History of the most beautiful VW ever built

 

This article is about a car that brought the car culture to Brazil and yet is not known about in other parts of the world. A little bit of history as to how this car came into existence, in Brazil from the 70’s there was an outlaw on the import of cars into Brazil, hence several unique cars such as the SP2 that were built locally popped up. The car was built under the Volkswagen Do Brazil (VWB) which was established in 1953, this is why the original Bug and the bus was built there for a long time even after the production ended in the other countries. They had some amount of independence from the main VW which allowed them to produce cars such as the SP2 and the forgotten Karmann Ghia.

Brazil had a rule that dated back to the 60’s that closed off its borders to importing of vehicles, this was done to setup industries and help the country develop.  The dominant companies that had setup operations in Brazil was Ford, Volkswagen, and General Motors. 

VWB plant

Volkswagen started a new project that was to be designed by Marcio Piancastelli and led by Senor Schiemann and Rudolf Leiding. The first prototype was presented in 1971, this car was designed during an era when Volkswagen wasn’t really known for sports cars.

Who was Marcio Piancastelli?

Marcio Piancastelli was an amazing Brazilian car designer who started his career as an intern in Ghia, in Ghia Piancastelli came up with a small concept car called the Pian GT it was a small sports car. After this he returned to Brazil and joined VWB. He began his journey in VWB with the VW Type III, it had a very British design language. The design that really put him on the map was the SP2, he was tasked with designing a sleek sports car on a stock Type III chassis. Marcio Piancastelli design of the SP2 is iconic and especially at the time it was one of the most dramatic stylings to ever be associated with VW.

About the car

The SP was launched in the year 1972 after being debuted as a prototype in 1971, SP was an acronym for São Paulo. The first version known as the SP1 had a rear mounted 1.6L air cooled engine producing 65HP was borrowed from the VW type 3, this was done by VWB too keep costs as low as possible. This was however a major flaw as the SP1 was heavy and the 1.6L boxer engine did not produce enough power to tick the sports car check list. And after building just 88 of these SP1’s VWB changed the engine with a flat 4 engine producing….wait for it a staggering 75HP! This didn’t make it all that faster but it surely looked fast.

Was it successful?

No, would be the answer, but then you would wonder as to why this wasn’t a success? Here’s why. In its overall production run a total of only 11,123 cars were produced until 1976. We are talking about a sports car that was manufactured in Brazil and for Brazil. Until the VW SP’s there weren’t any except the Puma GT which was also built on a VW platform but had a fiberglass body. Post 1976 saw the entry of quite a few sports cars, so one could also say that the car was ahead of its time. 

The car had a few flaws too the two main ones being lack of performance to back its styling and the interior was very cramped. Though the car was designed from ground up it took design cues from the Audi 100 coupe, VW 412, also the Porsche like taillights is easy to spot. If you showed a person who knew nothing about the SP, they would easily mistake it for a front engine car, the sleek styling and over all low height was the main talking point for this car. The car sat as low if not lower than a Karman Ghia and the Porsche 914.

The SP2 failed to sell in large numbers with production for the model totaled somewhere between 10,205 and 11,123 (numbers aren’t accurately documented), and only a few hundred were imported to Europe. The locals gave it a nick name called ‘Sem Potência’ which translated to ‘without power’. Another fun fact about the car is that it was brought to life by just a six-member team, the sixth member of the team was Helga Leiding’s wife.

When Leiding moved to Germany to take over VW, he unfortunately did not introduce the SP2 to the European market. The reason being that VW Europe was going to move towards water cooled front wheel drive layout cars.

Very few SP2’s and ever fewer SP1’s survives today partly because they were rarely exported to other markets, but also because they suffered a great deal from rust. Despite all the issues I feel this as one of the most beautiful looking cars VW has ever produced.

 

 

This is the Puma GT

All pictures were taken form: https://petrolicious.com/articles/the-volkswagen-sp2-is-a-beautiful-piece-of-brazilian-history