
PRODUCT INTRODUCTION
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Dr. Ferdinand Porsche, the founder of the Porsche Car company, was a genius designer whose
design ideas have influenced many today. He has designed the Beetle, the Elephant heavy tank
destroyer, the Type82 Kubelwagen, the Type166 Schwimmwagen and Lohner-Porsche Mixed
Hybrid, the world's first car powered by hub-mounted motors in the wheel.
While Ferdinand Porsche was designing, Adolf Hitler was waging war across Europe and plunging
the World into chaos.
The fates of these two Austrians were intertwined in the 1930s, when Hitler made two promises to
the German people after his election as head of the Third Reich: one was to have steak on dinner;
the other was to have a car for every German family. The car had a very specific requirement,
being able to carry 2 adults and 3 children at the same time, i.e. a standard German family, and
travel at a speed of up to 100km/h, while selling for no more than 1000 Reichsmark. Then Germa-
ny built a network of dams and highways, constructed the KdF Motor City in Wolfsburg, Lower
Saxony and registered the Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung des Deutschen Volkswagens mbH,
which later developed into the world-renowned Volkswagen headquarters. The national car also
got its official name, KdF-Wagen, which later became the famous ‘Beetle’. kdf took the German
Kraft Durch Freunde literally "Strength Through Joy", which was the name of the vacation organi-
zation under the German Labor Front at that time. At the same time, the government adopted a
savings plan for the general public to buy ration coupons through this organization to pre-save for
cars, which proved to be a scam set up by Hitler to raise funds for the coming war. The subsequent
series of policies created a large number of employment opportunities, the economy was booming
for a while and Germany was unparalleled. The people had steaks, but not cars. Then war came.
KdF-Wagen, known as the people's car while none were sold to the people, all being requisitioned
by the army and converted into military vehicles, the most famous one being the Kübelwagen
(Released on Nov.25 , 2021, Product No.11241). We feel honored if you already own it in your RC
collection. If not, the Type82E is a great start to realistic scale RC models. The Type82E, primarily
offered to senior officers, uses a KdF Wagen body on the exact the same chassis as the Kübelwa-
gen, a rear-mounted, rear-drive chassis with a limited-slip differential. The post-war civilian version
was the Beetle, which later became world-famous.
Technically speaking, Kommandeurwagen refers to the car with Beetle body based on the Type86
4WD chassis, specially provided for high officers at the front, model number Type87. Type82E, on
the other hand, refers to an officer's car based on the Type82 barrel car 2WD chassis fitted with a
Beetle body. The difference in appearance between the two lies in Type87’s wider fenders and
footrests and larger size off-road tires.
The air-cooled engine features no need for water to cooling, making it ideal for use in hot and cold
environments. Hence, it was sent in large numbers to the North African Corps under Ehrewin
Rommel, which is also the prototype of our Kommandeurwagen model.
EN
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