1949 Hotchkiss 864 Artois S49

1949 Hotchkiss 864 Artois S49, Tour Auto 2017

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Hotchkiss et cie, Saint Denis, Paris, France.  Hotchkiss was  originally an arms and munitions manufacturer founded by an American ordnance engineer called Benjamin Hotchkiss. After he died, the company produced car parts, car engines and then eventually whole cars.  The 864 Artois was based on a pre-war model and was sold in the late forties and early fifties.  It was a 4 door sedan with  a 2.3 litres 4 cylinder front mounted engine and rear wheel drive.  Top speed was around 75 mph.  As a sporting marque Hotchkiss won the Monte Carlo Rally a number of times in the early thirties. They also raced at Brooklands and Montlhery.  After the war they again competed in the Monte Carlo (winning in 1949 and 1950) and the Tour de France Automobile.  Eventually the marque was swallowed up by Delahaye.   In 2017 Maxime Lepissier and Bruno de la Villesbrunne drove this car in the regularity section of the Tour Auto Optic 2000.

1949 Porsche 356 SL Gmünd Coupé

1949 Porsche 356 SL, Porsche Rennsport Reunion V, Laguna Seca 2015

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Porsche, Gmünd, Austria.  After the war Porsche moved to Gmünd in Austria to design his own cars. They were rear engined roadsters and coupés built around Volkswagen components.  With an aluminium body and an air-cooled boxer 4 cylinder engine these cars started the Porsche tradition. The aluminium bodies later became steel and Porsche moved back to Germany but Porsche kept some aluminium bodies as super light works competition cars.  In 1951 they entered the Le Mans 24 hours and the car pictured won the 1,100cc class beating the French DB Panhard and also the 1,500cc class winning Jowett Jupiter.   This was Porsche's first entry into the Le Mans 24 hours, a race they would eventually win for the first time in 1970. In 1952 one of these cars won the Liege-Rome-Liege rally.