Carrera book comments and questions

[vhelmle]

Hello Everyone,

Steve Heinrichs has asked me to respond to Mr. Hall's point that the letter I posted does not address the question or later comments.

I am so sorry, I posted the next to last letter, not the June letter that addresses the storage in the Brazil warehouse. Let me correct my error:






Thank you so much,

Vietta

[alan hall]

Thanks Vietta. I can see how you could interpret the June 4 letter that the car is at the Tress facility. I suppose it could also be interpreted that they are just assuring Porsche that the car has not been given to the buyer. At this point I would like to see what Andrew can summarize regarding his assertion that there were two cars racing in Europe in spring and summer of 1954 and if that assertion is definitely correct then the task will be to see what cars they could possibly be. At that point you get a situation where if everything else has been eliminated then what is left has to be correct. This may be (1) that Tress did not physically have the car at their facility and 05 was in Europe or (2) that 07 was the only car in Europe but underwent a variety of changes during that period or (3) there was an entirely different car being raced in Europe as well as 07.

[Type550]

It is the same driver in both of these photos and has been identified as Jorge Lettry who was a mechanic for Bino Heins (who raced 550-05 in Dec 1955). Heins raced for Fasanello and it is highly likely Fascinello owned the car on its return to Brazil where he drove the streets with his feline, before 550-05 was raced again.

http://bestcars.uol.com.br/hm/303-jorge-lettry-1.htm

Hello Everyone,

Steve Heinrichs has asked me to post the photo that we believe is Fasanello in Brazil seated in 550-05.




Vietta

Is it me or does this car appear to have an antenna fitted? Is this antenna present in any of the other pictures?

[Type550]

Alan,

Although if feels like groundhog day, this is the Reader's Digest version...

550-07 was documented for the last time in this photo at Autobahn Munich-Nuremberg Experimental Test on 25th March 1954. 550-07 is identified as a hinged back 550 and you can see the join and straps behind the cockpit.



550-01, 02, 03, 04 and 05 were all designed as fixed back cars. The first 4 cars have been accounted for at the time of March 1954.

I posted a photo from a French publication dated April 1954 of Veuillet driving a fixed rear 550 at the Montlhery track with the licence plate - 5254 WO which is a French registration owned by Veuillet's dealership - Sonauto. This photo would have been taken prior to the April release of the publication.



Veuillet would only take the 550 to the factory for repairs, not to be rebodied. To change a 550 from a hinged rear to a fixed rear is serious reverse engineering and as Porsche had already settled on the hinged rear for the rest of the 550 builds, you would have to question why would they go backwards in design.

The 550 with the same licence plate was first raced in the Montlhery Coupe du Printemps 25-4-1954



followed by Sable-Solesmes Rallye 8-5-1954 where we can see the fixed rear identical to 550-05 as it appeared in the Paris Auto show





It then appeared with Annnie Bousquet driving it in the Montlhery Coupe d'Automne 19-9-1954



The car also appeared in other European races with other plates later on.
550-05 was then returned to Brazil to be raced by Bino Heins.

I will leave it up to you to digest my thoughts

[alan hall]

Andrew,
I apologize if it seems I was asking you to re-post what you had already posted, but seeing the photos together in one post so they can be scrolled through really helps in understanding your position! I have to agree with you the car in the first photo, the March '54 Autobahn test is not the car in the other photos and the car in the other photos certainly appears to be a different car. I cannot see as much detail in the scanned photos as would be nice but I would say the car in the other photos (the April magazine, the April 25th Montlhery, the May 8th rallye, and the September 19th Montlhery) certainly appear to all be the same car.

So if these are two different cars the question must be answered as to what two cars these are. I certainly have no answers here and must rely on you and Steve for these answers...but I can ask questions. How sure is everybody that the first photo is actually of the Autobahn test in March of '54 and if that is positive, how sure is everyone that that car is 07? If that is a sure thing then what possibilities are there for the other car? One other question...was 07 built originally as a hinged back car or was it originally built as a fixed back, and if originally built as a fixed back are there any photos of it in that configuration? I guess I am wondering if the Autobahn photo is mis-identified as to either date or car which might mean the car in the later photos could be all of 07?

[Type550]

If it helps sort things out, I am happy to repost. 550-07 was originally a buckelwagen, so it had a high back seat, but still a hinged rear. You have to remember that 550-06 which was also a show car and a buckelwagen was the first of the hinged rear 550s

550-06



550-07

[Impi]

Hi First of I must congratulate everybody on their attempts to document this fascinating piece of history.
My 2 cents for what they are worth: Jorge Lettry is still very much active in Brazils motor scene and I still find information on the Puma sports cars freely given by him at club meetings and the like. I personally would like to meet him but being 12000km away in South Africa it will be nigh on impossible. I am sure he would remember the 550 very well and could possibly fill in all the gaps from memory. He built quite a few mid engine vw specials and would have been keen to study the 550. He also seems to have lots of fotos of those days.
regards
Armand

[alan hall]

An item that has been nagging me about this problem is the presence of the knock-off wheels on the April 25, May 8, and Sept 19 car. Sure, they could have been added to the South American car or the car shown as the March '54 Autobahn car, but why would anyone make that change? I honestly feel that changes made to a race car are made for some technical reason and not for a simply aesthetic reason. The knock-off wheels are heavier and increase un-sprung weight and would detract from the car's handling, but they do have an advantage in a race where you are going to have to change tires such as 24 hours at LeMans because they allow for a faster wheel change. But if you are going to use the cars for short races and rallyes it makes no sense whatsoever to change from disk wheels to the knock-off wheels.

The more I think about this and review the photos that Andrew has posted, the more convinced I am becoming that we are looking at three distinct cars, the South American car, the Autobahn test car and the car being raced in the April 25, May 8 and September 19 races.

I may be incorrect here but I believe Steve's contention is that the Autobahn test car was re-bodied in the back end to the old style rear, knock-off wheels added and was the car raced in the later races, all within a couple of weeks....frankly this seems really un-likely. Similarly I believe Andrew feels the South American car was shipped back to Europe, modified with knock-off wheels and was raced in those races in summer of '54. Based on the correspondence that Vietta posted, this also seems pretty un-likely.

So at this point I would like to ask both Steve and Andrew if there is any possible three chassis numbers that would fit for these cars?

[Steve Heinrichs]

Guys,

As we begin to change focus to later races and to 550-07, I think it is fair to summarize that 550-05 went to South America and was there until at least some time in June of 1954.

So---the March and April races we have discussed ad nauseum, were 550-05.

//////////////

We'll now move on to the September races and the 550-07 stuff.

Steve Heinrichs

[vhelmle]

Vietta

[vhelmle]

Hello Everyone,

Steve Heinrichs has asked me to post some of the original information we considered in our understanding that 550-05 (not 550-06) went with Stuck to Brazil, then was sold to Fasanello and eventually Heins. We disagree with some of the information noted in this source. For example, we believe Heins raced 550-05 and that Fasanello probably did not actually have an accident in 550-05.

The handwritten notes are difficult to decipher, so please let us know about errors you find.

[Type550]

Interesting how in every European race the car had a 'central locking device' on each wheel as opposed to the standard lugs found on 550-07...

[Type550]

Alan,

550-05 at the Paris show and also at the Porsche factory was fitted with the Rudge wheels. Although these wheels do look the same, they were different. Here is a blog I recently wrote about them...

http://type550.com/11171/rudge-wheels-on-a-550/

An item that has been nagging me about this problem is the presence of the knock-off wheels on the April 25, May 8, and Sept 19 car. Sure, they could have been added to the South American car or the car shown as the March '54 Autobahn car, but why would anyone make that change? I honestly feel that changes made to a race car are made for some technical reason and not for a simply aesthetic reason. The knock-off wheels are heavier and increase un-sprung weight and would detract from the car's handling, but they do have an advantage in a race where you are going to have to change tires such as 24 hours at LeMans because they allow for a faster wheel change. But if you are going to use the cars for short races and rallyes it makes no sense whatsoever to change from disk wheels to the knock-off wheels.

The more I think about this and review the photos that Andrew has posted, the more convinced I am becoming that we are looking at three distinct cars, the South American car, the Autobahn test car and the car being raced in the April 25, May 8 and September 19 races.

I may be incorrect here but I believe Steve's contention is that the Autobahn test car was re-bodied in the back end to the old style rear, knock-off wheels added and was the car raced in the later races, all within a couple of weeks....frankly this seems really un-likely. Similarly I believe Andrew feels the South American car was shipped back to Europe, modified with knock-off wheels and was raced in those races in summer of '54. Based on the correspondence that Vietta posted, this also seems pretty un-likely.

So at this point I would like to ask both Steve and Andrew if there is any possible three chassis numbers that would fit for these cars?

[alan hall]

Vietta, What is the source of the two pages of notes you just posted? I also am wondering how it was decided that the notes regarding 550-06 were incorrect. If the South American car was in fact 550-06 then things actually might make more sense, with the Autobahn test car being 550-07 and the car in the European races run in April, May and September being 550-05. The descriptions of the cars in the notes seem to match this possibility.

[Carrera GT]

A short comment on the notes - from my understanding, Porsche did not do Book notations nor a Kardex type file on the Spyders. I see the notes as being an internal factory hand written work-order (build sheet) record for 550-05.

Michael Doyle