Lucky Auto Union

When the Jowett Javelin was forced off the market, I had to look around for a car I could enjoy and tried a D.K.W. Indeed, having completed over one hundred and eighty thousand miles in these cars I asked myself why I enjoy being a D.K.W. owner.

First of all I like things that are thoroughly unorthodox: the D.K.W.’s three-cylinder two-stroke engine satisfies me.

I hate being pushed around, therefore the front-wheel-drive is still for me (in spite of what I have had to read each month in this journal) the essence of safety and comfort. I do like getting a move on and this fiery steed never misses a gap. What I did not like was mixing petrol and oil, but the very effective mixer, now a standard fitting, has disposed of my one and only dislike. Obviously this car ran only be sold by a keen firm of enthusiasts, and my experience is that the firm of Frazer Nash certainly are entitled to that description. I am certain that D.K.W. owners must have virtually driven them “barmy” in their efforts to glean the technical knowledge they need about their machines.

A very high import duty has made the cost of this car so high that it is obvious that comparatively few are sold, and the provisioning of spares must be thoroughly, uneconomical, and as Frazer Nash are handling post-war D.K.W.s they must obviously be saddled with the pre-war models, too.

Messrs. Auto Union must be delighted that they have such an old-established firm of enthusiasts to watch over their interests in England, for while it is obvious the service cannot possibly be 100 per cent, it is, nevertheless, better than the service I have personally received from any other organisation-British, French, German, or Italian. No. I haven’t forgotten American, but I haven’t driven and neither have I any wish to drive any of their vulgar, ostentatious vehicles.-W. J. T.