Volkswagen Typ 82

The prototype of an army car, as unified as possible with mechanical filling with the civilian model KdF-Wagen , was developed at the Volkswagen factory in 1938 (the first prototype was designed by F. Porsche back in 1936) and received the designation KdF Typ 62 or VW Typ 62 . In the same year, the first 30 cars were assembled. After testing and improvements, the prototype received a new designation KdF Typ 82 or VW Typ 82 . It went into serial production in November 1940, was standardized in the Wehrmacht as Kfz.1 ( German: Kraftfahrzeug —- “car”).

The car differed from the civilian model in a special lightweight open 4-door body with flat panels, rear wheel gears, an interwheel limited-slip differential, increased to 290 mm ground clearance, 16-inch wheels (in the version for the African desert - with a wider tread width).

The body was assembled from thin tin, longitudinally reinforced sheets, had a folding windshield and a tarpaulin hinged roof. The name Kübelwagen or Kübelsitzwagen was not only the Typ 82. This is a general name for open-type army vehicles, at the initial stage of the design of which, because of the need to lighten and simplify the design as much as possible, they refused the doors or replaced them, like the roof, with tarpaulins, seats, for greater safety, installed deep - "pelvis" ( Kübelsitz ).

Typ 82 was used in all German troops until the end of World War II for transporting personnel, transporting ammunition and fuel, evacuating the wounded, and as a mobile workshop. On the basis of Typ 82, more than 30 modifications of multi-purpose vehicles were created.

On the VW Type 82, a four-cylinder opposed carburetor engine with a capacity of 23.5 liters was installed. with. In March 1943, a 25-horsepower engine with a working volume of 1130 cm³ began to be installed on the Kubelvagen. In total, until the summer of 1945, 50,435 "kyuble" were produced, which made Kfz.1 and its modifications the most massive light vehicles in the Wehrmacht and SS troops . In the years 1943-1945, the Type 82E headquarters vehicle and the Type 92SS closed-body vehicle for the SS troops from the pre-war KdF-38 were also produced on the 82-type rear-wheel chassis (total 667 units of both models combined). In addition, the all-wheel drive headquarters car VW Typ 87 was produced (564 units were produced in 1942-1944) with a transmission from the mass army amphibian VW Typ 166 (Schwimmwagen) (14283 units were produced in 1942-1944)

The ownership of German military vehicles was determined by the letters on the license plate of cars. So, the letters WH denoted belonging to the Wehrmacht, WL - to the Luftwaffe, WM - to the Kriegsmarine, and OT - to the Todt Organization, runic lightning - to the SS.