Audi Tradition
The first step to be made to know more about this special car, was to contact Audi Tradition. They helped me with the article in the Auto Union Veteranenclubs Magazine. They told me the car was built after Mercedes sold the company to Volkswagen in 1964. The new owner stopped all further developments related to DKW as one of his first measures. Also they said that it was not likely this car was a project between Auto Union and a TU. The contact with the Universitie in Frankfurt, mentioned in the article, didn’t yield new information.
Because of the use of parts from other car brands it isn’t likely that Auto Union was involved in the project.
MH Kaiserslautern
In November 2015 I got a mail from a German DKW specialist. He told me he knew the car since the 70’s. It was built by students at the Coachbuilders Master School in Kaiserslautern (MHK). After that it wasn’t used anymore and in poor condition. An acquaintance from Frankfurt bought it, but also did not restore the car and then it was sold to a DKW Club member in Holland.
I searched the internet and found this interesting website about the work of the MHK.
You see a lot of very nice coupes based on DKW, Borgwards and other chassis. It looks like high standard work. Similar as my Auto Union.
Claus Luthe was a German car designer, noted for his design work on the NSU Ro 80, NSU 1200 TT, Volkswagen K70 and numerous seminal models from Audi and BMW. Luthe was a pioneer of aerodynamics and digital design within the automotive field.
He studied at the Coachbuilders Master School in Kaiserslautern. At the MHK he designed and build with 3 fellow students a two door limousine based on a DKW F 91 chassis.
Unfortunately, the contact with the MHK didn’t provide any new information. They could not find anything about this car in their archives. This looked like the end of the search on the history of the Auto Union.
In December 2017 I was called by a gentleman who said he had worked on this car. Later that week I came in contact with another old student who still had pictures of the construction. These great pictures were a big relieve after 2.5 years searching. Finally I had the conformation who had built this beautiful coupe.
The vehicle was built by students of the College of vehicle engineering at the master school of Kaiserslautern for their master examination. In 1968 it was designed and built on a DKW 3-6. The origin of painting was also red. The interior was not carried out by them. They found it difficult to build a sporty car on the DKW chassis. The schedule was also very tight. The car had to be finished in three months. The difficulties they had, were as follows. The radiator was too high. The base unit needed to be partially renovated and the dashboard had to be made completely new. This was all additional work, which almost blew up the tight schedule. The front window is from a Porsche and the rear window is from a Fiat 850 Coupe, but upside down (180 degrees).
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