This week’s Prime Find is an example of the car said to mark the beginning of the modern Audi era, transforming a relatively minor German car company into what is today a hugely successful premium brand competing across almost every segment of the market.
The Audi name first made an appearance in 1910, the culmination of the merger of Wanderer – itself founded in 1885 – and Horch, founded in 1899, and the first car to carry the Audi name was the Type A10/22.
1928 saw the owner of DKW take a controlling share in Audiwerke AG and four yeears later Audi merged with Horch, DKW and Wanderer to form Auto-Union, and a few years later saw the introduction of the company’s four-ring logo, one for each brand, although it originally only appeared on the phenomenally successful Grand Prix cars. With regard to road cars, the Audi brand played an increasingly minor role and from 1939 the name fell out of use for the next couple of decades.
After WW2, it was impossible for Auto-Union to pick up where they left off as all their factories were located in what was to become East Germany; indeed, the controlling Soviet authorities ordered the factories to be dismantled, with just the Zwickau plant remaining, from which the Trabant began to emerge a few years later, and the firm of Auto-Union AG was effectively liquidated, to re-emerge in 1949 in Ingolstadt, with the aid of funds from the federal Bavarian government and the Marshall Plan.
Initially the plant produced only small two-stroke engine machines – a delivery van and a 125cc motorcycle – but things looked as if they would change with the Daimler-Benz takeover of the company in 1958/59. It was during the 1950’s that the DKW F89 and F91 and then the Auto Union 1000 came out of the Dusseldorf factory that was rented from Rheinmetall-Borsig.
While the Daimler-Benz investment enabled a modern car manufacturing plant to be built in Ingolstadt, Auto-Union proved not to be a good fit for the company and in 1964 they sold off the business, with Volkswagen acquiring a 50% stake in 1964 and eighteen months later, taking full control.
The Auto-Union 1000 was replaced in 1963 by the DKW F102, the first DKW with a four-stroke rather than two-stroke engine. So significant was this development that VW decided to drop the DKW name as it was inextricably linked with old two-stroke technology, reclassified the F102 as the F103 and marketed it initially simply as an Audi, the first car to carry the badge for 25 years.
The above very abridged and simplified run-through of the company’s history leads us nicely to our Prime Find, which is a 1965 Auto Union F103 or Audi, as it was marketed before a name change to Audi 72 (indicating its power output). It is on sale with a private vendor in Duisberg, Germany.
This was the first of what was to become a series of F103 models that did for Audi what the Neue Klasse did for BMW, with the range eventually consisting of Audi 60, 75 (replacing the 72), 80 and 90 models, with the number representing the model’s engine output in PS. The F103 series were four-cylinder, front-wheel-drive two-and-four door saloons and three-door estates – known as the Variant – mated to a four-speed manual transmission.
Externally the F103 was a subtle development of the F102, with one of the main visual differences being the rectangular headlamps, and only minor changes were made to the car’s styling during it’s production run to 1972. A total of 416, 853 F103’s were produced, and according to the vendor, only 3,000 or so of these were the original, simple Audi model which were built in 1965 only.
Our Prime Find is one of the 3,000 and looks to be in excellent shape – the seller, who has owned the car for 23 years, claims it is in “perfect, unrestored condition”. The car is finished in Sea Blue with a Pearl White a roof, a colour scheme which compliments its smooth clean lines very nicely, and the paint looks to have kept its sheen.
The interior of the car is claimed to be “complete and original right down to the floor mats”, and the seats – finished in a combination of grey fabric and vinyl – look barely worn, having been reupholstered 24 years ago. The 1685cc engine was also replaced by another unit from 1965, and the car has done 20,000km on this engine out of a total of apparently verifiable 96,939, so the car has been gently used in its 57-year existence.
The 72PS that pushed out back in the day propelled this Audi to a maximum speed of 148kmh/92mph, with 100kmh achieved in 14.8 seconds, acceptable for its time – if you wanted more performance, then buyers could upgrade to the larger engined, later versions. The underbody is claimed to be rust-free.
The car is supplied with its “original operating instructions”, two sets of repair manuals and an original and complete spare parts list. The vendor is offering set of spares that include door locks and handles, mirrors, electrics, axles and gearboxes for another €2,500. It also has a current TÜV (German MOT) that is valid until September 2023.
This is a fascinating car – one of the first post-war Audi’s and an important model in the marque’s history. It looks terrific, but despite it’s apparent excellent condition and rarity, it seems the vendor has had some trouble selling it – it’s listed on mobile.de as well as ebay, and failed to sell on an online auction site that is new to me, MyCarmunity (I know…). The asking price is €17,500 or £15,000, and it is the most expensive of the 60/75/80/90 series available on mobile.de. You can check out the ad on mobile.de here, and the MyCarmunity ad is still up, with many photographs – we’ve borrowed a few as per usual, and also as per usual, if this piece of Audi history is of interest, we recommend arranging prior inspection if possible.
With our Saturday instalment of Prime Find of the Week, we’re offering our services to the classic car community, by passing on our favourite classic car for sale from the week that passed. This top-tip might help a first-time-buyer to own his first classic, or it could even be the perfect motivation for a multiple-classic-car-owner to expand his garage with something different. We’ll let us be inspired by anything from a cheap project to a stunning concours exotic, and hope that you will do the same.
Just remember – Any Classic is Better than No Classic! We obviously invite our readers to help prospective buyers with your views and maybe even experiences of any given model we feature. Further to that, if you stumble across a classic which you feel we ought to feature as Prime Find of the Week, then please send us a link to primefindoftheweek@viaretro.co.uk