Ernst Fuhrmann

During his first time in Zuffenhausen, in the mid 1950s, he was in charge of developing the Porsche Type 547 racing engine, which became known as the "Fuhrmann engine".

Fuhrmann born in the last days of Austria-Hungary, but died as a German citizen. Fuhrmann attended primary school and secondary school in Vienna. Between 1936 and 1941 he attended Vienna technical university TU Wien. During the war he undertook his military service, and from 1943 worked at AEG in Berlin, researching ultrasound and infrared devices. By 1947 he was working for Porsche, initially at the facility in Gmünd, Austria, later moving to Stuttgart. In 1950 he married his wife Elfriede. That same year he received his Doctorate of Mechanical Engineering from Prof. Richter at TU Wien for his study of valvetrains in high-speed internal combustion engines.

In 1952/53 he provided significant input to the development of the Porsche Type 547 engine, which became known as the "Fuhrmann engine". It was first used in the Porsche 550. This air-cooled four-cylinder boxer engine has two overhead camshafts on each of the Volkswagen Beetle-style two cylinder banks, driven by bevel gears on horizontal shafts in the same concept as the pre-war Wolseley OHC valvetrain (which had a racing success in MG K3), and had a built-up Hirth-type crankshaft on roller bearings instead of a typical one-piece crankshaft on split bearing metal.

In 1956 Fuhrmann left Porsche and took over responsibility for development with the car parts company Goetze. In 1962 he was appointed to the board of directors.