"Wankel Crocodile" and A Hovercraft Are Now On Display At The Autovision Museum

Altlussheim, Germany, 5 December, 2024 - First of all, visitors to the Museum AUTOVISION, which is known for its numerous special exhibits, do not need to fear encountering a bad-tempered, free-running crocodile when entering the exhibition halls! 

One of the two newly acquired exhibits enriching the Wankel exhibition is of course not a live large lizard, even though its capabilities appear to be identical in many respects. The second new addition - a Hover Hawk hovercraft with three rotary engines - is just as spectacular, almost exotic and hardly known even in specialist circles.

Universal Vehicle With Wankel Engine
A Wankel-powered all-terrain vehicle developed in Switzerland can now be marvelled at in the automobile section of the rotary piston exhibition, lined up between legendary vehicle models such as the Mercedes C 111 or the Citroën M35. CroCo AG in Kägiswil developed this extremely manoeuvrable four-wheel drive vehicle of the same name in the 1970s, probably originally for military operations. And the model name even had a double meaning: the company name stood for ‘Cross Country’. It is also the abbreviation for ‘crocodile’. This was a perfect fit, as the wadeable off-roader not only had four-wheel drive but also four-wheel steering, a swivelling chassis and even the ability to float - all features that enabled the CROCO to move on similar terrain to the reptiles of the same name. Nevertheless, series production for the army never took place, as its Wankel engine could only be operated with pertrol fueld. A prerequisite for military use, however, was a diesel engine, as these have much more flexibility in terms of replacement liquid fuel in an emergency. Nevertheless, the rotary piston engine from the Israeli licence holder SAVKEL had one special feature: its housing was air-cooled and the piston was oil-cooled.   

CROCO went into series production in the ‘Ländle’
After the Swiss cross-country company was taken over by the Luxembourg-based TAG Group, the CROCO went into serial production after all, albeit for civilian use. At the time, the all-terrain universal vehicle was built in Rheinstetten near Karlsruhe in Baden-Württemberg by the company VMB-Vesta. From there, it was marketed as an ATV (All Terrain Vehicle). In the end, however, only a total of 60 vehicles were built - which was all the more reason for the AUTOVISION museum management to preserve this extraordinary off-roader for posterity as another example of a special Wankel vehicle in the exhibition!

Almost floating over the Nordic ice and snow tracks

Another new addition to the Wankel exhibition is the HOVER HAWK Wankel hovercraft. It was originally used several times by postal delivery services in the far north (Norway, Sweden, Finland). When the usual routes on the water were iced over in winter, conventional postal boats without icebreakers had no chance of reaching locations which were sometimes fairly remote. Here, the Hover Hawk offered the great advantage of being able to seamlessly alternate between travelling on the water or simply on the ice cover on partially icy sea routes. Two Wankel engines from Fichtel & Sachs were used for propulsion. A third motor of the same design permanently filled the air cushion to provide the necessary buoyancy.

The two new additions to the world's only permanent Wankel exhibition at the Museum AUTOVISION prove once again how versatile the rotary piston technology was once used. The Wankel engine was the first choice wherever little space was required with a lot of power!