The Volkswagen EA 48 is a milestone in automotive history. The compact car concept, which development engineers Heinrich Seibt and Gustav Mayer came up with, was the first to combine the space-saving McPherson strut suspension with a front-wheel drive and its associated steering mechanism. Today, this concept is seen as a pioneer for the front-wheel-drive cars offered in the compact car segment. Volkswagen produced two prototypes in 1954, one of which was scrapped at the end of the project. As November's "Classic of the Month", the only remaining EA 48 is now on display for Autostadt visitors at the ZeitHaus.

THE FIRST VEHICLE OF ITS KIND

In the early 50s, Volkswagen began work on Development Order 48, which was abbreviated in German as "VW EA 48". The goal was to design a 4-seater, front-wheel-drive, entry-level model that would be positioned as a compact car below the Beetle. This around 3.4-metre-long 4-seater was both the Wolfsburg Group’s first vehicle designed entirely in-house and the first compact car. This vehicle was also ahead of its time, and not only because it combined a front-wheel suspension with front-wheel drive: The hatchback for the self-supporting "Ponton" body, which was first used six years later on the British Mini, only established itself within car design for the compact class in the 1970s. The 13-inch wheels specially manufactured by Continental, which permitted the use of particularly small wheel housings, are one of this vehicle's most visually striking features. Under the bonnet, a transverse and air-cooled 18 hp two-cylinder boxer engine, a kind of halved Beetle engine, accelerated the vehicle up to 95 km/h. Test drivers had very high praise for the EA 48's handling, in particular its chassis, thanks to its considerable power-to-weight ratio, but the running behaviour of its engine posed a few problems.

A MISSED OPPORTUNITY

After test drives of 2,600 km on factory premises and 130 km on public roads, the EA 48's development and testing phase ended in February 1956. The fact that this compact car never went into series production can be largely attributed to the international success of the Beetle, which used up existing production capacities. In addition to the unwillingness of Volkswagen Managing Director Heinrich Nordhoff to jeopardise this success by introducing a competitor from his own company, the then Chancellor Ludwig Erhard is also rumoured to have had a hand in this decision: At the request of C.F. Borgward, Volkswagen should refrain from manufacturing this vehicle so as not to jeopardise jobs elsewhere. Designer Gustav Mayer, later known as the "father" of the Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles brand, was convinced to the end that his compact car concept would have changed the automotive market during Germany's economic miracle.