I guess these are the grandads of 911's. I was reading the story of Bernd Rosemeyer and high speed record runs between Frankfurt and Damstadt.

Mercedes and Carraciola got the record with 432,7 Km/h! That is fast on a public road. B. Rosemeyer was going to beat that in his Type C, but crashed and died. This was 1938. These guys were nuts! It is believed that the air-pressure of speed (1000 kg/cm2) on the aluminium body + sidewinds (+200 kg/cm2) caused it to "explode". I wonder how aerodynamics were on those cars, no lift?

Amazing cars! The crankshaft on the V12 had 2000 parts! and the construction of the intake/exhaust valve system has 3 cams.

Wonder how they sounded like.

Jan

 

Did I read that top speed correctly?
That's 260 miles an hour!

Where did you see this stuff?

CJ

 

I think that Auto-Union is what now is known as Audi.

 

It is

 

Auto Union alone did not morph into Audi, Audi is the combination of Horch, Wanderer, DKW, and Auto Union. Hence the four rings in the logo.

 

The four rings were on the front of the car that Rosemeyer unfortunately died in.

 

From Audi themselves

<a href="http://www.audi.com/com/en/company/history/history.jsp" target="_blank">http://www.audi.com/com/en/company/history/history.jsp</a>

 

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">Originally posted by SWE993C2S:
<strong>Wonder how they sounded like. Jan</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">I remember reading about these Auto Union GP cars being re-created recently by Audi to show them at classic car events.

And are you familiar with the CD by Pink Floyd drummer and classic car collector Nick Mason "into the red", it's got classic cars soundtracks but I think the Auto Union is not included. The soundtrack of the BRM V16 from that collection is amazing.

Enjoy <img border="0" alt="[burnout]" title="" src="graemlins/burnout.gif" />

Nol

 

Audi commissioned someone in the UK to build them, a few of them IIRC.

 

Actually I think Auto Union is the combination of Horch, Wanderer, DKW, and Audi. All of these makes used the Four-Rings symbol.

 

Originally, these cars were designed by Ferdinand Porsche. Later, the Type D was designed by Robert Eberan von Eberhorst and Dr. Ing. Carl Feuereisen. Porsche at this time was doing the "Beetle". Type Ds were smaller than Porsche initial creation, but had engine capable of 8000 rpms... in 1936!
Eberhorst went later to do chassi work at Aston Martin.
Driving Type D were guys like Nuvolari and Stuck.
And a slight correction Type C had a V16, Type D a V12.

Jan

 

If you wanna see some pics of the mercedes museum:
<a href="http://www.gummen.org/evenement/evenement_show.asp?art_id=249" target="_blank">http://www.gummen.org/evenement/evenement_show.asp?art_id=249</a>

unfortunately the site is in dutch

grtz,
l

 

If you like this sort of thing, you should make a pilgrimage to the Goodwood 'Festival of Speed' every summer in South of England. Its a hillclimb up a private road on the Earl of March's estate, including flint stone walls and all!

It attracts a fantastic collection of machinery and drivers, all the big name Le Mans winners, ex F1 and current. I saw Nick Heidfeld take the 'old', ie previous season's, F1 McLaren up there for the new record a few years ago, also Derek Bell in the 917/30 Can Am car.

CDs are fine, but reality adds another dimension!

Cheers, Maurice