The cars from Zuffenhausen have always been more elite than vehicles from Mercedes-Benz, BMW or Audi.

While new Porsches are often attacked, especially the off-road models Cayenne and Macan, old Porsches are always welcome everywhere.

They are often many times more expensive than a new car.

But not all.

We took a closer look at four old sweethearts and rode out of the quartet with each one.

All four belong to the fleet of Porsche Classic and the Porsche Museum.

Boris Smith

Editor in the "Technology and Engine" department.

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Let's start with the 356, the nucleus of the company.

It was the first car to bear the name of the brilliant inventor and designer Ferdinand Porsche (1875 to 1951).

The sequence of digits 356 simply refers to the 356th project of the Porsche design office founded in Stuttgart in April 1931.

However, the sports car related to the VW Beetle should actually be called 349, because at the beginning there was simply Project 7, probably to make the first customers believe that something had already been done before.

During these times, the future VW Beetle also learned to crawl – another story that fills books, also initiated and decisively promoted by Ferdinand Porsche.

Without the Beetle, Volkswagen would not exist today.

Seen in this way, Ferdinand Porsche practically created two automobile brands.

Porsche lost its independence in 2009 after a failed, insane takeover attempt when they wanted to swallow VW, and went into the Wolfsburg group.

But that too is another story.

Like the family saga about the Porsche clan.

Well, the first Porsche that only bore this name drove in 1948. The public premiere of the 356 was in March 1949 at the Geneva Motor Show.

From today's perspective, the tiny and underpowered sports car was built up to 1964, around 76,300 units were built, of which 23,800 were convertibles.

Some of these were Speedsters, originally created for the American market, with just a little spare top, a small windscreen and slotted glass for the doors.

A Speedster looks particularly chic in red.

Luckily we catch a few rays of sunshine on a fairly rainy weekend when we are allowed to get behind the wooden Nardi steering wheel of the original Porsche.

wooden steering wheel?

"Contemporary Extra", they say.

The bucket seats were standard equipment even then.

The original speedometer to the right of the dominant rev counter goes up to 250 km/h, which is far too much to promise.

But because the 356 is very light at around 1100 kilograms, a slim 60 hp from a 1.6-liter four-cylinder is enough for driving performance beyond 160 km/h.

In fact, the little one doesn't feel underpowered, on the contrary.

He walks really well, the four gears are shifted through quickly.

As a child of the 1950s, he has a minimalist dashboard, standing pedals, a cane handbrake and a 6-volt battery.

There were 12 volts from 1960, disc instead of drum brakes in 1962. Because the battery is quickly empty if someone does not turn off the headlights after parking, the 356 warns in a very modern way with a beep.

But that's the only structural change, Porsche Classic claims.