The Volkswagen Beetle is one of the bestselling cars of all time. As such, a legendary car like this loaded with historical facts. So here are a few fun facts you might not know about the Beetle.
The car’s name is not the Beetle
Yes, it’s true! Although most Volkswagen enthusiasts know this, many people around the world do not. The official name of the Beetle was the Volkswagen Type 1, due to the fact that it was the first car produced by the company. The ‘Beetle’ nickname comes from a New York Times article, which likened the cars overall design to a beetle, hence the nickname.
The Beetle was designed 13 years before it actually was
This may seem confusing. You see, the final design for the Beetle was revealed in 1938 by Ferdinand Porsche. However, Ferdinand Porsche had been working on the design of the car for nearly 8 years beforehand. But what is less known is that Porsche actually built on a previous design by a Hungarian inventor, Béla Barény. He initially designed the basis of the Beetle as an 18-year-old student, in 1925, later submitting the designs to Volkswagen.
The engine from the Beetle is legendary
While the original Beetle’s engine had only 19 kW of power, but despite this, the car was perfectly capable of comfortably travelling at a speed of 100 km per hour. However, over time, the air-cooled engine became larger and more powerful. The engine would end up being used in almost every other Volkswagen model, up until the early 1970s. Around this time, the aging air-cooled engine was replaced by a more modern water-cooled engine. The air-cooled flat-four would end being in production until 2003. How?
The Beetle is the longest produced vehicle in history
While the European production of the car would run for 40 years, from 1938 to 1978, production in other parts of the world would run for much longer. South American markets loved the Beetle and were not ready for it to be discontinued. As such, Mexican, Brazilian, and other South American countries continued producing the car all the way to 2003, when Volkswagen finally shut down worldwide production of the car for good. This means that the Beetle was produced for an incredible 65 years!
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