The German firm that put a turbo on everything.
Who built the K27
K27 is a model number, not a brand. The brand is KKK — Kühnle, Kopp & Kausch — a company founded in 1899 in Frankenthal, a small city in the Rhine valley near Mannheim. Heinrich Kühnle, Adolf Kopp, and Walter Kausch founded the firm to build industrial machinery: pumps, compressors, and steam equipment.
KKK moved into turbochargers in the 1960s. Industrial turbocharger work, mostly — for marine and stationary engines. Automotive turbocharging was still a frontier. Porsche, Audi, Saab, and BMW were all working on turbocharged production cars in the early 1970s, and KKK supplied the units.
What "K27" means
KKK named its automotive turbochargers with a letter for the family and a number for the size. The K27 was a single-stage radial-flow turbocharger sized for engines of roughly 2.5 to 3.5 liters. The 930 Turbo used the K27 from 1975 onward. The 944 Turbo used a related K26 unit. The 911 Turbo S of the late 930 era used a larger K28.
The K27 sat behind the engine on the right side of the bay, fed by an exhaust manifold collector. It produced peak boost of approximately 6 to 8 PSI on the 930 3.0 — by modern standards, low. But on an engine making 3.0 liters from six cylinders with relatively modest base power, that boost was enough to nearly double the output.
What "no intercooler until 1978" means
An intercooler is a heat exchanger that cools compressed intake air before it enters the engine. Cooler intake air is denser, contains more oxygen, and produces more power with less risk of detonation.
The 1975-1977 930 had no intercooler. Compressed intake air went directly from the turbocharger to the intake manifold. Intake air temperatures could reach 130-140°C under load. The engine ran high knock risk — internal combustion happening too early in the stroke. Porsche compensated with conservative ignition timing and high-octane fuel requirements, but the engine was still living close to its limit.
In 1978, with the 3.3-liter update, Porsche added an air-to-air intercooler mounted under the rear deck spoiler. That is why the whaletail grew that year — it had to make room for the intercooler. Power went up. Reliability went up. Boost stayed roughly the same on paper but the engine could safely use more of it.
What else KKK turbocharged
- Audi Quattro — original 5-cylinder turbo from 1980
- Saab 99 Turbo — one of the first mass-market turbocharged sedans, from 1978
- BMW 2002 Turbo — short-lived high-strung version of the 02-series, 1973-1974
- Mercedes-Benz 300SD — the first turbodiesel passenger car in the United States, from 1978
- Volvo 240 Turbo — late 1980s racing homologation
KKK turbochargers became the de facto standard for European turbocharged cars in the 1970s and 1980s. If a German car of that era had a turbocharger, there was a high probability that turbocharger was a KKK.
What happened to KKK
KKK was acquired by BorgWarner — the American automotive supplier — in 1998. The KKK brand was retired. The Frankenthal facility remained, now operating as BorgWarner Turbo Systems. Modern Porsche turbochargers come from the same Frankenthal plant under different branding.
When enthusiasts say "KKK turbo" today, they mean a specific era and a specific philosophy: a small turbocharger that built boost late, ran hot, and required the driver to know what was coming.