One of the consequences of this price limit was to build the car without a hydraulic brake, which would have required the payment of licence fees to Lockheed as the holder of the appropriate patent. "The crucial point was to leave out everything we did not really need. So we took a very systematic approach, the car's wheelbase following from the space required by four adults to enjoy acceptable roominess. And the track of the car was kept as small as possible, allowing the Volkswagen to drive along field paths and down narrow village roads."
Time was short and the project did not exactly benefit from the lack of funds, with advance payments of 20,000 reichsmarks a month soon turning out to be much too low. The engineers were even forced to start building and assembling the first test cars in the garage of the Porsche Mansion in Stuttgart. Another restrictive factor was the lack of space, especially since the machines used took up additional room in Ferry Porsche's private workshop required to accommodate a drilling and milling machine as well as two lathes and of course the twelve-man development team. "Don't ask me how we did it", he said later, "but the first three prototypes called the VW Series 3 were all built there."
Development of the Volkswagen took longer than planned, the first Volkswagen code-named V1 (V = Versuchswagen or Test Car) being completed almost exactly a year after the official start of development. On 3 July 1935 Ferdinand Porsche presented his new saloon to an RDA committee, the second test car, a convertible code-named V2, setting out on its maiden trip on 22 December. And again two months later, on 24 February 1936, the two first models of the Volkswagen made their official world debut in Berlin.Working closely with Porsche's top-notch engineers, Ferry Porsche had learned a lot, developing from a simple intern into the Junior Manager broadly acknowledged for his skills. Ferdinand Porsche consistently pushed and promoted his son, constantly raising him to a higher standard, until in 1935 Ferry was made responsible for the driving tests of the new Volkswagen. The first prototypes of the V3 test model were built by autumn 1936 and then used for systematic driving tests. Acting as the Test Manager, Ferry Porsche took on the task to cover 50,000 test kilometres or over 30,000 miles by the end of the year - and driving all-out also on Sundays, the team succeeded in covering the distance required in all three cars by 22 December 1936.
This first test was not only a technical, but also a political challenge for Ferry Porsche, since, while he was Porsche's Test Manager, the Association of the Automotive Industry of the German Reich had delegated their own staff members to keep a "critical eye" on the tests being conducted. And while different opinions on the test results soon arose, the 100-page report ultimately sent to the RDA arrived at a positive conclusion: "The car shows qualities that justify its ongoing development."