Cutaway

Cutaway

Show filter
NSU Spider

Elsewhere in this issue you can read all about how the NSU Ro80 wasn't the fragile horror that it's often made out to be, but here's where the Wankel rotary engine started; with the NSU Spider, which was the first production car to feature such motive power. Launched in 1964, the Spider was a two-seater convertible with a rear-mounted engine. That engine was a single-rotor unit that put out 50bhp, and the more you revved it the smoother it became. Red-lined at 6000rpm, it was possible to spin it all the way to 8000rpm, and presumably self-destruction soon after.

617
Drives TODAY use cookie