comparison with larger cars such as the Opel Olympia Rekord, the Borgward Isabella, the Fiat 1400 and the Peugeot 403. What these cars had in common, however, was an engine of approximately 1500 cc, which was something that till now the Taunus had conspicuously lacked. Ford in Germany did not have the investment cash available to develop a new model of their own in the rapidly growing market segment of middle-sized (by the standards of the time and place) family cars, but by installing a 1498 cc engine in the Taunus 12M they were able to announce almost as a new car the Ford Taunus 15M which could be profitably produced and sold alongside the car with which it shared virtually every component apart from the engine block and cosmetic touches, including a strongly differentiated front grill, intended to emphasize the differences between the cars to potential customers. The new engine was based on the unit that had originally been developed with a side-mounted camshaft for launch in the 1939 “Buckeltaunus”. Now, however, the originally planned side-valve configuration was replaced, for the first time on a German Ford, with overhead valves. This reflected developments also underway in England where a new ohv-engined Ford Consul had appeared in 1951. The crankshaft on the new German Ford engine was formed hollow rather than from a solid casting, which was seen as a way to save weight. The Taunus 15M was offered with exactly the same choice of bodies as the 12M. It was also offered with the option of a "Saxomat" automatic clutch, married to the three-speed gearbox (though not with the four-speed box). Broadening the range more In September 1955, at the same as the Taunus 12M received its update, Ford also introduced a Taunus 15M de luxe. This top-line model was identified by a particularly elaborate front grill and a two-tone paint scheme. Various luxury features hitherto unavailable or else offered only as optional extras were included in the price for buyers of the Ford Taunus 15M de Luxe. These included items such as the windscreen washer, reversing lights, tubeless tires, vanity mirrors in the sun visors and a headlamp flasher. Many of these will have been regarded as relatively mainstream in North American cars, which will have added trans-Atlantic glamour to the Taunus 15M in a country where, especially in the south of Germany, the continuing presence of large