AutoCult Neretti I (1964) (Belgium)

About the Original:

The only One

In the 1960s, under the anagram “Neretti”, resulting from the surname of Roland D’Ieteren, the Belgian wanted to launch a car brand that should supply the Mexican market. Roland D’Ieteren, who grew up with the family business, which made its money by importing Volkswagen and Porsche for the Belgian market, was already early characterized by his love for cars, especially of the brand Volkswagen.

For his future Neretti project he planned to draw on a Chassis of the Volkswagen Beetle and to fit it with a new car body, which in terms of sportiness left only little to be desired. In 1964 he sketched his design concept, crafted the framework of the car body and coated it with glass fiber layers. The result was a two-seated sports coupe, whose sportive design would never imply that it was built on the chassis of a Volkswagen Beetle. Driven by an 1,584cc-big four-cylinder engine; obligatory positioned in the rear of the car; with an output of 54 hp the car was able to accelerate to a top speed of approximately 140 km/h. The extend to which this speed was really achieved is not known, as it remained questionable whether the small sportscar was ever tested on the streets to its full extent. The reason for this is the fact that there was only one copy of the streamlined glass fiber body fitted to a Volkswagen Chassis existing.

The Belgian VW-enthusiast planned a large-scaled production for his sportscar and to sell it on the Mexican market. It was probably also planned to export the car in single components from Belgium to Mexico, to produce the complete glass fiber body in Mexico and also to undertake the final assembly of the car in the Central American country. The letter would have implied that the Neretti would have been a Mexican car. But this never happened, the prototype of the Neretti I remained the only copy of the car – preserved even today.