The Austro-Daimler Sascha (also called Sascha or Sascha Porsche) is a car from 1922. It was designed by the ustrian, Czechoslovakian and German car, truck, aviation motor and tank designer

Ferdinand Porsche Ferdinand Porsche (3 September 1875 – 30 January 1951) was an Austrian-German automotive engineer and founder of the Porsche AG. He is best known for creating the first gasoline–electric hybrid vehicle (Lohner–Porsche), the Volkswag ...

. The car was named by Ferdinand Porsche after Count

Sascha Kolowrat-Krakowsky Count Alexander " Sascha" Joseph von Kolowrat-Krakowsky (29 January 1886 – 4 December 1927) was an Austrian film producer of Bohemian-Czech descent from the House of Kolowrat. A pioneer of Austrian cinema, he founded the first major film stu ...

, a friend who had encouraged him greatly to build a small, lightweight sports car, and who also personally financed the project. In that period, Porsche still worked for the Austrian

Austro-Daimler Austro-Daimler was an Austro-Hungarian automaker company, from 1899 until 1934. It was a subsidiary of the German ''Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft'' (DMG) until 1909. Early history In 1890, Eduard Bierenz was appointed as Austrian retailer. The com ...

and designed a small, lightweight sports car of 1100 cc that was revolutionary for its time. It had a four

cylinder A cylinder (from ) has traditionally been a three-dimensional solid, one of the most basic of curvilinear geometric shapes. In elementary geometry, it is considered a prism with a circle as its base. A cylinder may also be defined as an infin ...

engine with 8 inclined overhead valves and

bevel A bevelled edge (UK) or beveled edge (US) is an edge of a structure that is not perpendicular to the faces of the piece. The words bevel and chamfer overlap in usage; in general usage they are often interchanged, while in technical usage they ...

-driven dual overhead

camshaft A camshaft is a shaft that contains a row of pointed cams, in order to convert rotational motion to reciprocating motion. Camshafts are used in piston engines (to operate the intake and exhaust valves), mechanically controlled ignition systems ...

s, preceding the bevel drive of the later Fuhrmann engine in some

Porsche 356 The Porsche 356 is a sports car that was first produced by Austrian company Porsche Konstruktionen GesmbH (1948–1949), and then by German company Dr. Ing. h. c. F. Porsche GmbH (1950–1965). It was Porsche's first production automobile. E ...

Carrera models. The motor had a very wide crankcase with a cast flat surface all along the two members of the ladder frame to which it was bolted rigidly in the same fashion as the big 6 Cylinder Hispano Suiza cars. The engine of the Sascha had a capacity of 1100 cc and produced 50 horsepower, which was quite a lot for that time. The car achieved a top speed of 144 km/h. For racing, the fender and

spotlight Spotlight or spot light may refer to: Lighting * Spot lights, automotive auxiliary lamps * Spotlight (theatre lighting) * Spotlight, a searchlight * Stage lighting instrument, stage lighting instruments, of several types Art, entertainment, an ...

could be removed. Surviving examples of this vehicle show staggered bucket seats for the driver and mechanic and the absence of a tail body. In most period photographs, the rear suspension, brakes and differential are exposed, though some also show a variant with a small torpedo tail being used. For the

Targa Florio The Targa Florio was a public road endurance automobile race held in the mountains of Sicily near the island's capital of Palermo. Founded in 1906, it was the oldest sports car racing event, part of the World Sportscar Championship between 1955 ...

race of 1922, three Saschas were sent to

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

. They came first and second in the 1100 cc-class with an average speed of over a distance of , with very bad roads and a few slopes of 12.5%. By comparison, the overall winner of the Targa Florio in 1922 won in a Mercedes at an average of 63 km/h while the car was equipped with a much more powerful engine.

Sources

* Wood, J (1997). Porsche'':''The Legend. Parragon. .

External links

* {{Cite web, title = photo Sascha during the Targa Florio, url =http://www.seriouswheels.com/pqr/Porsche-at-Targa-Florio-1922-Austro-Daimler-Sascha-1024x768.htm Porsche Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft Sascha