VW Typ 87 - Herbert The War Bug #blogpost

“Make love, not war” or how did that saying go again?

Background

It all started with some German engineer named Ferdinand Porsche and an Austrian guy with a moustache… you probably heard of them. A couple of years before the war, the idea was to develop a car for the masses, given the name KdF-Wagen or -for propaganda reasons- Volkswagen (people’s car). KdF means “Kraft durch Freude” (power through joy), a political organisation to bring everybody’s leisure activities into line. It was planned to sell a car for 990 Reichsmark (about 4000€ adjusted to 1938 inflation). Inspired by cars like the Tatra 77, the car should be aerodynamic to drive well on the then-new Autobahns. There was a simple plan: everybody who wanted a car should save 5 RM per week and when he accumulated enough money, he would receive his car. 60 RM for transport and 200 RM for registration and insurance additionally. The plan was going well until the war started and the Volkswagen production lines were switched to the Typ 82 Kübelwagen (bucket seat car) and the Typ 166 Schwimmwagen (amphibious car), both based off the Volkswagen chassis but with permanent all wheel drive. The first actual Volkswagens were produced in 1941 as a propaganda measure. Not a single Volkswagen customer actually received his car before the war ended.
The pictures above should say it all.

The Plan

The WW2 had a completely different requirement to man and machine than any other conflict before. The new mobile warfare strategy needed cars that were both offroad-capable and faster than a tank at full speed. For a quick comparision, the Soviet BT-7 light tank could be as fast as 80 km/h onroad and 50 km/h offroad. That was the requirement the offroad vehicles had to match. That means that simple trucks with bigger tyres were not an option. There were to slow. Crawler tractors were an idea as well, but they were even slower (albeit better offroad). The new Volkswagen seemed like a good idea, being aerodynamic and relatively fast for its engine power.
It wouldn’t take a long time until somebody was to count one and one together and end up with a prototype. This somebody was, not a huge surprise, Ferdinand Porsche. His idea was to simply mate the Typ 82 chassis together with the Volkswagen body. The result wore the name Typ 87 Kommandeurswagen (staff car) and had the same 1.1 litre 25 bhp flat-4 engine as the standard Volkswagen, but was about 5 cm wider per side to have space for the big offroad tyres.

Useage in the war and aftermath

The car pictured above is not a Typ 87 Kommandeurswagen for one reason: only a handful were made. Some sources state four, some state five. Either way, you could count them on one hand. It is believed that the some went to the Eastern Front and one or two went to North Africa. The field marshal Erwin Rommel is said to have been a fan of the Kommandeurswagen.
About 650 Volkswagens were used by the air force and by the railroad, but these were normal production Volkswagens that just had different tyres, sometimes not even that. They were used as staff cars as well, but with normal Volkswagen chassis and normal Volkswagen body. No all wheel drive there.

However, the French and the British liked the concept alot. Many of the normal Volkswagens were given to the British after the war and the French even ordered 100 Kommandeurswagens for their military. This order was, however, never executed since the factories were destroyed and producing normal Volkswagens was the priority. The fact that only five or four of them were ever made makes them a highly sought after collectible piece today. Surprisingly, they all are still intact. Of course they belong to a museum.
Old habits die hard and Ferdinand Porsche never gave up the idea of the Typ 87 Kommandeurswagen. Only today we call them 911 Carrera 4.