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Melkus
The Melkus factory was based in Dresden and its founder Heinz Melkus began building cars in the late fifties. From 1959 on Melkus began producing F Junior cars and they soon became very popular in the Eastern Bloc countries due to the difficulties of obtaining cars such as Coopers. The cars were powered by 3-cylinder 2-stroke Wartburg engines and whilst the were never really competitive with Western cars they nevertheless went very well against similar cars.
As the new F3 came into being initially several of the late model F Junior cars were converted over to the new regulations and then purpose built F3 designs were produced. Once again they were seldom in with a chance against the Western cars as their Wartburg engines only gave about 85-90bhp.
Spaceframe construction was favoured in all the F3 designs, and some developments were carried out to make the cars as aerodynamic as possible to compensate for power deficiencies, bodies were very slippery and the suspension was sited inboard front and rear. Surprisingly drum brakes were used up to 1970 when the first disc-braked cars were built, presumably disc brake components were in short supply through the 1960s. One interesting aerodynamic tweak that was seemingly tried was that the air from the radiator was ducted along the body in two tunnels to vent at the tail.Heinz raced his eponymous cars with much success in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Latvia and Russia and his son Ulrich was similarly successful until his death from a racing accident in 1990.
As the new F3 became more and more competitive and the Eastern European authorities became more insular Melkus switched to building Formula Easter cars. Sadly Heinz Melkus died on the 5th September 2005.
Thanks to Alexey Rogachev for the new pictures and the guys at TNF for additional information.
Drivers
1964 ?
Laszlo Bognar, Manfred Bretschneider, Peter Bretschneider, Max Byczkowski, Ferenc Demel, Peter Findeisen, Wolfgang Kauf, Günther Klug, Horst Klug, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Frieder Rädlein, Hans Roediger, Valerij Schachverdov, Dieter Schierz, Siegfried Scholz, Istvan Sulyok, Tibor Szeles, Hans-Theo Tegeler.
1965
64
Vladimir Ptushkin, Ants Seiler, Georgy Surguchev.
63
Rudolf Goldin, Vladimir Ptushkin, S Shakhbazyan.
?
Laszlo Bognar, Manfred Bretschneider, Max Byczkowski, Ferenc Demel, Peter Findeisen, Vladimir Hubacek, Günther Klug, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Frieder Rädlein, Hans Roediger, Siegfried Scholz, Miklos de Sorgo, Istvan Sulyok, Tibor Szeles, Antoni Weiner.
1966
65
Frieder Rädlein, Heinz Melkus.
64
Yuri Andreev, Viktor Lapin, Yakov Vartpatrikov.
63
O. Kosinov.
62
Laszlo Bognar.
?
Herbert Armstroff, Manfred Bretschneider, Peter Bretschneider, Peter Findeisen, Evegeny Glukharev, Vladimir Hubacek, Günther Klug, Wolfgang Klug, Klaus-Peter Krause, Manfred Lesche, Siegfried Leutert, Hans Roediger, Miklos de Sorgo, Istvan Sulyok, Tibor Szeles.
1967 Herbert Armstroff, Manfred Bretschneider, Peter Bretschneider, Peter Findeisen, Vladimir Hubacek, Günther Klug, Wolfgang Klug, Wolfgang Krug, Klaus-Peter Krause, Manfred Lesche, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Frieder Rädlein, Ralf Röber, Hans Roediger, Siegfried Scholz, Tibor Seles, Miklos de Sorgo, Istvan Sulyok, Tibor Szeles.
1968 Herbert Armstroff, Manfred Bretschneider, Peter Bretschneider, Peter Findeisen, Peter Jurack, Günter Klingner, Klaus-Peter Krause, Wolfgang Krug, Wolfgang Küther, Manfred Lesche, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Ulli Melkus, Frieder Rädlein, Ralf Röber, Hans Roediger, Miklos de Sorgo, Istvan Sulyok.
1969 Manfred Bretschneider, Siegfried Bubenik, Peter Findeisen, Frank Hausmann, Roland Jurack, Günter Klingner, Günther Klug, Klaus-Peter Krause, Wolfgang Krug, Wolfgang Küther, Manfred Lesche, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Ulli Melkus, Frieder Rädlein, Ralf Röber.
1970 Manfred Bretschneider, Siegfried Bubenik, Peter Findeisen, Frank Hausmann, Günter Klingner, Klaus-Peter Krause, Wolfgang Küther, Manfred Lesche, Dieter Lindner, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Ulli Melkus, Dieter Raabs, Frieder Rädlein, Joachim Willmann.
1971 Siegfried Bubenik, Christian Gallus, Frank Hausmann, Günter Klingner, Kurt Klotz, Klaus-Peter Krause, Wolfgang Krug, Wolfgang Küther, Manfred Lesche, Dieter Lindner, Werner Markhoff, Heinz Melkus, Ulli Melkus, Miklos de Sorgo, Joachim Willmann.
1972 Siegfried Bubenik, Christian Gallus, Frank Hausmann, Günter Klingner, Klaus-Peter Krause, Wolfgang Küther, Dieter Lindner, Heinz Melkus, Ulli Melkus.
