1937 DKW F8 - Front Luxus Cabriolet

Rare Cabriolet version of the DKW F5

An extremely rare model exported to England

A Horch in miniature

When DKW introduced the F1 in 1931, its first series-production front-wheel-drive car, it was highly advanced for a small German motor car. Four years and several stages of development later, the F5 appeared in 1935. The basic recipe remained the same: a two-cylinder two-stroke engine, front-wheel drive and a backbone chassis beneath a lightweight body.

Alongside the sensible saloons, however, there was the Front Luxus Cabriolet. Its elegant open body was built by Horch in Zwickau – effectively the well-to-do relation within the Auto Union family. With its long bonnet, deeply cut doors, generous helping of chrome and lined hood, the little DKW looked remarkably grown-up. The fact that a two-stroke was still chattering away up front did nothing to diminish its charm.

A small proportion of production was destined for export. For markets where traffic kept to the left, even right-hand-drive Front Luxus Cabriolets were built – in positively homeopathic quantities.

The Luxus Cabriolet received the most powerful version of the little two-cylinder engine of just under 700cc. Its 20 bhp was sufficient for around 85 km/h. Anyone buying such a Luxus Cabriolet was hardly in a great hurry anyway. This was open-air motoring with style.

The pleasure did not come cheaply. The Front Luxus Cabriolet cost considerably more than the ordinary DKW models and remained correspondingly rare. It is precisely this contrast that makes it so appealing today: mechanically an economical little car, outwardly a miniature expression of grand luxury. More show than substance? Perhaps. But economy was rarely packaged more attractively.

‘Performance Car, with a simple two-stroke engine, which gives a surprising performance for its size and is well sprung.’ So judged the British magazine Autocar in a 1937 road test of the DKW. This Front Luxus Cabriolet is proof that the occasional DKW did indeed find its way across the Channel. Auto Union even maintained a London branch in Great Portland Street, through which this particular car was most likely sold.

It was first registered in January 1939. A Registration Book dating from 1955 records Kenneth Arthur Thomas George Melbourne-Cooper as its owner at the time, and the Luxus Cabriolet remained registered in his name until 1980. In 2014, the rare DKW came to Austria, where it has since led a well-preserved, if rather sedentary, existence. That alone is reason enough for some careful attention before it returns to the road, so that before long this DKW can once again live up to its name in every respect. This rare DKW is accompanied by thick folders of old literature, including an original owner’s manual in English, written on a typewriter.