Re: VW Plans Renault Tie-Up, Horch Revival-Magazine

Francois Dion (francois@hyperreal.org)
Wed, 10 Jun 1998 11:28:59 -0400

> The company's plans in the luxury class, Stern said, include reviving the
> ``Horch''
> brand owned by its Audi AG subsidiary. ``Horch'' limousines were the
> pre-World War Two favourites of millionaires and film stars in Germany.
>
> VW intends building Horch cars with 18-cylinder motors at a factory in
> Dresden, according to Stern.

It is interesting to note the egotistic attitude of VW, exactlylike the managing
circle of Horch back then. They would
make claims of infinite lives for their cars. The engine
was a V12 of 6 litres producing only a bit over 100 hp
and due to it's complex design, was extremely expensive
to maintain. You would think that such a monster
producing such a low output (at a 6 to 1 compression
ratio might I add) should have lasted forever. Plus
supposedly everything was engineered to the finest
specs. 20 years later not many survived and nowadays
I believe there are only 4 Horch V12 left in existance.
So much for infinite lives.

It didn't do very well at the time as it was too boring,
too heavy (over 3000 kg!), didn't have the
performance to match the price, and all the complexity
that went into making everything as silent as possible
was the downfall of it, as soon everything came back
to normal sound levels which were deemed unacceptable
by the owners (considering how much it cost... this is
the same problem with Rolls Royce btw).

> It also wants to buy Italian sports carmaker
> Lamborghini and add it to its Audi subsidiary, Stern said.

That is the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard. Is it
Portofino time again? Hey, why not have GMC build
the Ferrari Maranello from now on... Or maybe Mack
or Caterpillar...

Ciao,
Francois Dion (francois@hyperreal.org)

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