1951 356 aluminium coupe. With front wheel skirts

[orange4boy]

Found this ultra cool '51 356 aluminium coupe. The 356 is one of my all time fav. cars.

Check out the front wheel skirts! Those front wheel are deep set already so they could make them a little bulged and get away with it. I wonder what it's Cd would have been?




Here is the link:

Porsche 356 Coupe : 1951 | Cartype

I like how many old racing cars have mods that look like ours. Screws showing, add on look. Makes me proud to be a modder.

[solarguy]

Slick car. Old Ferdinand had a few aero tricks up his sleeve. I particularly like the leather straps with buckles holding the boot shut.

As an aside, FP also designed an integrated electric wheel/hub/motor back in the day. We moderns aren't as smart as we think we are.

troy

[evolutionmovement]

Yeah, it's a shame Porsche went from innovators and performance based on efficiency to purveyors of 911s and vehicles with stretched 911 styling. They're like the Morgan of post-war styling. The 928 should have replaced that damned 911 decades ago.

[winkosmosis]

What's wrong with the 911? Doesn't it have a very low cD?

[Frank Lee]

I was wondering the same thing. 911s are the ****.

[orange4boy]

Not to jump all over you evoluionmovement but...

Morgans and 911s

Classic and classic

The shame of Porsche would have to be the Cayenne. I sneeze at it.

[cfg83]

orange4boy -

Originally Posted by orange4boy

Not to jump all over you evoluionmovement but...

Morgans and 911s

Classic and classic

The shame of Porsche would have to be the Cayenne. I sneeze at it.

I'm not into 911s (squish the bug!), but my nephew thinks they're Da Bomb right now (yooz needz skillzz to dwive 'em). He's also conflicted. He hates the Cayenne, but he knows it contributes to the "health" of Porsche and therefore the 911. Such is the beginning of the end of youthful idealism, .

CarloSW2

[some_other_dave]

There is a red Speedster (simple lightweight convertible version of the 356) that has wheel skirts front and aft like that. It is vintage raced locally; I have seen it at the track a number of times in that configuration. The skirts make it look even a little more like an old-fashioned bathtub flipped upside-down...

The car pictured above is one of the "Gmund coupes", which had bodies hand-hammered out of aluminum. There were fairly few built at a converted sawmill in Gmund, Austria in the late 40s. Then the company moved to Stuttgart and made the cars out of steel. When Porsche decided to try a Le Mans entry for 1951, they took one of the older un-sold aluminum coupes and tried to make it more aerodynamic. The several-mile-long main straight in that race placed a premium on drag reduction, especially if you had a little tiny 1100cc motor.

-soD

[evolutionmovement]

The 911's not a bad car at all, but its symbolic of the lack of progression that is anathema to the values of its founders. It's a great car, just not what Porsche was founded on and that so-called Porschephiles freak out at the thought of Porsche being anything but 911s is the reason they're in such a design quagmire today (and why I argue that they are not true fans of Porsche as they completely misunderstand its founders thirst for advancement and unique ideas), afraid to make anything that doesn't look like they stretched 911 sheet-metal over everything. Morgans are great (though I wish they'd still make a Trike), but retro is their thing. Ferdinand and Ferry Porsche never looked to the past, always innovated. It's amazing how far they've developed a bad design (rear engine sports car), but that's a triumph of engineering within the severe restrictions of marketing. If left unencumbered by such artificial constraints, and accepting that Ferry is long gone, I'd love to see what their engineers and designers would be able to do (which I'd bet wouldn't be a rear-engined car as a start). At least let the Cayman kick the 911 as it naturally would if not, once again, hobbled by marketing too scared to let the king be naturally dethroned as its standard bearer. Keep the 911 for the midlife-crisis doctors (it IS still very efficient for what it is and a great car), but I'd like to see a return to the original values of efficiency and performance through careful engineering, light weight, and small engines. Why not a direct-injection 4-cyl. sports car under the Cayman capable of at least 40 mpg? I'm sure Ferry would have done it and he brought the 911 into the world in the first place. Most of all, I'd like to see them find some damned design direction divorced from the 911! A front-engined SUV and a sedan with looks based on a small rear-engined sports car. Really, WTF. Look at Porsche's history and the great variance of the cars throughout their history (for an even more interesting time, go back to the old man's stuff from before he started his engineering company) and how they've stagnated the last 15 years. They're managing a brand now without understanding what made the brand so valuable to begin with.

Lucky for Bugatti's memory that the company died soon after the unfortunate deaths of Jean and Ettore and before it could really violate their values of a technical creation only being perfect when it is perfect from the point of view of aesthetics... Oh wait. If I had an archenemy, VW would be it. And yet, all would be forgiven if they produced the one-litre or the trike they built a few years ago.

[gone-ot]

...isn't that the coupe version of the roadster that James Dean died in?