Founded by the creator of Horch cars, August Horch, at Zwickau in East Germany, Audi became part of the Auto-Union in 1932, was nationalized in 1945, and became defunct until 1965, when the name "Audi" was resumed at the "new" Auto-Union works at Ingolstadt in Western Germany. The Audi of today is one of Germany's leading cars, now part of the great VW Group, following Audi's merger with NSU's car side. Horch's first Audi was a 2612cc car; other superb quality four-cylinder models of 3564cc, 4680cc and 5720cc followed. Driven in major sporting events they proved very successful. Pre-war models had ioe engines; after the war, new sv engines of 2071cc were introduced, there was also an ohv 3500cc 50 hp. The first six-cylinder motor, an ohc 4655cc unit, appeared in 1924, the first straight-eight sv 4872cc appeared in 1928 after J.S. Rasmussen (then head of DKW) had bought the remains of the American Rickenbacker car works and began building the Rickenbacker eight-cylinder engines in Germany. At about the same time he also bought Audi (Horch had left the works in 1920). 1929 saw the introduction of the Audi Zwickau 4371cc an 5130cc eight, followed in 1931 by a 3838cc sir cylinder and a small 1.1 litre four with Peugeot motor. Most Audis were luxurious cars with special coachwork. Audi joined Wanderer, DKW and Horch in the newly formed Auto Union in 1932, and the 1933 built front-engined 1963cc Audi got a Wanderer six-cylinder ohc engine. It was followed by a similar 2255cc model and a 3281cc car with an ohc Horch six cylinder motor. Mercedes controlled the destiny of Audi in the mid-1960s and also designed the first post-war Audi 1.7 litre four-cylinder engine... and before the first new Audi was on the market, they had sold Auto-Union to VW. The new range consisted of cars from 1496cc to 1871cc and, with the Audi 50 of 1974, also 1093cc and 1272cc cars of first-class design and workmanship. All these new Audis are front-wheel-drive cars. ©VEA
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