Question: What was the first car ever made by Porsche?
If you said the 356 we're sorry to tell you that you're miles out. In fact, the first Porsche ever made predates the 356 by half a century.
This is the Porsche P1, the company's first ever car, and it was designed by the company's founder, Ferdinand Porsche, nearly forty years before he was tasked by Adolf Hitler to design what turned out to be his most enduring design, the Volkswagen Beetle.
Known officially as the Egger-Lohner electric vehicle C.2 Phaeton model, the car will be unveiled at the Porsche Museum at the end of this month, having sat untouched in a warehouse since 1902.
Porsche claims that the car will "bridge the gap between the past and present day developments such as the Porsche 918 Spyder," which on the face of it seems a rather ridiculous claim. However, like the 918, the P1 is powered using the wonder of electricity. Unlike the 918, on the other hand, the P1 doesn't have a separate petrol engine, making it the first, and so far only, Porsche ever to run solely on electric power.
The electric motor, which weighs 130kg, offers an output of 3hp, putting it some way off the pace of the 887hp offered by the 918, but the driver could, for short periods, increase this to 5hp, allowing the P1 to achieve a top speed of 22mph.
The power was sent to the rear axle through a twelve-speed controller, which had six forward gears, two reverse gears and four gears which could be used to brake the car.
Astonishingly, Porsche claims that the P1 had a range of 50 miles and featured a Lohner alternating vehicle body, which has been lost, allowing the car to be used in both the winter and summer.
Ferdinand Porsche entered the car in an 1899 road race in which the competitors had to travel 24 miles with three passengers on board. Not only did the P1 win by 18 minutes, it also completed the race using the least amount of energy.
The car is on display as part of an exhibition at the Porsche museum in Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen, Germany and can be viewed free of charge on 1 and 2 February.
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