One reader of our recent posts wondered when he'd hear more about the Porsche 914 chassis hidden under the twin-rotor Corvette and maybe under its Opel cousin. When rumors spread in the late 60s that Porsche was readying a mid-engined car for production, many of us expected it might resemble some of the previous mid-engined Porsches, most of which were road racers like the 550 (see the Jan. 18 post, "On a Lonesome Highway in California") . The very first Porsche 356 prototype pictured below had also featured a mid-mounted VW engine, but for the first production cars made in Gmund, Austria, Porsche reverted to the rear mount.
Readers of car enthusiast mags like Road & Track, this writer included, were hoping we'd get something like the 904 from 1963-65, which featured modern, lightweight materials (including Porsche's first fiberglass body) and slippery, wind-cheating lines. The 904 served as a platform for the 4-cam 4 flat 4 racing engine (a mechanic's nightmare of legendary status), as well as a test bed for the then-new s.o.h.c. dry-sump six being readied for the 911 (twenty of the 904-6 variant were built) and even the Formula 2-derived flat 8. We hoped we'd be seeing something like that level of mechanical innovation (but without the flat eight's exploding flywheels). Then again, anyone standing next to a 904 might have realized that adding bumpers (or even headroom) might have put an end to its visual fascination.
What we saw instead when the new 914 broke cover in late 1969 was a design apparently driven by concerns about practicality of use and economy of production, in a style best described as Unconscious Bauhaus…
But the new car had some advantages: plenty of space for two people and their luggage, user-friendly handling, and a variety of engines starting with a 1.7 liter VW flat four (this version was sold in Europe as a VW) with an optional 2 liter flat six from the 911, and later including 1.8 and 2.0 liter fours. The lift-off roof panel stored easily in the trunk, and visibility was better than most mid-engined designs, although engine access seemed deliberately designed to discourage or even offend amateur mechanics (a trait shared with the current Boxster / Cayman twins). But even people who enjoyed the handling and convenience thought it didn't look enough like a Porsche, or even a sports car. This group included Italian, French and even German designers, which is why, after featuring a rotary-powered 914 disguised as a Corvette in our previous post, we have still not exhausted the trove of eccentric, mostly forgotten 914s. We can lead off with the Heuliez Murene…
which was designed for the French coach builder Brissonneau & Lotz (which also produced the '68-'73 Opel GT bodies) but built and exhibited by specialist manufacturer Heuliez. It seems to miss both the sports car and Porsche identity that enthusiasts wanted, instead offering even more practicality in a Citroen-flavored package. A little while later in Germany, Albrecht Goertz, designer of the hallowed BMW 507, offered his prototype of a 914 Eurostyle sports kombi, and Porsche execs were interested for awhile, but decided that demand for a sports wagon with almost no rearward visibility would not justify tooling costs…
And then Giorgetto Giugiaro at Ital Design showed the Tapiro, a glassy exercise with gull-wing entry and engine doors on a 914-6 chassis. Giugiaro claims this design as his first true wedge, and like all but three Giugiaro show cars built through the year 2000, it was painted silver gray, as the master felt this color best showed off the forms and surfaces of his cars. Tapiro never was seriously considered for production, and suffered a fire after being sold off as a road car. The shell is now on display at Design Giugiaro's museum.
The most practical offering after the Heuliez effort, and also maybe the least polarizing of this group of designs, showed up on Pietro Frua's stand at the Geneva Show in March of 1971. It was built by Frua on a 914-6 chassis for the Porsche distributor in Spain, and Porsche brass was so impressed with it that it was considered for a limited run of production cars. It displays Frua's usual deft handling of proportion and detail, with angled louvers in the sail panels flanking the backlight so that occupants could catch more rearward view, but like the other show cars (and like the production 914) looks not a whole lot like a Porsche…
For their next foray into offering a mid-engined car to the public, nearly 30 years later, Porsche would stay closer to the design vocabulary they established with their Spyder race cars, and the Boxster would find wide acceptance and success.
Photo credits:
1948 Porsche 356-1, 1964-65 Porsche 904, and 1970-71 Porsche 914-6: Wikipedia
Heuliez Murene 914-6: Heuliez / Brissonneau & Lotz
Goertz 914-6 Eurostyle: zwischengas.com
Ital Design Porsche 914-6 Tapiro: Ital Design photo reproduced on flatsixes.com
1971 Frua Porsche 914-6 coupe: ideiblog.com
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