Pelican Parts Forums

Paraphrased from Porsche 911: Forever Young, by Tobias Aichele:

Otto Fuchs Metallwerke had made forged wheels for armored military vehicles for Porsche during the war. So it made sense for Porsche to contact the same company when they came up with the idea of creating light alloy wheels for their 911 production car in the mid-60's. Fuchs representative Herr Kretsch offered Porsche something beyond their expectations, though: the possibility of mass-producing a high quality <u>forged</u> alloy wheel.

Nothing on this scale had ever been attempted in Germany.

Heinrich Klie of the Porsche model department (the early version of the styling studio) was given the task of styling the wheel. He became the 'father' of the Fuchs wheel. He is also responsible for a number of 911 design details, including the complete dashboard.

Klie and his team were given no precise instructions for the wheel, so he simply went to work with Plasticine modeling clay and came up with a design. Where styling assignments would typically involve weeks of trial and error, changes, and new revisions, this wasn't the case with the Fuchs wheel. The first model was shown to Ferry Porsche, who approved it "with a wave of a hand," according to Klie.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...chsMeeting.jpg

It then went to the suspension design department, where engineer Rudolf Hoffmann was responsible for the wheel's physical properties. Minor modifications were made.

From there, Fuchs chief engineer Karl-Heinz Ochel had to oversee a whole new process for manufacturing the wheel. 58 steps were required to make a single Fuchs wheel.

Quote:

From Porsche 911: Forever Young, by Tobias Aichele
"To be precise, the Fuchs wheel was formed by the following steps. A pressed piece of stock was forged to make a forging blank. Next, drop forging the blank produced the ventilation holes and deburred the flange. A further drop forging step resulted in a split flange, before the workpiece was widened by rolling. And here is the secret advantage of this complex manufacturing process: the Fuchs wheel stayed in production for so many years because it could be rolled to any width desired. The forming process resulted in a wheel with a completely finished inner side. The outer, visible side of the wheel was turned on special lathes, which resulted in the smallest possible wheel imbalance. A carefully developed surface finish -- polishing, anodizing, and painting -- permitted different design variations over the years and assured high corrosion resistance."

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploads/2FuchsSteps.jpg

After being tested directly on numerous cars, some very minor changes were made, and the wheels were offered on the 1967 models. There was some internal controversy in the company over the design itself, but the marketing people prevailed in support of the wheel, and history proved them correct. The wheel became a runaway success and remained a design fixture on the 911 for 20 years.

(Image quality is only so-so because I don't have a scanner. I used a digital camera.)

(Originally posted a good while back.)