As a peculiar little white car emerged from the deep forests of Norway’s Telemark in the late 1950’s, it was with grand ambitions of turning the Scandinavian country into a car manufacturing nation. The Troll Sportscoupé was presented as a Norwegian – and improved(!) – Porsche. It was Per Kohl-Larsen who had made his fortune producing coffee in Africa who was the driving force behind the project. But instead of sending thousands of the Troll Sportscoupés onto the Norwegian roads, the ambitious adventure collapsed in a cloud of fibreglass dust, financial issues and modern technology.
Per Kohl-Larsen called his new company “Plastik & Bilindustri” which simply translates into Plastic & Car Industry. Together with two engineers, Bruno Falck from Germany and Norwegian countryman Erling Fjugstad, they constructed the little coupé which they named Troll – a somewhat odd choice of name as it equally means troll in Norwegian. They started their efforts in the mid-fifties and were able to introduce their first car to the press in October 1956. It was a compact coupé body which was manufactured in fibreglass, as this new material was full of promise for the car industry. In the USA, Chevrolet had introduced their new Corvette with a fibreglass body as early as 1953. Interest in fibreglass was growing rapidly in Europe as well, but thus far these had all been low-production kit cars based on a pre-war chassis and mechanicals. As such, Per Kohl-Larsen had a clear goal of making the Troll Europe’s first mass-produced car.
By utilising fibreglass, it was possible to keep the overall weight of the Troll below 700kg, which was estimated to be a saving of approximately 130kg compared to a similar car with a steel body. Furthermore, production of the body was also both simpler and cheaper, which was naturally a huge bonus during a time where European countries were still recovering from the war.
They had managed to source the very modern 700cc 2-stroke engine with 2 cylinders and not least Bosch fuel injection from the German Gutbrod-Werke’s bankruptcy. Technically, it was a hugely advanced engine for the period, but it still only managed to pump out a humble 26hp. The fuel injection also proved troublesome which led to considerations of swapping to the 3-cylinder 2-stroke engine produced by SAAB just across the border. However, this never materialised.
Besides the engine, they had equally secured the chassis from Gutbrod’s Superior model. This chassis proved to be 15cm longer than the initial design for the Troll bodywork, but this was easily solved by extending the body a little thereby giving the Troll a small rear seat instead of being a pure 2-seater as it had initially been intended.
It was in this format that the first Troll was delivered to a costumer on the 1st of May 1957. The small team was all geared up and ready to initiate mass-production, but they still lacked the official permission required by the Norwegian government. Despite numerous attempts, this document was never granted the small company “Plastik & Bilindustri”.
This dispute with the government most likely stemmed from the Norwegian politicians being worried that granting permission for car production could affect Norway’s export. At the time, Norway were exporting huge amounts of fish meal and other fish products to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. In return, Norway imported cars from the same countries. So the authorities worried that Norwegian car production would kill off the import of cars from the East Bloc and this in return would have an impact on Norway’s export of fish products. They simply couldn’t risk the little Troll tipping the scales of the trade balance with the East Bloc.
The exciting new Norwegian car project sadly came to an end before it even gathered real momentum. Amidst the bureaucratic dispute, “Plastik & Bilindustri” just didn’t have the financial backing to continue without an income from cars sold. Finally, in 1958, they closed the doors to the company for the last time. A mere five Troll Sportscoupés had been manufactured in this time and the Norwegian car production dream ground to a halt leaving Per Kohl-Larsen and his family financially ruined. Today it is but a tiny footnote in automotive history, but could a group of more supportive politicians have given us a Porsche beating Norwegian sportscar?
Source: http://trollbilen.no/