AUTHOR     Smale

        ENGLISH

ISBN 10     1844252094

ISBN 13     9781844252091

FROM BY REVIEW IN THE 356 REGISTRY:

Porsche – The Carrera Dynasty by Glen Smale certainly starts off with promise.  Of 216 pages, 93 are clearly 356 or at least of the period.  And the acknowledgments mention almost everyone still alive at Porsche AG.  However, on the first page of text, Smale mentions that Ferdinand Porsche never worked for the company bearing his name “as he died in the same year it was established.”  Generally accepted, as the progenitor of all Porsche is the Typ 64, Smale correctly explains that the its other appellation 60K10 refers to the (Porsche) VW design of Typ 60 and the “K” is for Karosserie (body) and 10 (variant number) but never connects the Typ 64 in the captions with the 60K10 in the text.  He also claims the car used the front of the existing KDF-Wagen – which just looking at the cars refutes as silly.  And Smale states the honorary doctorate came in 1940 – well the Germans did give him one, but the “hc” in ING hc F. Porsche, as used by Porsche, was granted by the Austrians for World War 1 services.  For the first time, I see a claim the low weight and small motor of the first Porsche yielded only 24 mpg.  Any 1674 pound car with a VW motor should give 30-40 mpg.  Nor did 356/2 (not 356-002), the first coupe use “a basic VW platform.”  Smale, displays a similar lack of basic/background knowledge, throughout the book, including both the inability to accept that a Porsche Abarth is precisely that and not a Porsche Zagato.  Unfortunately, things don’t improve in the 911 period, until the 964 is reached.  A nice feature is a time line of significant events keyed to each chapter.

So, in a couple pages and confirmed by reading the whole book, it becomes clear that Porsche – The Carrera Dynasty is not going to be the ultimate reference.  But there is a lot to recommend The Carrera Dynasty – first, there are many really good, unfamiliar to me at least, period photographs – including a superb color photograph of the von Frankenberg 550 at LeMans in 1953.  I suspect that most of the period pictures have come from the Porsche Arkivs, and continue to wonder when the well will run dry.  Not the first choice for your Porsche reference shelf, but worth considering, if your interest runs to really nice pictures and you can cull out the errors, or just don’t care:  Porsche – The Carrera Dynasty lists at $44.95.

AUTHOR     Smale

        ENGLISH

ISBN 10     0955656427

ISBN 13     9780955656422

PRICE              $125.00

LIST PRICE     $150.00

IN STOCK @ BLOCKS BOOKS

AUTHOR     Smale

        ENGLISH

ISBN 10     1844254267

ISBN 13     9781844254262

NOT CURRENTLY AVAILABLE @ BLOCKS BOOKS

TITLE     Porsche 956/962 Complete Photographic History          

        ENGLISH

ISBN 10     No ISBN 10

ISBN 13     9780857330987

OUT OF PRINT -- NO LONGER IN STOCK @ BLOCKS BOOKS

TITLE     Porsche at LeMans

               Sixty Years of Porsche Participation in the World's Greatest Motor Race

        ENGLISH

ISBN 10     No ISBN 10

ISBN 13     9781844259953

PRICE              $60.00

LIST PRICE     $72.95

OUT OF PRINT -- NO LONGER IN STOCK @ BLOCKS BOOKS

                        The Complete Story

AUTHOR         Long

   ENGLISH

ISBN 10          No ISBN 10

ISBN 13          9781785000393

NO LONGER  AVAILABLE @ BLOCKS BOOKS