ok I will tell you... Its a company not around any more and you cannot afford it! 1937 Horch 853 Voll & Ruhrbeck Sport Cabriolet
Tip: open Google Image Search in another window or tab; drag the image you want to identify to that. The search field will enlarge and say "drop image here". That yielded, indeed, Horch. It would not have been possible to identify it as such unless one were familiar with that individual car, as the bodywork is bespoke, apparently the work of Voll & Ruhrbeck. Here is the other end: Here is another of their efforts, on a Bugatti Type 57: The rear fenders are particularly nicely done.
Both Audi and Horch were founded by August Horch, who translated his surname into Latin for his second attempt (= listen! - singular imperative). Auto Union came about through the merger of Audi, DKW, Horch, and Wanderer, hence the four rings in what remains the Audi logo.
Nice to see things like this appreciated. I believe I've seen that one up close and personal. In my best hoodlum speak, it will wear you the **** out in all the right ways. As to why post it here, the customs (and kustoms) we love here owe their existence to such things. Those early coachbuilders inspired individual souls to create the ***y and swoopy art forms we see on Mercs, Caddys, early and late Fords, and much of what came later and continues to flourish today. The long-winded version of "inspiration"...
It has a 302 cu.in. straight-8; about 100bhp. Horch did have a range of smaller V8s at the same time.
Disagree but agree at the same time. There are a lot of stock cars on this board. But I guess your definition of what a hot rod is, differs. Don't take this as an attack. I am just curious. What make you think it is not a hot rod? Is it because it is not from one of big three? Or is because it is not this boards definition of a traditional hot rod? To me this is custom. But because you ain't gunna get this kinda craftsmanship just any where. A lot of what's on that car might not be stock. I wouldn't know, but I think it has some great styling that can be transferred to our world. Just some dialog and an opportunity for me learn.
I think theHIGHLANDER said it. There is an unbroken continuity between the coachbuilders of the pre-war era and the custom builders of the "traditional" age. To a large extent the term "traditional" is used on the HAMB in a sense that can best be summarized as "self-referent": that is, hot rods and customs built quite emphatically in consciousness of the historical phenomena "hot rod", "custom", etc. This holds an inescapable but rather interesting paradox, as those phenomena originally came to definition outside any such self-referent condition. That is, we're about traditional customs as a manifest idea despite those customs having been built, at least initially, without any such manifest idea about what a "traditional custom" is. It was a gradual process, however: I believe the aforementioned phenomena had the nature of social movements in that they developed a self-referent aspect almost from the start, though that was always offset by prior outside reference, which must have included the recent exotica of the day. That is to say, the custom builder in 1954 was probably as aware of the cultural meaning of the Grandes Voitures of the '30s as he was of the emerging "kustom" praxis that was growing before his eyes. One can write a doctoral thesis in social history on this stuff. There is something very characteristic of 20th-century American culture here, i.e. an ability quite spontaneously to establish Ways It's Always Been within extremely short periods of time. There's an entire second doctoral thesis in that.
Nice Ned, really. To key in on something specific, look at Darrin, Edsel Ford and "Bob" Gregorie as just 3 examples. Darrin hung a shingle out in Hollywood offering restyled cars for the rich and shameless in the movie biz. A gennie "custom shop" as we know it. He hacked and whacked Packards (and perhaps a few others) into his vision of long, low, channeled, etc. Still, Clark Gable said of the early Darrin, "...it looks better from further away..." in a rather sarcastic reference to the 1st efforts. "Bob" and Edsel sliced and diced a Zephyr into what Edsel viewed as a custom car that was "Truly Continental" after his return from a European excursion. That Continental was channeled, sectioned, custom tail section, stretched hood and fenders, hardtop doors, and eventually push ****on door openers. His inspiration was clearly the swoopy and ***y Euro cars such as the Horsch presented by the OP, and surely many others seen around Europe in the posh sandboxes he played in. There were others that would manifest their dreams into post war Caddys, some examples of which were seen at this year's Amelia Island concours, like this 49 or 50 Caddy from Coachcraft:
The Horch is one of those cars that every guy or gal who plans on customizing a car needs to study. Not to copy or emulate but to understand form, function and and to understand that you don't need to add extra stuff for effect without purpose. It flows from the front bumper to the rear bumper without any hiccups. From every angle you see the whole car and then your eye sorts out the individual components each of which is somewhat unique but blends so well into the rest of the car it doesn't dominate the car. Even the dual spares blend into the back of he car and don't dominate it like dual sidemounts would. That is the same thing we see with the great customs. you see the whole car and then you see the separate components that make it so great when they are combined.
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