Big interview: Eugen Kolb
As a bodywork specialist who worked with Komenda, Klee and Butzi and ended his career under Harm Lagaaij, Eugen Kolb oversaw much change at Porsche. He recounts his time there to Total 911
Full insight from the bodywork specialist who oversaw the early 911 right through to 996
Eugen Kolb began his career apprenticed to coachbuilder Reutter in 1953. He recalls that besides 356s, in the early Fifties they were also assembling Studebakers at Zuffenhausen. “We were organised in small groups and each one had its specific task – doors, bonnets, wings etc. What I remember is that we absolutely couldn’t afford to waste material.” He worked in particular on smoothing the 356 Cabriolet to create the 356 Speedster, notable for its lowered windscreen. Keen to improve himself, in 1961 Kolb took a year off to study at Kaiserslautern where he became a certified coachwork master craftsman. “It was a specialist college partly funded by the motor industry. At that time there were only two such schools in Germany.”
When he returned to Stuttgart he joined Porsche itself, working for chief body engineer Erwin Komenda: “The challenge then was the move from making the 356 to the 911 body, a very different construction. This was the biggest shift the company had ever undertaken. At the same time I was also working on the 904: we had to build a hundred of those for homologation.”
Porsche was keen to develop a car for FIA GT racing. The basic shape of the 904 was adapted by Butzi from the 718 and the frontal area kept as low as possible. The detail design was that of Heinrich Klee and the project was overseen by technical manager Hans Tomala; preparation for manufacture was carried out under
Gerhard Schröder and Eugen Kolb. Aerospace manufacturer Henkel supplied the glass reinforced plastic (GRP) body, a radical choice at the time, though various British kit cars had been using this material since the 1950s (the 1961 Lotus Elite was an entire GRP monocoque).
“The whole 904 development was such a rush, there was no time to do wind tunnel testing,” recalls Kolb. “It wasn’t a monocoque – the body was riveted to a ladder chassis. US regulations stipulated that the petrol tank had to be the other side of the firewall, so insulated from the passenger compartment, and this would influence the design of the 911. My task was to create
enough space for a flat six while Gerhard Schröder managed assembly in Reutter’s body shop.”
With the basic shape of the 911 established, Kolb’s responsibility was to make it compliant. The 356 was based on the Beetle, but the 911 was an entirely fresh start. After plans for a 911 Cabriolet fell through (chassis rigidity problems scuppered the initial prototypes) Kolb’s first big job was the Targa open-top 911: “This car had to have a ‘Cabriolet feeling’. My role involved strengthening the windscreen pillars and the floor pan and modifications to the tail, but others were responsible for the ‘T’ bar.”
Kolb’s experience saw him drafted into the racing department where Ferdinand Piëch was on a mission to win Le Mans. “He dictated what he wanted and my task was to make the wind tunnel model then take them up to full size. Henkel also supplied the 917 shells, but in between the other bodies came from Wagenfabrik in Rastatt and that was my responsibility. The 910 was a sort of extended 906; for the 907 Piëch wanted everything lighter and more aerodynamic, which fell to me. Then came the 908 of which we did three versions. When it came to the 908/3 I had to make space to accommodate the flat eight and Piëch had me look at what Ford and Ferrari were doing. I also had to find room so that fuel injection would fit.”
In the early 1970s the emphasis returned to the 911 and Kolb shaped the wider wings and front and rear spoilers for the 930 Turbo. He also integrated the intercooler in the spoiler of the 930 3.3-litre. The next 911 job he recalls is the Cabrio version which Peter Schutz told Porsche it had to have. “Gerhard Schröder had already done most of the work, but by then he was in management and I adapted his original design. Essentially we used more steel, reinforcing the floor and firewall. Later we electrified the hood and had to plan the fitting of the electric lift mechanism.” The Speedster idea re-emerged at this time and as he had been with the original Speedster, Eugen Kolb was responsible for the lowered windscreen pillars
and the tail with its specific rear cover. When in 1990 it was decided to make a 964 Speedster, Kolb was called in to modify the 911 Cabriolet chassis, which again involved putting more steel in the floor. The 964 itself he remembers with a smile: “It was fun getting those side strips to stick!” The 993 too involved him: “Porsche wanted a better air conditioning specification and I had to find space for that, and we did a lot of preparation for a new interior.” Much of this would ultimately be discarded in 993 development budget cuts.
Eugen Kolb’s speciality also saw him deployed on a series of projects from the 959, where his experience was vital in recycling as much of the 911 body structure as possible and to deal with third parties such as Wagenfabrik, who supplied hand-laminated panels for Weissach’s race cars. “I usually got the odd jobs such as the electric windows for the 959. They came from Audi and I remember on the prototype they leaked.” As Weissach sought third-party contracts, his bodywork expertise was called on to design amongst other things new cabs for Harvester agricultural machines, and when Piëch’s Audi Quattro was being readied for production, Kolb shaped the transmission tunnel, an area in which Audi, hitherto only a front-wheel drive manufacturer, had no experience.
“The end of the 1980s was not a happy time at Porsche, although things did improve after Wiedeking arrived. By then I was deputed to the styling department under Harm Lagaaij,” he smiles broadly. “These designers do wonderful sketches and my role was to interpret them so that they could actually be manufactured, translated into production. I had to tell them where from a manufacturing and aerodynamics point of view they could site spoilers for instance.”
He worked on the 986 Boxster, contributing the hood, called in thanks to his Cabrio background to make it watertight. “Originally, Porsche intended to have a manual hood, but then marketing told them that female buyers who would comprise 25% of 986 purchasers would be put off.” Building in the electric mechanism fell to the man who had successfully done that job for the 3.2 and the 964, Eugen Kolb. “When it came to the ‘Wiedeking test’ where the CEO tried both manual and automated hoods, the manual hood stuck!” Porsche selected the electric hood for its new sports car.
Keen to exploit Porsche’s expertise, Wiedeking set up a US joint venture in the US to offer consultancy to brands such as Cadillac. Kolb was sent over as the hood specialist, but found America was not to his liking – “something of a ‘not invented here’ attitude: I came home after a short period.” He retired in 1997 after a career which spanned the 356 to the 996. “It was a good time: I saw a lot.”
Like most of his time-served colleagues, he never thought, he says, of working anywhere but Porsche, and in 2019 he was delighted when Porsche invited him as the original body engineer to assist in preparations for the 917’s 50th celebration. Kolb joined a group of retired former colleagues, including Hans Mezger, advising on the restoration of the original 917 001 to its precise original specification.
“These designers do wonderful sketches and my role was to interpret them so that they could actually be manufactured, translated into production”