Imagery...

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a Göpll, copy of Kombi made in East Germany, often on a wooden structure with various engines.

[Super_Randy]

proof socialism works

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December 26, 1971: A whole new look on the Spirit of Christmas... (Eurocircuit - Netherlands)

[Super_Randy]

the origins of class 11

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Pick-up and trailer in 1945 made by VW.

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In the picture you can see a soaked pretzel beetle in a kind of car wash. Apparently the two women on the sides are responsible for the soaking and rinsing of the vehicle.
Why is the photo special? Not until the 8th. In August 1962, Johann Sulzberger and Gebhard Weigele patented the first "self-propelled car wash for motor vehicles" in Augsburg: Two brushes drove around the car on tracks. Machine cleaning was invented. However, there has been an early form of automatic car washing in the United States since 1951.
The very first car wash opened in Detroit, Michigan in 1914. The car wash was called "Automated Laundry", but it wasn't really automated. The "Automated Laundry" was used according to the traditional "bucket-and-sponge" principle.
So what we are seeing here is a further development of the manual car wash. The car license plate, a British license plate, existed only until 1956, so it helps with the timing order. Thanks to Willy Lehmacher, we can now prove how the first car wash machines evolved on the way to the automatic car wash.
Digital scan of original negative. About 1952. Photo by Willy Lehmacher. © City Archive Hagen.

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This is the V303/3, the cornerstone convertible that was used to drive AH to the train station after the ceremony on May 26, 1938. Completely hand made as part of the small V303 series of 3 cars. Sometimes mistaken for the VW38/31 AH convertible that he received for his 50th birthday in 1939 and which still exists, but it is not the same car. The biggest clue is the double row of air slots in and above the lid, plus the molding.
This picture is taken in Wolfsburg after the British occupied the zone and got the Volkswagenwerk up and running again, so the car survived the war. But it disappeared soon after, never to be seen again. It was 8 years old at the time, so few people realised its significance.

[Super_Randy]

somebody posted this on a model car forum