The single best 356 history!

FROM MY REVIEWS IN THE 356 REGISTRY:

By the time you read this, Dirk-Michael Conradt's 356 PORSCHE: FAHREN IN SEINER SHÖNSTEN FORM will be available in the Peter Albrecht translation as PORSCHE 356: DRIVING IN ITS PUREST FORM. For almost three years I have been convinced the Conradt's book would be the ultimate 356 history. Unfortunately my self-taught German was barely up to puzzling out the captions, charts and short bullets of werksarkiv memoranda. Now, alle est clare.  Truthfully, it is no longer a problem discerning when opening rear quarter windows appeared on a 356 coupe -- ask Richard Miller. It is no problem knowing which top is correct to an early Speedster -- ask Don Fowler. Nor is it a problem knowing whether a Convertible D should have a rear seat back -- ask Brett Johnson. Not so incidentally, these are part of the crew Brett Johnson put together to final proof Peter Albrecht's translation. I was honored honored to also assist in the proof reading. Peter has extremely good credentials; he is a fluent German speaker, he owns and is fascinated by 356 Porsches, and he is the technical editor of SPORTSCAR INTERNATIONAL magazine.

While the what and when of 356 Porsches have been well worked out in Brett's 356 AUTHENTICITY, the one thing we could only speculate about was why did Porsche do it that way?  Dirk-Michael Conradt

achieved unlimited access to the archives by gaining the factory's trust. He did it the old fashioned way: he was editor of the premier German collector car magazine, Motor Klassic, in which never has a negative

word been said about Porsche. But then how could anyone? 

It is internal factory memoranda which make this book so spectacular.  As might be expected, the factory

minutes dwelt on the problems Porsche -- that is Ferry Porsche -- recognized:  

    27 July, 1951-Herr Porsche asks for an investigation of inertia forces upon throttle closing at 6000 rpm. High priority should be given to perfect closing of the heater flap inside the heater box.  5 September 1951-Repeatedly occurring defects, which are to be eliminated in the 1951 model program. Bottoming of the front suspension. Bottoming of the rear suspension. Clutch guide sleeve seizes. Improved clutch lining. Clutch graphite rings defective. Loud transmission. Transmission jumps out of 4th gear. Poor VW steering.  Pushrods pop out. Bent valves. Leaking master cylinder.

    13 May, 1952-Communication to Reutter: ... One recurring problem is that the opening in the engine compartment is not large enough for the engine. We request that you check your template against our

drawing 0356.00.0402.

Many of the proposals were never carried out. Luckily, attempts to curry favor with America, including thermometer, speedometer, column shift, quad headlights, were never placed in production. But you can see them in PORSCHE 356: DRIVING IN ITS PUREST FORM. Period photographs are mainly werks fotos, most taken by Porsche's favorite photographer Julius Weitmann. They are marvelous, including the idiosyncratic advertising photographs which were quaint back than and now verge on high kitsch.  

An area so mysterious that I wasn't even aware it existed is the coachwork of the Gmünd cabriolets. Conradt credits H. P. Wyssmann, who donated chassis 003 to the Swiss Traffic museum, as having worked out the fate of the Beutler cabs. Unfortunately all six are now accounted for. Even more unfortunately the other 5 have been destroyed. Conradt considers it a mystery that chassis 003 is assigned to a Viennese builder-probably erroneously. I consider the real mystery to be, that Tatra bodied 16 of the original 52 Gmünd cars and I was unaware of it until now! And worse, Keibl and apparently Kastenhofer, also of Vienna, bodied an unknown number of Gmünd cabriolets. Keibl also bodied the Denzel, VW derived, sports car in the '50s. Even coupes were bodied in Austria-including the much photographed

coupe delivered to Taher Pasha of Egypt. Apparently more than half the Gmünd cars, therefore have Viennese bodies. Actually it makes a lot of sense, given the transportation and border crossing problems of the period, for Austrian carrozzeria to supply the body for an Austrian built chassis -- it's just I knew nothing

of this. According to Conradt, Keibl cabriolet bodied chassis 025 is in the museum in Zuffenhausen, complete with original build certificate, documenting what Porsche supplied (chassis, fenders, front lid, unfinished dashboard, door inner structure, exterior rear panels, unattached bumpers, air inlet grille, nitrocellulose lacquer) and what Keibl supplied. If so, I have never seen it on display there. Even those funny body numbers are now explained. Are any of the Austrian bodied cars in the U.S.?

Perhaps my only quibble with the book is the translation of the title. I seem to remember from '60s advertisements FAHREN IN SEINER SHÖNSTEN FORM translated as DRIVING IN ITS FINEST FORM. The inclusion of Porsche factory photo, documents and communications gives an insider's

view of 356 planning, marketing and production -- this book is required reading.

356 PORSCHE; Driving in its Finest Form, Conradt ($64.95) compares favorably with Ludvigsen's PORSCHE: EXCELLENCE WAS EXPECTED as the single book you must have if you are interested in 356 Porsches and can read. It benefits from 15 years of additional research, including a team of 356 REGISTRY experts who proof-read the English translation.  (I maintain that the title is best translated as Driving in its "Finest Form rather than "Purest".)