Schwimmwagen!

If you know your Volkswagen history, you'll know straight away that this odd creation is a Schwimmwagen. If you don't, then here's where you find out. Based on the running gear of the Type 87 Kübelwagen - that's the four-wheel drive version of the go anywhere, VW-based wartime staff car beloved of the German army. This was the car that went where not even a Kübelwagen dare to tread. When the big cheeses in the German Army decided that conquering swathes of land wasn't enough and they wanted the water as well, they demanded of the boffins at Porsche an amphibious, go-anywhere vehicle that could carry on when the going got too tough for the Kübel and the half-motorcycle, half half-track NSU Kettenkrad. Engineering challenges like this were what Porsche thrived on, and with the four-wheel drive system already in the bag, that just left the not inconsiderable task of getting a similar vehicle to float. And before you think ‘no big deal, a standard Beetle floats' - it doesn't, that's nothing but a common myth.
Naturally, the Porsche design team triumphed and produced a simple, elegant and rugged solution to the problem. Actually, to be fair, they produced a simple, rugged and downright ugly solution that looked a bit like a Kübelwagen with its doors welded shut. The key difference was that rather than having the body bolted to the floorpan, as is common with all ‘Beetle'-based vehicles, the two parts were welded together to form a single monocoque structure. For buoyancy in water they relied on their schoolboy physics lessons and the knowledge that a vessel's buoyancy value is equal to the weight of the fluid displaced by it. Otherwise known as the rubber duck principle.

For the full story on this car make sure you pick up a copy of the May 2009 issue of VolksWorld 

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