Devrim

Devrim

Last sample of Devrim at TÜLOMSAŞ
Overview
Manufacturer Eskişehir Demiryolu Fabrikası (Eskişehir Railroad Factory) (TÜLOMSAŞ)
Production 4 units
Model years 1961
Assembly Eskişehir
Designer

The car is designed and engineered from scratch by Turkish Engineers. Body and interior is designed by:

  • Eng. Nurettin Erguvanlı (M.Sc.)
  • Eng. Ercan Türer (M.Sc.)
  • Architect Kemal Elagöz (M.Sc.)
Body and chassis
Class Middle sized, road type.
Layout Rear wheel drive
Powertrain
Engine

2000cc carburetted, straight 4 engines, 10 units produced:

  • Type A4L Sidevalve engine, 50 HP at 3650 rpm (4 units),
  • Type A4T Overhead valve engine, 60 HP at 3650 rpm (3 units),
  • Type B3T Overhead valve engine, 70 HP at 3650 rpm (4 units).
Transmission

manual, 10 units produced:

  • Type A (3 units)
  • Type B (4 units)
Dimensions
Length 4500 mm
Width 1800 mm
Height 1550 mm
Curb weight 1250 kg
Chronology
Successor Anadol A1

Devrim (pronounced [devˈɾim], English: Revolution) was the first ever automobile designed and produced in Turkey.

Automotive Industry Congress

On 15 May 1961, the Otomotiv Endüstri Kongresi (Automotive Industry Congress) was opened by President Cemal Gürsel. In his inaugural speech, he said:

“ ... We will reform agriculture too, but it is not possible to achieve anything just by selling grass! We can barely receive 7-8 buses in exchange for a shipfull of cotton. You may apprise how much effort is needed to raise a shipfull of cotton. Therefore, industry is necessary.

We have to become industrialized with a well-balanced tempo. This is a certain requirement. You may ask "don't we have any industry?" Yes we have, but they are so dispersed that all of them must be arranged to work for one direction.

When it comes to the automotive industry; a modern country must produce its own transportation vehicles. In today's world transportation vehicles occupy an important place in the economy. We must produce our own transportation vehicles, we must transport with our own vehicles. First, we have to build some of the parts; then, with improvement, we must build up to 70-80% of them.

Some people say that it's impossible to produce automobiles in Turkey. This thought is the product of dark minds. Turkey has many industrial branches that encourage us in this way too...

 ”

After the congress, Gürsel issued his order to build a prototype engine and car meeting the requirements of the country. These prototypes would be compared with the best cars of the time, the shortcomings would be identified, and project development work would be undertaken in order to produce the best possible car in Turkey.

Design and production of Devrim

In 1961, President Cemal Gürsel ordered 24 engineers, working in various companies, to build a car fully designed and produced in Turkey. It was to be demonstrated during the Republic Day celebrations on October 29, 1961.

After 130 days of hasty labor at the workshop in Eskişehir, which later became the TÜLOMSAŞ factory, the engineers managed to make four prototypes of the automobile. One was black, and the others were cream coloured. It was named Devrim (the Turkish word for Revolution.)

Technical specifications of Devrim

The schedule was extremely tight nonethless four cars could be completed and two of these cars (cream and black coloured) were shipped to Ankara for the Republic Day celebrations. Polishing paint of the black car was done while on the train to Ankara. None of the cars had gasoline in them, as a safety precaution, and the cars were filled with little fuel, only for maneuvering. Since the compression rate was increased to boost engine performance, high octane fuel needed to run the engines without engine knock. High octane fuel was only available in Ankara back then. On the day of the celebrations, President Cemal Gürsel got on to the black car before it was refuelled for a ceremonial ride. After proceeding approximately a hundred meters, the vehicle came into a halt. Then the President got off from the black car and got on to the cream colored car at the back (which was filled up earlier) and went to Anıtkabir with it. Two cars completed the ceremony runs without any problem. The newspaper headlines in the following day were, "Devrim went 100 meters and it broke down." The car became the subject of jokes for many years. It is noteworthy that roughly at the same dates the car of the Queen of England broke down and lords pushed the car during ceremony.

Devrim was never mass-produced. One reason for that was the cars were crafted prototypes and the production process was not well-documented, with almost no technical drawings remaining from the production phase. Another reason was that the demand was not high enough to make mass production feasible. Conversely Anadol factory has been founded just a few years after (1966) and started serial production of passenger vehicles. The founder of Anadol automobile factory Vehbi Koç was a Ford dealer and before Devrim project he was not believed that it was possible to produce cars in Turkey.

Conspiracy theories

A popular conspiracy theory about the failure of mass production suggests that the American auto giants, who sold most of the foreign cars in Turkey back in the early 1960s (even the Police cars were GM and Ford models, especially Chevrolet, until the late 1970s) had approached the Turkish government to cancel the project, and it was decided to keep the relations smooth between the two close NATO allies.

Five years later, in 1966, Anadol became Turkey's first mass production passenger car, produced by Otosan (a joint venture between Ford Motor Company of the United States and Koç Holding of Turkey.)

Legacy

Three of the prototypes were destroyed, their engines converted to diesel generators, but the last one is kept, in working condition, inside the TÜLOMSAŞ factory in Eskişehir, where it was built. The story of the building process and hard efforts of the 24 engineers who worked on Devrim automobiles became the subject of a documentary film, which was released in Turkey in 2008. In late 2010, students from the National University of Science and Technology in Pakistan developed a hybrid car with inspiration from Devrim, and named this car Devrim II.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Devrim.