In April 1958 the then Daimler-Benz AG acquired a majority
in Auto Union GmbH. All the remaining shares followed on 31 December
1959. By 1960, Auto Union was therefore a wholly-owned subsidiary of
Daimler-Benz. Important moves for the future were made in the period up
to 1 January 1965, when Volkswagen acquired a majority in Auto Union
from Daimler-Benz: From 1961, the major Mercedes-Benz plant in
Düsseldorf was constructed on a site previously operated by Auto Union.
Mercedes-Benz also made important contributions to the development of
the Audi models of the 1960s.
Stuttgart. 60 years ago
the Board of Management of Daimler-Benz AG held four meetings to
deliberate on an initiative by major shareholder Friedrich Flick: in
early 1958 he proposed a merger between Daimler-Benz AG and
Auto Union GmbH. The industrialist reckoned that the model ranges of
the two companies would complement each other. This would enable
synergies to be used for future development work. At that time Flick
owned a shareholding of around 40 per cent in each of the two
companies. On 6 March 1958 the Board of Management in Stuttgart finally
decided to take over a majority of the Ingolstadt-based company with
the four rings as its trademark.
On 1 April 1958 the
Supervisory Board of Daimler-Benz AG approved the acquisition of just
under 88 per cent of the authorised share capital of Auto Union GmbH.
The transaction was retrospective to the beginning of 1958. Before the
Second World War Auto Union AG, founded in Chemnitz in 1932, was one of
the major competitors of Mercedes-Benz with its Audi, DKW, Horch and
Wanderer brands. This rivalry also manifested itself in motor sport,
where the Silver Arrows from Stuttgart competed against the racing cars
of Auto Union. Following the reincorporation of Auto Union GmbH in
Ingolstadt in 1949, the only vehicles in production were the two-stroke
models under the DKW brand and, for a few years, the likewise
two-stroke Auto Union 1000 (1958 to August 1963).
On 14 April 1958, the first joint Board of Management meeting
between Daimler-Benz AG and Auto Union GmbH was held in
Stuttgart-Untertürkheim. The agenda included two important questions
concerning the technical direction for the future. For example, the
representatives of Daimler-Benz AG had their doubts whether the
three-cylinder two-stroke engines of DKW would have much of a chance in
the passenger car market even for just a few years. In fact, the
matter appeared to have been settled, as Auto Union had already
declared itself willing to equip the successor to the DKW 3=6 passenger
car with a four-cylinder four-stroke engine. Ingolstadt was not
willing to dispense with the two-stroke engine at once, however.
At
the end of April 1958, the Daimler-Benz Board of Management members
Professor Fritz Nallinger and Wilhelm Künkele travelled to Düsseldorf
to begin coordinating the activities of the two companies. In August
1958 Hanns-Martin Schleyer and senior engineer Arthur Mischke were
appointed to manage the liaison between Daimler-Benz AG and Auto Union.
And on 21 December 1959 Daimler-Benz made an agreement to acquire the
remaining shares of the Ingolstadt company on 31 December 1959. From
1960, Auto Union therefore became a wholly-owned subsidiary of
Daimler-Benz AG.
Birth of the Mercedes-Benz plant in Düsseldorf
In
July 1958 the foundation stone was laid for a completely new
Auto Union plant in Ingolstadt. This went into operation in 1959. This
immediately opened up capacities that were highly attractive to
Mercedes-Benz at the Düsseldorf location of Auto Union founded in 1950.
And when the Supervisory Board of Auto Union decided to relocate its
production entirely from Düsseldorf to Ingolstadt on 31 May 1961, this
made fundamental changes possible.
In 1961 Daimler-Benz AG took
out a lease on the location, which had been constructed on a former
Rheinmetall-Borsig production site after the Second World War. The
Stuttgart-based company then relocated production of the L 319 van and
the OM 636 diesel engine, as well as the assembly of steering gears
and gearshift linkages, to Düsseldorf. In 1962 Auto Union sold the
Düsseldorf plant to Industriemotoren GmbH, a subsidiary of
Daimler-Benz AG.
This firmly enshrined the Düsseldorf plant in
the company’s production network. Over the years it was continuously
expanded to reach the outstanding position it holds today. In recent
years alone, Daimler has invested around 300 million euros in the
location. Today around 6,600 employees work in Daimler AG’s largest
worldwide van plant in Düsseldorf. It is the lead plant for worldwide
production of the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter. In early March 2018, the
production line for the latest-generation Sprinter went into operation
in Düsseldorf.
Audi models with Mercedes-Benz genes
While
Düsseldorf was being established as the lead plant for the
Mercedes-Benz van division, the aim was also to modernise the
production of Auto Union now concentrated in Ingolstadt. The financial
resources required for this were considerable: between 1959 and 1964,
more than 340 million German marks were invested at Auto Union in
addition to the proceeds from the sale of the Düsseldorf plant to
Daimler-Benz AG.
Yet development at the company progressed only
slowly. This is why Daimler-Benz dispatched one of its most capable
engineers to Ingolstadt on 8 October 1963: Ludwig Kraus, head of design
in the Mercedes-Benz pre-development department. Kraus had been
designing marine diesel engines since the late 1930s, played a major
role in the design of the 1.7-litre OM 636 diesel engine after 1945,
and in the early 1950s was head of design for the successful
Mercedes-Benz W 196 R Formula 1 racing car and the 300 SLR (W 196 S)
racing sports car. Now his mission was to accelerate changes at
Auto Union. Kraus had something of a home advantage, as he had gone to
school and obtained his higher school leaving certificate in
Ingolstadt.
His arrival was to have far-reaching consequences.
This is because Ludwig Kraus not only brought a team of highly
motivated young Daimler-Benz technicians with him to Ingolstadt, but
also a new, almost fully developed four-cylinder engine with the
in-house designation M 118 and the original code name “Mexico”. Its
high compression ratio (1:11.2) and the intense swirling effect on the
intake mixture of helical intake ducts led to a low fuel consumption.
It was also low in vibrations, as all the tests at the time confirmed.
As
a so-called medium-pressure engine, this Mercedes-Benz four-cylinder
unit had its 1965 debut in the new Auto Union Audi Premiere, also known
internally as the F103. This vehicle was the first post-war passenger
car by Auto Union to feature a four-stroke engine, and also the first
post-war model under the Audi brand.
Moreover, subsequent
vehicle developments at Auto Union and its Audi brand also bore the
distinct signature of Mercedes-Benz. This is because Ludwig Kraus
remained in Ingolstadt as Technical Director when Daimler-Benz AG sold
its majority in Auto Union to the Volkswagen group on 1 January 1965.
From 1966 the company was a wholly-owned subsidiary of Volkswagen.
Kraus
and the other former Mercedes-Benz engineers were familiar with the
prototype development work carried out since 1953 for the possible
Mercedes-Benz medium-class model series W 122 and W 119. These had a
front section reminiscent of the W 113-series SL sports cars, modern
body lines with a low beltline and a dynamic rear end design. It is
therefore not surprising that the body of the first Audi 100 developed
at Auto Union shares features with the W 119. This model too was
equipped with the four-cylinder medium pressure engine. Kraus initially
worked on the medium class car in secret, though it finally celebrated
its premiere in 1968 – and brought the company its great leap forward
into the future. The Audi 80 (1972) and Audi 50 (1974) were also
designed under the aegis of Kraus.
Source: Daimler
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