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Tilman Brodbeck Remembers

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Tilman Brodbeck Remembers www.porscheroadandrace.com Tilman Brodbeck remembers Published: 12th January 2018 By: Kieron Fennelly Online version: https://www.porscheroadandrace.com/tilman-brodbeck-remembers/ Tilman Brodbeck poses with a 1973 911 Carrera RS 2.7 Coupé (left) and a 911 Sport Classic (right) – 21 September 2009 To be able to write on your résumé that you worked for one of Porsche’s CEOs would be quite an achievement. Tilman Brodbeck can however do a little better than that, for in a 40- year career, he was assistant to no fewer than five successive Porsche presidents. But, as he tells us, he held other posts too. When he started at Zuffenhausen, the company was still ruled by Ferry Porsche, whose nephew and Technical Director Ferdinand Piëch, was literally snapping at his heels. www.porscheroadandrace.com Ferry Porsche www.porscheroadandrace.com Unlike many of his contemporaries who went to Stuttgart University to complete their education, Tilman Brodbeck went further afield, to Darmstadt 100 miles to the north, for his engineering studies: “I wanted to get away from home,” he smiles revealing the slightly nonconformist streak that runs through much of his thinking. His speciality at Darmstadt was in airflow techniques, a subject then very little developed. Tilman’s background meant that after he joined Porsche he was promoted to body project engineer. “One of my tasks was on the 924 (Porsche’s first front engined model) where getting sufficient cooling air to the engine was quite a challenge within the overall shape we wanted for the car.” Prior to this though and before even being assigned a title, Brodbeck had had to prove himself: he was handed the daunting responsibility of resolving the 911’s tendency to lift its front end at high speed. Simply adding weight to the front fender did not solve the problem. “We used to drive up to Ehra-Lessien (VW’s extensive proving ground), and after Kassel, the autobahn straightens out and you were expected to drive that section flat out. I always dreaded having to take the wheel on this stretch, because the 911 wandered about so much.” Experiments in the wind tunnel at Stuttgart university showed how air was lifting the front end of the 911, but at that time, no one was using spoilers or aerodynamic aids on production cars. Flaps and attempts at ducting airflow had however indicated some improvement when tried on race cars and inspired by this Tilman, developed a lip for the 911 front valance. The result was a 50% reduction in lift. “Ferdinand Piëch was delighted, but then he really piled on the pressure giving us three weeks to prepare a lightened 911 for the motor sport division.” www.porscheroadandrace.com Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 Coupé (1973) without ducktail undergoing tests in the wind tunnel Glass fibre bumpers replaced the originals and thinner glass was specially ordered. With Brodbeck’s ‘lip’ the 911’s drag coefficient was improved, but the rear wheels now lacked traction. “This was a real headache,” recalls Tilman, “I literally couldn’t sleep.” Then he remembered his first car, a rear engined Fiat 850 coupé Spider and how its successor, the 900 turned out to have a much higher top speed than the 5bhp increase should have made. But that 900 had a lip, a sort of spoiler on the engine cover…Brodbeck hastily fabricated a rear spoiler and took a 911 so modified to the wind tunnel: the results were sensational. Rear lift went down by 60% and drag and top speed were also improved. The modification was presented to Tony Lapine’s design studio and Wolfgang Möbius produced the ‘Bürzel’ www.porscheroadandrace.com or ducktail. Proving runs at Weissach and Ehra-Lessien by Günter Steckkönig, in Brodbeck’s view as fine a driver in his day as Walter Röhrl, confirmed the improvement seen in the wind tunnel. Homologation would require a production run of 250 units. Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 Coupé (1973) undergoing tests in the wind tunnel this time with the ducktail fitted The sales department baulked at this just as it had with the 911 R five years earlier and briefly it seemed the latest lightened 911 would remain a prototype too. However, newly appointed CEO Ernst Fuhrmann was keen to make his mark and in a dramatic scene which Tilman Brodbeck witnessed by chance, Fuhrmann asserted himself, telling his sales chief he would either sell 250 or none at all. “So that was how the Carrera RS 2.7 came to be,” said www.porscheroadandrace.com Tilman, “an entirely accidental success! I’m not an old car fan (a view shared by former design director Harm Lagaaij who believes logically that newer is always better) but that RS is one old Porsche I would love to own!” The perfect pair – his and hers – in the foreground is the 911 Carrera RS 2.7 with early scripting, while the 2.4S model is just behind Traditionally an engineering led company, in the early 1970s, Porsche had over 200 engineers, vastly out numbering the 25 designers employed by the styling department. When Butzi Porsche left the firm, his deputy Tony Lapine took over and in asserting the role of the Porsche design studio, at times made it appear like a separate company, sharpening divisions between engineering and design. Famously, he used to say to his cohorts that ‘if marketing likes it, ignore them and if engineering likes it, start again.’ Tilman Brodbeck has not forgotten what it was like to be caught in the crossfire between the machine shop and www.porscheroadandrace.com the easels. “Tony Lapine could be quite arrogant. He had great difficulty in accepting that you need studio engineers.” Part of Brodbeck’s role was liaising between engineers and designers. Sometimes this worked well from the outset, as for example with the whale tail. The German highway authorities objected to the ducktail on grounds of pedestrian safety. So, it was redesigned, largely by Wolfgang Möbius, with polyurethane edges to soften it; not only did this resolve the problem, but it expanded the spoiler sufficiently for it to incorporate the intercooler of the 3.3 version of the 930 Turbo in 1977. “In 1979,” continued Brodbeck, “I was summoned to Zuffenhausen along with Ulrich Bez and another colleague. We had been shortlisted to serve as personal assistant to Ernst Fuhrmann. Bez joined Porsche a little while after me, but he really considered he was the man for the assistant job and was quite put out when I got it. (Bez would leave subsequently for BMW) He’s done alright since then as boss of Aston Martin. We still joke about it when we meet.” www.porscheroadandrace.com Porsche CEO, Ernst Fuhrmann, poses with a 911 and a 928 (1978) Fuhrmann was, in Tilman’s words, a true car nut, launching the 911 Turbo and expanding Porsche’s range with the transaxle cars. But by 1979, he was an isolated figure. His policy of phasing out the 911 in favour of the 928 (instead of making it a parallel model) was deeply unpopular. Matters came to a head the following year and Fuhrmann was eased out to become chancellor of Vienna University and Tilman found himself working for a new chief, Berlin born American Peter Schutz. “Schutz was the right man at the right time,” asserted Brodbeck. “It was the first time that Porsche had had a real marketing man in charge. Under Fuhrmann, the Porsche family had been content with annual profits of DM 25million (roughly $10m in 1979.) Schutz had the outsider’s vision and ambition, seeing much more potential for the Swabian company. He recognised that the 911 was the cash cow and restarted the development process that his www.porscheroadandrace.com predecessor had stopped. “Schutz made us understand customers: ‘never forget who is paying your salary’ he used to tell us.” Brodbeck remained in touch with his old boss who, he said occasionally liked to sound as if he was still in charge at Zuffenhausen. And he defended Schutz against charges that the CEO was sometimes too ambitious, with for instance the aviation project, often viewed as an extravagance. Peter Schutz imagined an America where Porsche owners could drive their 911s to the airfield and take off in their Porsche powered private planes. Given that the existing Lycoming four-cylinder motor used by almost all small aircraft makers was a 1930s anachronism, the idea of the modern, fuel injected 3.2 flat-six replacing the antique Lycoming did not seem unreasonable. “It wasn’t the price which killed it,” protests Tilman. “It failed because of Ralph Nader and all the product liability worry he’d stirred up. Porsche could offer the flat-six at a cost only a little above the competition. The problem was the insurance premium which pushed the final price out of contention. Piper and Cessna showed interest then turned away when this became clear. It was a pity. I saw a Porsche-powered Mooney aircraft take off from the skidpad at Weissach and fly over it: you should have heard it – it really was incredibly quiet, like an electric motor.” www.porscheroadandrace.com The Porsche 959 shows off its stylish lines Brodbeck, though, was critical of Schutz in the CEO’s last couple of years. “The dollar was equal to DM 1.80 in 1981 and by 1985 had risen to four Deutschmarks. Schutz really made hay during those years and he didn’t waste the money. He invested it in the production facilities and Weissach and the 959 which generated undreamed of publicity for Porsche.
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