9 in) – in the early 1990s, is built for the South American and Central American markets. It can be imported into other countries, such as the United Kingdom.

Since 1991, the T2c has been built in México with the water-cooled 1.8 L inline four-cylinder 53 kW (72 PS; 71 bhp) carbureted engine, easily identified by their large, black-coloured, front-mounted radiators, and since 1995 with the 1.6 L air-cooled engines for the Brazilian market.

Since production of the original Beetle was halted in late 2003 as a 2004 model, the T2 remained the only Volkswagen model with the traditional air-cooled, rear-mounted boxer engine until the Brazilian model shifted to a water-cooled engine on 23 December 2005. There was a 1.6 L 50 hp (37 kW; 51 PS) water-cooled diesel engined version of the T2, which was manufactured from 1981 to 1985 in Brazil. This version was very economical – values from 15 km/l to 18 km/l are reported – but it suffered from low performance and an insufficiently capable cooling system, which led to short engine life.

The end of the Volkswagen air-cooled engine on a worldwide basis was marked by a Special Edition Kombi. An exclusive Silver paint job, and limited edition emblems were applied to only 200 units in late 2005, and were sold as 2006 models.

An aircooled and a watercooled VW Kombi (T2), made in Brazil. Model years 2005 and 2006.

More onerous emissions laws introduced by the Brazilian government for 2006 forced a shift to water-cooled engines. The new “Flex Fuel” water-cooled engine will run on petrol as well as alcohol. Borrowed from the Volkswagen Fox, the engine is a rear-mounted EA-111 1.4 L 8v Total Flex1,390 cc (84.8 cu in), 58 kW (79 PS; 78 bhp) on petrol, and 60 kW (82 PS; 80 bhp) when run on ethanol, and 124 N·m (91 lbf·ft) torque. This version has been very successful, despite the minor changes made to the overall T2-bodied vehicle. It still includes the four-speed transmission, but with a new final drive ratio it can cruise at 120 km/h (75 mph) at 4,100 rpm. Top speed is 130 km/h (81 mph). 0 to 100 km/h (0 to 62 mph) is achieved in 22.7 seconds (vs. 29.5 seconds for the last air-cooled version). Improvements were made with 6.6% better fuel economy, and nearly 2 decibel (dB) less noise (again vs. the air-cooled version).

The Volkswagen Type T2 is by far the longest model run in Brazil, having been introduced in September 1950 as the Volkswagen “Kombi”, a name it has kept throughout production. The fierce competition from European front-wheel drive newer generation vans still cannot match the Kombi’s unparalleled cost-benefit equation. Only produced in two versions, bus (nine-seater or 12-seater – a fourth row is added for metro transportation or school bus market) or panel van, it offers only one factory option: the rear window defog. As of June 2009, the T2 is built at the Volkswagen Group’s São Bernardo do Campo plant at a rate of 97 per day.

The production of the Brazilian Volkswagen Kombi ended in 2013 with a production run of 600 Last Edition vehicles. The phaseout of the T2c marks the end of an era which lasted since 1945 (when started the second generation of Volkswagen Type-1 – it will be the final production of metal-made bumper cars after 68 years. A short movie called “Kombi’s last wishes” was made by VW Brazil.

Post-Type 2 generations

Third generation (T3; 1979–1992)

 Volkswagen Type 2 (T3/Vanagon/T25)

Main article: Volkswagen Type 2 (T3)

The Volkswagen Type 2 (T3) also known as the T25, (or Vanagon in the United States), the T3 platform was introduced in 1980, and was one of the last new Volkswagen platforms to use an air-cooled engine. The Volkswagen air-cooled engine was phased out for a water-cooled boxer engine (still rear-mounted) in 1984. Compared to its predecessor the T2, the T3 was larger and heavier, with square corners replacing the rounded edges of the older models. The T3 is sometimes called “the wedge” by enthusiasts to differentiate it from earlier Kombis.

Fourth generation (T4; 1990–2003)

Main article: Volkswagen Transporter (T4)

Early 1990s Multivan Allstar T4

Since 1990, the Transporter in most world markets has been front-engined and water-cooled, similar to other contemporary Volkswagens, almost two decades later than it did for the passenger cars. T4s are marketed as Transporter in Europe. In the United States, Volkswagen Eurovan is the brand name.

Fifth generation (T5; 2003–present)

Main article: Volkswagen Transporter (T5)

 2004 Volkswagen Transporter T5

The Volkswagen Transporter T5 range is the fifth generation of Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles medium-sized light commercial vehicle and people movers. Launched 6 January 2003, the T5 went into full production in April 2003, replacing the fourth generation range.

Key markets for the T5 are Germany, the United Kingdom, Russia, France and Turkey. It is not sold in the US market because it is classed as a light truck, accruing the 25% chicken tax on importation. The T5 has a more aerodynamic design. The angle of the windshield and A-pillar is less; this makes for a large dashboard and small bonnet.

In June 2009, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles announced the one-millionth T5 rolled off the production line in Hanover.

Additional developments

Brazilian Air Force 2006 Kombi Total Flex is a flexible-fuel vehicle

In 2001, a Volkswagen Microbus Concept was created, with design cues from the T1 generation in a spirit similar to the New Beetle nostalgia movement. Volkswagen planned to start selling it in the United States market in 2007, but it was scrapped in May 2004 and replaced with a more cost-effective design to be sold worldwide.

Names and nicknames

Like the Beetle, from the beginning, the Type 2 earned many nicknames from its fans. Among the most popular, at least in Germany, are VW-Bus and Bulli (or Bully) or Hippie-van or the bus. The Type 2 was meant to be officially named the Bully, but Heinrich Lanz, producer of the Lanz Bulldog farm tractor, intervened. The model was then presented as the Volkswagen Transporter and Volkswagen Kleinbus, but the Bully nickname still caught on.

The official German-language model names Transporter and Kombi (Kombinationskraftwagen, combined-use vehicle) have also caught on as nicknames. Kombi is not only the name of the passenger variant, but is also the Australasian and Brazilian term for the whole Type 2 family; in much the same way that they are all called VW-Bus in Germany, even the pickup truck variations. In Mexico, the German Kombi was translated as Combi, and became a household word thanks to the vehicle’s popularity in Mexico City‘s public transportation system. In Peru, where the term Combi was similarly adopted, the term Combi Asesina (Murdering Combi) is often used for buses of similar size, because of the notorious recklessness and competition of bus drivers in Lima to get passengers. In Portugal it is known as Pão-de-Forma (Breadloaf) because its design resembles a bread baked in a mold. Similarly, in Denmark, the Type 2 is referred to as Rugbrød (Rye bread). Finns dubbed it Kleinbus (mini-bus), as many taxicab companies adopted it for group transportation; the name Kleinbus has become an appellative for all passenger vans. The vehicle is also known as Kleinbus in Chile.

In the US, however, it is a VW bus, a “vee-dub”, a minibus, a hippie-mobile, hippie bus, or hippie van, “combie”, Microbus or a Transporter to aficionados. The early versions produced before 1967 used a split front windshield (giving rise to the nickname “Splitty”), and their comparative rarity has led to their becoming sought after by collectors and enthusiasts. The next version, sold in the US market from 1968 to 1979, is characterised by a large, curved windshield and is commonly called a “bay-window”. It was replaced by the Vanagon, of which only the Westfalia camper version has a common nickname, “Westy”.

It was called Volksie Bus in South Africa, notable in a series of that country’s TV commercials. Kombi is also a generic nickname for vans and minibuses in South Africa and Swaziland, often used as a means of public transportation. In Nigeria it was called Danfo.

In the UK, it is known as a “Campervan”. In France, it was called a “camping-car” (usually hyphenated) though this has been expanded to include other, often more specialized vehicles in more recent times.

Mexican production

T2 production began in 1970 at the Puebla assembly factory.

Offered initially only as a nine-passenger version called the Volkswagen Kombi, and from 1973 also its cargo van version called the Volkswagen Panel, both variants were fitted with the 1.5 L air-cooled boxer engine and four-speed manual gearbox. In 1974, the 1.6 L 44 bhp (33 kW; 45 PS) boxer engine replaced the 1.5 previous one, and production continued this way up to 1987. In 1987, the water-cooled 1.8 L 85 bhp (63 kW; 86 PS) inline four-cylinder engine replaced the air-cooled 1.6 L. This new model is recognisable by its black grille (for its engine coolant radiator), bumpers and moldings.

In 1975, Volkswagen de Mexico ordered two specially-made pickups from Germany, one single cab and one double cab, for the Puebla plant. These were evaluated for the possibility of building pickups in Mexico, and were outfitted with every option except the Arctic package, including front and rear fog lights, intermittent wipers, trip odometer, clock, bumper rubber, PVC tilt, and dual doors on the single cab storage compartment. VW de Mexico was interested in having the lights, wiring, brake systems and other parts manufactured in Mexico. Ultimately, VW de Mexico declined to produce pickups, and the pickups were sold to an Autohaus, a Volkswagen dealer in San Antonio, Texas, since they could not be sold in Mexico. By law, no German-made Volkswagens were to be sold in Mexico. These are probably the only pickups that were produced in Germany for Mexican import, and have the “ME” export code on the M-code plate. The green double cab was sold to a new owner in New York, and has been lost track of. The light gray (L345, licht grau) single cab still exists. Pickups were not manufactured in Mexico, nor were they imported into Mexico from Germany, save for these two examples.

In 1988, a luxury variant – the Volkswagen Caravelle – made its debut in the Mexican market to compete with the Nissan Ichi Van, which was available in cargo, passenger and luxury versions.

The main differences between the two are that the Caravelle was sold as an eight-passenger version, while the Combi was available as a nine-passenger version, the Caravelle was only painted in metallic colors, while the Combi was only available in non-metallic colors, and the Caravelle was fitted with an AM/FM stereo cassette sound system, tinted windows, velour upholstery, reading lights, mid and rear headrests, and wheel covers from the European T25 model.

In 1991, the 10 cm (3.9 in) higher roof made its debut in all variants, and the Combi began to be offered in eight- or nine-passenger variants. In 1991, since Mexican anti-pollution regulations required a three-way catalytic converter, a Digifant fuel injection system replaced the previous carburetor. The three variants continued without change until 1994.

In 1994, production ended in Mexico, with models being imported from Brazil. The Caravelle was discontinued, and both the Combi and the Panel were only offered in white color and finally in 2002, replaced by the T4 EuroVan Pasajeros and EuroVan Carga, passenger and cargo van in long wheelbase version, inline five-cylinder 2.5 L 115 bhp and five-speed manual gearbox imported from Germany.

Buses AUTO UNION Germany

Bussen Auto Union

Auto Union Dkw-symbol-vorn logo vijftiger jaren

Auto Union logo dertiger jaren

auto-emblemen Audi

Veel bussen van het merk Auto Union zijn er niet te vinden. Eigenlijk is er alleen een klein personenbusje gevonden wat niet eens lang te koop is gebleven. http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto_Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DKW_Schnellaster http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2010/03/the-mother-of-all-modern-minivans-1949-dkw-schnellaster/ In de onderste link word de bus, hier snellaster genoemd zelfs de moeder alle moderne minibussen genoemd. Het was een zuinig, licht busje waar je zeker voor die tijd “comfortabel” van het ene naar het andere punt kon komen. Het merk heeft veel namen gehad. Auto Union, Horch, DKW, Audi, en er zijn er als je de verschillende werelddelen meerekent nog wel meer te noemen. We beginnen met de Horch, een bus voor 22 tot 55 personen.

Auto Union Horch 22-55 passengers

Auto Union   3=6 F800-3 1955

Auto Union DKW Bus Ad

Auto Union op aanhanger voorzijde

Auto Union op aanhanger achterzijde

Auto Union VW Vanagon 1980

Auto Union Dkw‑schnellaster‑bus

Auto Union   F89L 684cc 2 takt 1050kg 1950

Audi, DKW, Horch, Wanderer, Auto Union

Auto Union DKW Flintridge Caravan

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Labels: AUDI, Auto Union, Bussen, Camper, Caravans, DKW, Horch, Kampeerauto’s, Oude Auto’s, Small Cars, Verleden, VW, Wanderer

Buses Amphibious Transports

donderdag 26 april 2012

Bussen Amphibie bussen

Amphibie Bartlett Waterlander Motorhome 1974

Amphibie Amphi Tours Montreal

In mijn speurtocht naar Amphibie bussen kwam ik op heel veel diverse sites terecht. Van amphibie auto’s tot onderwater vliegtuigen. Het blijkt dat er in de dertiger jaren van de vorige eeuw flink op los is gefantaseert en dat heeft leuke Science Fiction/Fantasy plaatjes opgeleverd. Realiteit is wel dat er op dit moment behoorlijk wat bussen rondrijden varen op deze aardkloot. Van Rotterdam en Amsterdam  tot in Japan en Nieuw Zeeland. Ook in de oorlog, de tweede wereldoorlog werden vrij veel amphibievoertuigen ontwikkeld, door allerlei merken als Volkswagen, Land Rover, Jeep en dergelijke, maar dat werden meer auto’s en trucks dan bussen. Dus hou ik het hier toch maar op bussen. In het hoofdstuk Auto’s wat ongetwijfeld volgen zal kom ik terug op de andere voer/vaartuigen.

Amphibious Bus Duck Tours Guntec

Amphibie Bartlett Waterlander-Motorhome 1974

Amphibious Bus Santa Barbara

Amphibie Belfast Splash Tours

Amphibious-bus-Japan

Amphibie bus v bootbus

AmphiCoach GTS-1 River-Ride Budapest

Amphibie bus België Crocodile Rouge-eau-heure

Amphibie VW Schäfer-Orion-01 Camper

Amphibious-tourist-bus-liverpool

Amphibie Bizarreries-Insolites-Vrac-Zanada-L-25

Amphibie Land Rover FV 18601 1962

Amphibie VW Schäfer-Orion-02 Camper

Amphibious Bus Unknown

Amphibieboot

Amphibien-bus

Amphibious Bus Belgium

Amphibiebus Splashtours Rotterdam

Amphibiebus Splashtours Rotterdam met Erasmusbrug

Voor de lol laat ik ook nog wat van die plaatjes zien waarbij de fantasie de vrije loop krijgt. Helemaal te gek. Let maar op!!

Amphibious-bus sightseeing tour underwater tour SF

Amphibious Airplane 1932 SF

Amphibious Craft for the Arctic January 1938 SF

Amphibious Lifeboat January 1937 SF

Zeg nou zelf. Helemaal te gek toch die populaire Science, een beetje Thunderbirdachtig.

Voor nu laat ik het hierbij. Gegroet.

Labels: Amphicoach, Bartlett, Bussen, Fantasy voertuigen, Landrover FV Amphibie, Science Fiction voertuigen, VW-Schäfer-Orion Amphibie Camper