(first posted 6/7/2014)
I did a double take when I ran across this at the Cohort, posted by frasier5. There were a number of German low-volume cars that shared certain styling elements with the Porsche 356, that first appeared in 1948. But none was as faithful as this 1952 Goliath GP700 with a body by Rometsch. And although the body style may not be original, it was very much so under the front hood. It h wad a pioneering transverse engine with transmission in-line drive train, a 700cc two-stroke twin. But most significantly, it was the first production car with fuel injection.
Goliath was part of Carl Borgward’s empire, and the GP700 sedan that appeared in 1950 was very advanced, if not even revolutionary. Its styling was well ahead of the times, at a time when many German sedans like the Mercedes were still sporting pre-war fenders and running-boards. But its most advanced feature was its transverse engine, with transmission in-line, which would appear to answer the question that was posed here a while back as to who pioneered that layout.
And in 1952, the GP700 Sport appeared, with the body built by the coachwork firm Rometsch, and fuel injection by Bosch. It would be several more years before the first Mercedes, the 1955 300SL, would sport fuel injection.
Here’s the Goliath driveline, although these appears to be a carburated version from the sedan. But the inline engine and transmission is quite evident.
I thought it was a real looker until I saw the front view… Love the drivetrain packaging, tho.
the front end needs a little bit of botox aye…lol (the two stroke drivetrain is cool! it would drive like a 1.2 litre four stroke for torque most probably)
Found this via Googling – big improvement, IMO!
It needs to lose the embellishment altogether, but then it might look a bit too much like a…
I wonder if this is the little red coupe in the Volvo parking lot article.
These were built in extremely limited numbers. Did I read “29” somewhere?
I work for a publisher and I am actually working on a book now that includes this car along with 24 other Streamlined cars. The book is titled “Streamlined”. According to its manuscript there were 25 built and only 2 surviving.
For years it was believed that only two had survived, but a third one has been found (or at least the ruined remains of it – it had been “updated” by re-equipping it with a VW motor in the rear!) and has undergone a complete and extensive restoration and brought back to new condition. Concerning the number built: two were constructed for Goliath by the body Rudy in Delmenhorst. An order for a further 25 was placed with the coach-building firm of Rometsch in Berlin. It is uncertain if all were actually built, but after exhaustive studies historian/author Hans-Gunther Riedel concluded that a minimum of 21, and a maximum of 27 Goliath Sports were built. (Reference “Genau genommen Band 4, Goliath Sport” by H-G Riedel, Verlag Peter Kurze, Bremen, 2012) (Verlag is the German word for publishing house)
This is a much better photo. The color/lighting/profile of the lead article picture makes it look more like a 356 than it really is.
Appearance aside, it’s a great stop in the evolution of the modern FWD car. There were FWD cars way before this (one of the most well-known being the Cord 812) but the 1952 Goliath GP700 Sport, not only with its pioneering engine/transmission orientation, but fuel injection, as well, goes a long way to laying claim as being the originator of what is now the universal arrangement of every FWD car sold today.
That looks like the offspring of a 356 and a Bristol 403. That grille–whoa! Looks like some sort of superhero logo!
Hmm. Do I see a precursor of the Trabant?
In this picture the engine is removed but you see the gear box and that transverse leaf spring.
Only on CC would I learn of a car such as this. The side view was impressive, the front more of a shock.
+1
Flat twin in line drive train, Jowett had been building their Bradford van/pickup in that configuration since forever and were still at it in the 50s they also released the Jupiter flat 4 in the early 50s using the mechanicals from the Jowett Javelin sedan, Herr Borgward with his fuel injection is a first sure but the drivetrain layout was well established. Cool car.
It’s not a flat twin; it’s a transverse inline twin. The point is, as far as I know, this is the first use of an inline engine mounted inline with a transmission in a FWD car. Quite a different layout than the Jowett, which had a boxer four ahead of the front wheels.
The Jowett even sounds like a slow-revving Subaru.
Paul,
it is an extremely interesting design. The gearbox design is very simple and pre-dates the Peugeot 206 by 50 years, very similar design. It is a very compact gearbox. Many other features stand-out in the design. Many things are modern about the design when you see it in the flesh and apart. Clearly the Peugeot 206 gearbox has a very compact diff gear-set not unlike this. These cars were designed to be mass-produced and adopt modular principals we see years later. The 1100 Hansa flat engine is a good case in point effective but simple.
Styling on the rare Coupe is very beautiful in the Germanic way of the time, people don’t really understand how beautiful and significant the German coach builders were . Erdmann and Rossi designs are some of the best ever which were often more beautiful than the French.
Made in Yorkshire so it had to be different from anything else!Like Scott and Panther motorcycles
LOL!
Remember, in Yorkshire, “different” often means “better” 😉
Surely Jowetts didn’t have transverse engine or FWD ?
No rear drive but flat engines and inline trans. inline with the chassis that is that last pic didnt load first time.
The Jowett had a boxer four, driving the rear wheels. The Goliath was the first FWD car with a transverse engine with its transmission mounted in-line, like almost all modern FWD cars do now.
No one has commented on the fuel injection, which must have been a mechanical system. Nothing like current electronic systems which now are controlled by a horde of sensors and a digital processor. From what I understand fuel is metered roughly rich enough to prevent problems in much the same way that carburetors generally worked.
Yes, it was a mechanical direct injection system, essentially a Bosch diesel pump modified with a throttle valve.
Did this mechanical fuel injection system owe any of its design features to, or have any direct ancestry from, the fuel injection system used in the Messerschmitt Bf109 and other German aircraft World War II? German aviation was the pioneer in fuel injection for gasoline powered engines, I believe.
This FI system was an adapted Bosch direct injection diesel pump, with individual plungers per cylinder, as used on diesel engines since well before the war.
Almost all the higher-powered German WW2 aircraft engines used fuel injection. Ive not read about those systems in detail, but I assume they were fundamentally the same too, meaning direct injection, and undoubtedly with a similar type of high pressure plunger pump. It’s pretty much the only system of FI used, until the indirect systems came along in the mid 50s, specifically deigned for gasoline engines, rather than adapted diesel-type pumps.
Yes, the Mk. 1 Spitfires were still using carburetors in the Battle of Britain, while the Bf-109s had fuel injection. A common escape tactic for the German pilots was to roll over and dive inverted, as the Spitfire engines would cut out due to fuel starvation if that pilot tried to duplicate the same maneuver.
It is still better than a carb because at least each cylinder receives the same amount of fuel. The Bosch K-Jetronic was a great transitional system, much more accurate than a carb but not mechanically complex at all.
I assume that the K-jetronic used an analog computer to regulate the fuel flow, although that is not clear from what I found online. Throttle body fuel injectors are like carbs in that the intake manifold will still distribute fuel unevenly.
The K-jetronic (also known as CIS-E) does use a control unit that is signaled by the oxygen sensor and temp sensors. It is a simple system that is basically very reliable. However, if you loan your car out to a family member for about a year and they believe the top of the red is a full tank, and a couple of days laying on empty means time to get another 10 dollars of fuel, at 300 K (miles) the pumps will die, the fuel in the filter will pour out black, and you will be going to U pull to replace the pricy fuel distributor after replacing pumps and filter. Ask me how I know! The earlier CIS without oxygen sensor on the earlier Rabbit, Scirocco, and Dasher was without any control units and was basically controlled by engine temp. It was very reliable as long as it received plenty of clean fuel.
Paul… What you mean about the Gutrbrod Superior, with his in line engine?
http://auta5p.eu/katalog/gutbrod/gutbrod_600_03.php
You’re misunderstanding me. Look at the picture of the drive train. The Goliath engine and transmission were mounted transversely, but the transmission was mounted directly in len (next to) the engine. That was unusual, and new. And that’s what almost all modern FWD cars have used, since the Autobianchi Primula of 1964 popularized, by using a four stroke engine.
The Gutbrod engine was longitudinal, like the DKW/Audi and such.
From the profile picture it looks like the engine/transmission package sits behind the front axle. That’s different from the common modern practice. As far as I know among current production cars only the Toyota/Scion iQ has the transverse engine/transmission behind the front axle.
No, the engine/transmission are in front of the axle.
I see. Thanks. What’s all that space behind the axle? Legroom? If so, the windshield must be very close to the driver’s face.
Questio two: The DKW f89, has too the transverse , but two stroke engine.
Yes, but its transmission was behind the engine, not inline with the engine.
Beautiful location. I wondered what it was and then I saw the “Classic Remise” sign in the thirth picture. More down-to-earth classics (Volkswagen, Peugeot, Renault, BMW) from the seventies in the row at the right, they all seem to be in a superb condition.
Classic Remise’s website in English:
http://remise.de/Classic-Remise-Duesseldorf-english-summary.php
This is what I love about this site-just when I think I have seen it all…
In the picture of the drivetrain, it looks as if the transverse leaf also acts as the lower control arm for the suspension. If this is true, it would be similar to the “Planadyne” front suspension Willys used in the station wagon through the mid ’50’s-later replaced with a simpler solid axle. Was there another lower suspension component to control fore-aft movement-perhaps a radius rod? Or a lower control arm? Would seem curious that a car looking that sporty would have such flexy lower front wheel control.
I do like the transverse leaf springing solution, it kind of reminds me of how evolution works-keeping an old functional feature and patching it into a new system because it is already there.
Ah, now I see from looking at that LP400 that it had lower control arms-but it looks like the transverse leaf served as the upper control arm-still kind of an iffy setup. With that amount of swing and sway I wonder how Paul enjoyed careening through the Alps with his godfather. Yikes!
“Classic Remise” in Dusseldorf.
There is a place like this in Berlin – west of the city center. It is an old car barn for trolleys or street cars called “Meilenwerk” and is full of personally owned collector cars and businesses that cater to them – including the collector car dealership “Thiesen”, with whom I have dealt. Lots more obscure German and other Euro stuff there.
I posted the pictures in the Cohort. I was in Berlin and went to the Classic Remise when there. It totally exceeded my expectations – I was expecting something of a museum and what I got was part museum, part event hall, part classic car storage (glass garages so you can see), a restaurant, all with garages of mechanics/restorations specialists on the perimeter of the building (some of the cars show the garages behind them). It was an old train station, converted to this. Admission is free, about a 20 euro cab ride from central Berlin. Highly recommend to anyone if they make it to the area. I was there for hours.
Such a cool car! The smaller German manufacturers were responsible for such remarkably interesting vehicles during the 50s-60s. I was somewhat familiar with DKW/Auto Union and NSU before finding CC, and I at least knew what a Borgward Isabella was, but I knew next-to-nothing about Carl Borgward’s other creations before reading this article: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-european/automotive-history-lloyd-sorry-no-full-liters/
From what I understand, it was not just the Sport Coupe model that carried the fuel injected engine, but also the GP700E and GP900E sedans. Taking the styling and drivetrain layout into consideration, I think it’s fair to say these were revolutionary cars – although few people would have realized it at the time.
I had always assumed their engine layout was north-south until the Trabant came up in the comments here a few months ago. Lloyds used (what I believe to be) a smaller version of Goliath’s two-stroke twin in the same transverse layout and debuted the same year, although as far as I can tell, the transverse engine/transmissions Saab 92 still has them beat by at least a few months – having gone into production in December 1949. Everything I can find on the Borgward cars says they began production in 1950, but then again, English language info on them is sparse. Borgward’s version was no doubt the more influential of the two, since Suzuki ended up copying it (legally under license or otherwise? this isn’t clear from sources on the internet) for their 1955 Suzulight, which popularized the layout in Japan.
Here’s a later GP900E sedan – apparently a U.K. model that has ended up in Australia. This one has a hot-rodded engine that is supposed to make over 80HP, but it’s lost its fuel-injection setup along the way, as most Goliaths have:
And since I can’t get enough of Borgward, check out this sweet proto-minivan Goliath Express – the second Borgward vehicle that could fit that description, the earlier one being the Lloyd LT vans, which were more “micro” than “mini”. It utilized the watercooled boxer four from the GP700/GP900 replacement, the Goliath/Hansa 1100 (a proto-Subaru itself), to drive the front wheels… although it appears to be of body-on-frame construction, so it’s not fully modern.
Borgward also built a diesel engine of their own design and a larger, six-cylinder car that was available as a Hudson-esque fastback or Pullman limousine. The Isabella TS Sedan was the BMW 3-series of the 50s and in their spare time, they built lots of 3-wheelers and a few EV trucks/delivery vans. All in roughly a decade! Was there ever a more ambitious auto manufacturer?
There were a few other BorgWard cars there – I loaded pictures of them too in to the Cohort. It was the first time I’d seen the brand.
Never saw one of these before – a very interesting and cool car!
In the early 60s in Towson MD we had a neighbor 5 houses down on Piccadilly Rd who owned a silver Borgward, I always thought that it was a dorky looking car, and even weirder, down at the other end of the street near where it ends on Chestnut there was a mustard color DKW. 2 stroke fog-maker. There were definitely some non-conformists in our neighborhood, as we also had a Renault Dauphine (a pos that was always broken) on one side of us, and a baby blue ’59 Bugeye Sprite (the 1st Sports car I ever rode in at 10 yr old) on the other!
When I was kid, I was enamored reading about the histories of so many obscure (yet highly influential) cars like the Goliath. Pre-Internet, usually the best (or only) source of info on defunct and lesser-known carmakers were the hard cover automotive encyclopedias at the local library. It was near impossible to further research cars like this one. So many brilliantly engineered cars were unjustly doomed to obscurity, being let down by tepid styling or weak marketing.
My grandpa’s neighbor owned one of these by ’77-’83. He’d take grandpop to the Park and sit down, feed the pigeons and talk about life. He was a “criollo”, ie, his ancestors had arrived in Uruguay, probably from Italy or Spain, about 40 years before his birth, which was probably at the turn of the century. For my gringo “zayde” (grandpa in Yiddish) whoy came in his 20’s with no language, thiis guy was the quintessential criollo. So, I remember the two 80’ish guys putpurring off in the Lloyd, leaveing a bluish smoke plume behind. Nice times and Nice friendships. You made my Day. Thanks!
I’ve read that the key Fiat innovation was unequal-length driveshafts. Does the transmission being in line with the transverse engine automatically mean unequal length driveshafts?
It does mean that the diff is not on the C/Line of the car. The easiest solution is unequal length driveshafts, which are fine for low power outputs. The alternative is to use a short shaft on the right to a steady bearing fixed to a bracket on the crank-case, with the driveshaft beyond it, matching the L/H driveshaft.
Off-topic, but the photo of the sedan (from Wikipedia) looks to me like a model in a diorama. Not sure why.
Somehow the red car in the background appears in sharp focus but the man walking towards it, while apparently close to it, is out of focus. Does anyone here know the photographic technique(s) being used?
The blur effect is created with image processing software.