John J Szobocsan

I decided to post a new thread to reply to your comments regarding Audi and Volkswagen. You are correct that by 1991 the influence of Piech was strongly felt in Audi design. Piech began his career in the mid-1960s with Porsche. He was in charge of engine development of the legendary 917! In the early 1970's his grandfather, Ferry Porsche, decided that he did not want the family involved in the family business so Piech was sent packing. He became Vice Chairman of Audi NSU AutoUnion in 1975. At Audi he was responsible for the development of quattro, the five cylinder engine and the aerodyanmic Audi 100 (also known as the 5000 in the States). Yes, this was the car that caused the unintended acceleration scare. Piech was Chairman of Audi at the time and appears to be the one responsible for the tardy response in the U.S. market. Piech promoted motorsports at Audi and is directly responsible for its rallying and Trans AM successes.

Piech developed the Audi brand virtually from the ground up. In 1993 he was promoted to Chairman of the entire Volkswagen Audi Group until his retirement in 2002. An interesting book about Piech and other auto executives is "Six Men Who Built the Modern Auto Industry" by Richard A. Johnson. I highly recommend it.

The Piech influence will be felt at Audi and VW for years to come. Piech was responsible for the platform approach taken by the group. Several analysts have derided the platform approach but the economics made Vag a stronger player in the international markets. Piech's predecessor, Carl Hahn, promoted mass production of a handful of designs. The Golf plant at Wolfsburg had a break-even point at 105% utilization!

The car industry has changed dramatically with the Korean and Chinese entering the world market. VW needs to become Audi and Audi needs to change to a more sporting platform to survive. This is a very difficult task as Audi needs to avoid disenchantment among the current customer base.

I can ramble on for a while but I will stop here.

Cordially,

John J. Szobocsan

phred

he also created the Phaeton and gave it to VW.

Rick 601

Im not Potomac2.7T but thanks anyway- feel free to ramble on!

Potomac-Greg

I just hope that VW management gets the long term support and consistency to follow through. Too often the mission gets compromised, resulting in wasted effort and tarnished brands.

I support VWs move into Audi territory, and Audi's move into BMW/Porsche territory.

Potomac-Greg

I think the PhA8ton is where VW wants to be in 5 or 10 years. It was just 2 much 2 soon.

John J Szobocsan

but we need to remember that the Phaeton is the new Bentley platform. Audi is able to justify the expense of a bespoke platform for the the A8 (basic architectural structures including suspension and drivetrain are shared with VW and Bentley)but Bentley's much smaller sales volumes do not. This was the problem with Rolls-Royce/Bentley and the reason why Vickers put the company up for sale. The costs of developing a new vehicle, in light of market and regulatory demands, is incredibly high. Vickers did not have the capital reserves to make the necessary investment in the motor car division; therefore, the decision was made to sell the unit.

Volkswagen, using the strength of its balance sheet, and engineering resources is able to inject the much needed capital into Bentley. Bentley today is one of the fastest growing nameplates. The Phaeton,on the other hand, and its glass factory in Dresden, represents the future of VW. The Phaeton, while viewed as a money pit, provides VW with knowledge on how to transition out of the mass market production-based world into the niche product world. One should visit VW's micro website on the glass factory. It is really amazing and shows the investment being made by Vag in advanced manufacturing capabilities!

The very economics of automobile production counters much movement into advanced technologies. The costs of having a technology fail in the field is much too great. Recall the issues facing Vag and the faulty ignition coils. Volume producers, if they want to innovate, need to incorporate advanced technologies in low volume, niche products to make the cost economics attractive for mass production and to learn of the technology's limitations. Audi introduced laser seam welding on the TT and Vag has since introduced this manufacturing concept in more pedestrian products including the VW Golf. The higher costs, and lower volumes, of the TT made this technology possible for introduction into the Golf. Laser seam welding increases the rigidity of the body shell at a minimal weight gain when compared to spot welding.

Cordially,

John J. Szobocsan

Potomac-Greg

... is giving me whiplash. Such clarity and knowledge contrasted with... the opposite.

Jmacs4.2

lol!

April

Heh, heh

April

even having a niche to which to properly apply it. He also had a large ego. Sometimes that is great for the company/project, and sometimes it leads to a bottleneck of design and engineering ideas when he's trying to be the boss of a huge company, and the lead engineer.