Historical Volkswagen Pictures

 I was pretty amazed when I saw this small collection of original pictures from early Volkswagen prototypes. They were posted on http://forums.motortrend.com by a guy who’s grandfather was an engineer / test driver in the early days when Volkswagen wasn’t even a factory yet. The two top rows of pictures and the last one are pictures of the VW30 prototypes. They must have been taken somewhere in 1937. Notice the convertible. This was car number 22 out of 30 VW30 prototypes. It was painted dark blue and was already fitted with bumpers. In this picture the convertible is still carrying its temporary license plate number IIIA-0426. It later received its permanent license plate number IIIA-37022. The other 2 cars are VW38 models. At page 170 from Chris Barber’s book ‘Birth of the Beetle’  he says ‘The only known picture of Car 43024…‘ which corresponds to the picture on page 171. As we look closely at the first picture of the third row we can see that this is in fact another picture of car ’43024′. Isn’t that great or what? The other VW38 prototype is car ’43019′. This car still has its original bumpers. Car ’43024′ already has been updated with VW39 style bumpers. These are truely amazing historical Volkswagen pictures. You begin to wonder if these are the only pictures this guy’s grandfather has…

Vintage VW For Dummies :-)

Ferdinand Porsche And His Creation

This nice historical picture recently sold on eBay showing Ferdinand Porsche standing next to a VW38 prototype. The selling price of this picture was 56 euro which is quite acceptable for such a piece of history. I’ve seen KDF pictures go for a lot more. Too bad I’m not the licky winner as my highest bid was 50 euro. Notice the long sunroof. Very nice! What happened to this one? Will it be found too like the one they recently found in Lithuania. Wouldn’t that me great, or what?

Complete Set Of Ten KdF posters

Last week a complete set of ten KdF posters ( 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10) was auctioned on eBay. Talking about a rare opportunity to get them all at once but then you had to spend quite a sum of money. I think it’s the third complete set I’ve seen auctioned on eBay over the past five years. These ten were in perfect condition. I had my eyes on some of them but those last second snipers outbid me. Too bad as I have already five of them and I want to make my collection complete. Hopefully there will be a next time.

ATV – All Terrain Volkswagens

1938 Prototype?

An interesting topic is going on on TheSamba.com about a car found in Lithuania in the summer of 2008. Severe butchering has been done to the car although it still has some very unique details (for instance the rear decklid) which could make it a pre-war VW prototype but is it? That’s the question we all like to know. Will it be restored? Who knows… It will be a real challenge to get this car restored to its former glory. At least I’m going to follow this thread for sure and if it turns out to be a real prototype it would be the rarest find ever!

Showing Off His Split Beetle

This guy is definitely showing off his standard Split Beetle. Well, I can’t blame him if your driving such a nice Split. It looks like a post July 1949 Split but it still has the ‘football’ type mirror. I thought these changed somewhere mid ’49. I can’t determine if this beetle has the thin aluminum trim or the thick chrome trim around the lens of the tail lights. From mid 1949 through very early 1950, Beetles used the thin aluminum trim version. The thick chrome trim ones were used on pre mid 1949 Beetles. This car also has the non embossed deck lid, small VW logo hubcaps and new style bumpers instead of the ‘banana’ style bumpers. All visible features making this a post July 1949 Split Beetle. Of course it can be modernized which was very common back then.