Posted at the CC Cohort by r0b0tr10t
(first posted 8/9/2013) This car has a long and fascinating history, if we can get past the usual stereotypical comments of it being a perfect example of what happens to cars in a Communist command economy. True enough, but let’s wait until the guffaws have died down some, and then I’ll take you on a tour of its convoluted past. There’s a bit of a surprise here: this version is not a two-stroke. And as it turns out, that title has more relevance to this car than I realized when I first came up with it.
DKW (full history here) was the world’s pioneer in adapting the two-stroke engine to successful front-wheel drive automobiles. In 1940, they unveiled the highly advanced and aerodynamic F9 prototype (above), with a CD of 0.42 and a new 896 cc three-cylinder set in front of the axle.
Since DKW was located in Saxony, the factory found itself in East Germany after the war. DKW was re-organized in the West, and eventually began a long line of two-stroke cars based on the F9. DKW had to be “rescued” by Mercedes in 1958, and then “sold” to VW in 1964, by then re-named Audi. And all Audis since have kept the same basic configuration of longitudinal engine just ahead of the front transaxle.
The F9 was put into production in DKW’s Zwickau plant by the new East German Industrial Association IFA, as the IFA F9. But eventually, the Zwickau plant was designated to produce the smaller entry-level Trabant beginning in 1955, also using a two-stroke engine but with two-cylinders. So the larger three-cylinder cars were commanded to be built in the former BMW factory in Eisenach (renamed EMW). For a few years after the war, BMW/EMWs were basically continuations of pre-war BMWs, but the market for such pricey cars was turning out to be much too small for East Germany’s communist economy.
The F9 got a completely new body, and went into production in 1956, now named Wartburg, after the castle overlooking Eisenach, as well as the name of a car built in the same factory during the early part of the century. The Wartburg 311 was quite a decent effort for the times, and very comparable to the DKW/Auto Union cars of the time. In fact, its body design was more contemporary, as DKW/AU held on to its basic F9-derived body until the early sixties.
The Wartburg effectively became the DDR’s upscale car, and one ordinary folks might not readily be able to afford. Very much the East German Audi A6, or A8 even.
In 1966, the Warburg got a completely new body, and was called the 353. In some export markets, its name was Wartburg Knight, and an RHD version was made for the UK. The engine by now had 992 cc, and power levels continued to increase, from 50 to 55, to ultimately 57 hp. Top speed was some 150-155 km/h (95 mph).
Advertising was racy…
There was also a wagon version,
As well as a pickup.
By the 1980s, needless to say, the two-stroke engines of the Wartburg and Trabant had become very obsolete, and environmentally unfriendly, with their perpetual plume of blue smoke trailing behind. Fuel economy was also sub-par. In 1988, Volkswagen offered to move a surplus engine manufacturing line to East Germany. That engine was the Audi-designed EA111 small four-cylinder OHC four, originally designed for the Audi 50, which also became the VW Polo. It was still a very modern unit by then, and had a long life in a variety of VW cars, including the European version of the Golf.
A 1.3 L version making a modest 64hp was installed in place of the two-stroke, and gave the now-named Wartburg 353 1.3 a new lease on life, beginning in 1988. But the collapse of the Iron Curtain and re-unification of Germany quickly made the Wartburg and Trabant–which also got a 1.1 L version of the same VW engine–irrelevant. The Wartburg soldiered on through 1991, and then the plug was pulled. The Eisenach factory was acquired by Opel shortly after.
When I first came up with the title “The East German Audi”, I assumed this was a two-stroke Wartburg, and based it on the historical connection to DKW. But since this turned out to be a 353 1.3, and actually has an engine designed by Audi, the circle is really complete, and the title takes on additional meaning. Now back to the guffaws…
Owners are called Wartburgers.
Actually, while I was living in Neidersachsen, I saw more than a few of these little cars. They were adopted by the hipsters around Bremen and Oldenburg, and since I hung with the hipsters, I got a chance to tool around in a few of the more unusual East German autos. This was one of them.
While I couldn’t appreciate the Trabant, I could at least stomach the Wartburg, the ones that didn’t leave embarrassing trails of smoke behind them, that is. I had a buddy with a Lada, a flatmate with a Ente, a friend of a friend who drove us around for beer in a Trabi, a cute girl with a Renault 5 and East German cars were, like I said, considered hip and cool.
I remember these Wartburgs in the same faded red. It seemed the Trabis came in blue and white, and the Wartis came red. The “modern” Wartburgs had the monochrome front end on them, which made the entire car look like a plastic Renault.
My Lada buddy lived in Woelfenbuttel, so thats VW territory and I think it was right around there and around Wenigerode that I saw most of the old East German cars.
Rough riding too. And almost everyone I knew were chain smokers, rolled their own, and the insides of their cars weren’t, let’s say, Febrese fresh.
Good times!
That’s right…you were once VanillaBursch.
Yes, the fragrances in that part of the world a few decades past were…heady.
In the last year of my grad studies, I made friends with a German guy who came from the east. This was just after the wall went down, like six months later. Anyway, his mom ran a bar in the eastern side and she somehow got the government to pay the wages of a worker. I got offered the job, so off to the kneipe I was. I was a dishwasher/cleaner buy man did I learn a lot of German,
Driving around in a Trabbi with a bunch of chain-smoking piss-tanks is not only totally gross, it’s horribly time consuming. Even with two people they were slow but with five, glacial.
Living on the eastern side of the Wall, I had assumed that the Ossies confined they weekly sanitation to the Sunday Bath and just put on more perfume the other six days. The smell of perfume, male or female, mixed with body odour and tobacco has always been my enduring memory of northern Europe.
This supposition was when I spent a couple of weeks hanging out with quite a well to do young lady from a nice suburb in the west and her affluent, professional parents were just as smelly as the Ossies.
Thanks for the article, Paul. In all honesty, I had all but forgotten the little Ossiewagens. They are really easy to forget because they were really just so horrid and worthy only of a crusher, or whatever they do with Trabbis.
I’ve always found these cars to be rather fascinating. Would love to have a chance to drive one some day, the two-stroke version, of course. I wonder how they compared against the original two-stroke Saab (which I seem to remember has some DKW roots).
It’s almost like they designed the hood and trunk lids to be interchangeable?
I would have liked to see a pic or two of the inside of the car. Those Wartburgs looked down right capitalistic compared with that oil belching plastic death trap called the Trabi. To me it looks body style wise like a lot of Euro cars of the 1970’s-1980’s (Fiat 128 etc) it looks very Volvo 240ish
The car used a freewheel so you did not have to use the clutch to shift between gears.
Didn’t the Wartburg 323 form the base for the Melkus RS 1000 gull wing sports car?
Your wish is my…pleasure. I’ve added it to the post too. The later ones like the 1.3 here had a more modern nacelle for the IP.
Thanks for the pic. It looks like a “three on the Tree” manual trans. You know there is something refreshing about a simplistic car with a simplistic interior. The non 1.3 VW engined Wartburgs had 7 moving parts in the engine. Not to much to go wrong with it.
Four on the tree… Sorry no rhyme but that’s what it is.
:o)
The reason DKWs had freewheels was because two-stroke engines get their lubrication from oil mixed in their fuel. When you close the throttle of a two-stroke engine, you stop it from being lubricated. The freewheel allows you to coast down a hill without seizing the engine from lack of lubrication. This is why Saabs had freewheels for as long as they used the transmissions that they copied from DKW.
& here’s the rarely seen wagon version …
JK
There was a Wartburg wagon, but your picture is of a Nissan Rasheen, a retro SUV from 1994-2000. Or maybe you were being ironic?
Ironic FTW! I’ve always had a soft spot for the Rasheen, Figaro, & Pao
But I’ve added the real wagon (and pickup) to the post. And your ironic comment inspired a Rasheen post, so it was fortuitous.
BTW The JK was internets for “Just Kidding”
I learn something every day, even in my old age. I should have known too, coming from you! 🙂
BTW, best avatar ever. I won’t tell you how many times over the years I’ve started to shoo that little bug from my screen. I actually hit it once…not too hard, fortunately. Now my hand just starts to move and then I remember….Flipper is here.
I’m with Paul re your avatar! I’ve tried to brush it off the screen more than a couple times…!
That 311 is a handsome little car. Part Volvo, part Karmann-Ghia!
I see a lot of visual similarities between the Wartburg and the later model Tatras. Also interesting is both makes we’re generally used by higher level party functionaries, while Skoda and Trabant were the worker’s cars.
Oddly enough during the Honecker era in East Germany(1971-1989) the Volvo 240 and 740/760 were the defacto state cars. It seems East Germany ordered a lot of Volvo 244/264 and 740 limo versions. They ordered the Volvo due to it not being as Western as BMW or Benz
Here is a link to a brochure of the Volvo 264TE limo
http://www.volvoclub.org.uk/pdf/brochures/264TE-Brochure1979.pdf
Here is a old photo of Honecker on parade on the right are Volvo limos along side of Chaika and Zils
I like that. Use it for a daily driver for the kids after I do a V8 swap and some good rubber. Never seen this body before
Deutsche
Kinder
Wagen…
DKW.
German Kiddie Car.
I thought that too when I saw DKW. But I thought it might be a car plant run by children (Deutsche Kinder Werks.) Maybe that was a Disney movie?
Ah, what a great write up. I came so close to getting myself a 311 a few years back, but in the end I got a ’64 220SE. I guess in a way both were cars that were a sign of success at the time, just on opposite sides of the Wall.
The car you’ve shown at the top is however not a four stroke. The Wartburg received a new front clip in the early eighties but was still powered by the 3 cylinder two stroke. I think the new front was made to accomodate the radiator, which used to be behind the engine in earlier models. The four stroke cars are recognizable by the integrated headlights and turn signals, like in the attached photo.
Having said that, I’d always choose the two stroke. The sound of them is simply amazing, like an orchestra of tubas spitting joyful little bees into your ears.
I thought the same thing, from the front end. But here’s a snip from this car’s back end. Did they change the front, or add the new 1.3 logo, which looks rather original. Hmmm….
Hmm, well that could very well be. Only way to know really is popping the hood. It’s nearly impossible to find an Eastern German car that is still original. These cars were kept alive on a tight budget and with a marginal parts supply. It was very common to reshell rotted out or damaged Wartburgs with an ‘Ersatzkarosse’ right until the Wall fell. Even the unitary Trabants were reshelled, which makes most cars still out there a mix and match of whatever was available. A testament to the ingenuity of the East Germans by any means.
Late to the party (no pun intended) but it’s a 1.3, only they had the big taillights. Two-stroke 353s kept the long, skinny, protruding ones to the end.
Whoops, photo didn’t attach. My bad.
So, they exported a RHD version to the UK? Did the UK have any safety or smog standards at all? It’s hard for me to imagine being able to buy a car from East Germany, or wanting to. Ditto with Ladas.
Even if the Wartburg had endless amounts of hipster coolness as standard equipment, I wouldn’t want one. Nope, I don’t want a Wartburg, even if it qualifies me to drive around with a smug, ironic post-modern smirk on my face.
Yes, they sold Wartburgs in the UK for several years – they often had full-page ads in the annual Daily Express World Car Guides. I bought a UK-spec brochure recently too, made interesting reading.
There were safety & smog standards,they were a bit lower than others
In Europe the 2cv was still legal right untill it died in 1990 so these cars got thru the crash test, the main safety test of the time. Emissions did not become an issue until the late 80s with CATs coming compulsory in 93.
Eastern Block cars were big here in the mid 70s due to price and spec. Wartburgs were a step up from Russian cars or so the guy a the top of my street thought. We used to laugh at the exhaust smoke!.
Fair comment on the smog (and no we didn’t have UK emission laws then) but safety? Why do you think the Wartburg would be unsafe? They were very solidly built cars with decent road manners.
In the UK I remember seeing a Wartburg on my way to school in the first and second years of secondary school so that would have made it 1971 and 2 before the emissions rules really came out.
In terms of safety, every car had to pass an annual MOT, still do, there have always been quite harsh fines for driving a car without a valid MOT as well as points on your driving license, 12 points and you can be banned from driving for a year
It had the nicer chrome front so must have been a 2 stoke. All eastern communist cars like this, the Lada and Skoda were considered to be inferior to anything else on the road and bought by odd types.
New car purchase were not that common even among the middle class (before any of you go on and on about the British class system, its completely different today), second hand car sales out numbered new car sales by a huge margin, a second hand European car would be considered preferable to a new communist car.
Modern cars excite me about as much as a washing machine or fridge but there is something about the 3 box simplicity of this I like, even quite ugly old cars are interesting
Hipster coolness? Blowing blue oil smoke all over the place and spewing out enough noxious gases to cover 100 newer Ford Fiestas?
Thought hipsters were green. Or in the German case, overwhelmingly members of the Green Party.
Reminds me of an engineer friend of mine who was heavily into environmentally friendly technology. He drove an old hooptie and I called him on it. He upgraded soon after.
Let me once again confirm that these cars are considered very cool anti-cars by Deutschenhipsters, blue smoke and all. Really!
My music teacher had one in 1972.My brother and his mates taped a condom to the exhaust outlet,you should have seen the teacher dash out of the car when it burst with a loud bang.That was the only one I ever saw,I left school 2 years later and it was starting to rust quite badly in the British climate
An interesting car – I always thought they were rear-engined. Now I know the engine’s at the correct end I find them even more interesting!
Ditto – always assumed they were rear engines, hence some confusion over the Audi reference. And even rear engine VW vans got some versions of the “Golf” inline fours.
Here in Hungary Wartburgs were quite common cars. You can see one every now and than even these days.
They had some good points: roomy interior, big trunk, good acceleration (even the 2-stroke variants), quite reliable (don’t think Mercedes W123 solidness though).
But from many aspects the W353 was inferior to the Ladas and Skodas: very bad stability, it was easy to roll them over. The boxy body design was a step back to the nice and detailed body of the earlier 312s – it was designed with economical and simple production in focus, not looks and quality. There were lots of big metal surfaces on the body without enough strengthening so the doors and the roof resonated like a big drum. Even the doors closed with a loud, resonating bang – very typical to the Wartburg. 🙂 Skodas and especially Ladas were much closer to normal cars.
“Skodas and especially Ladas were much closer to normal cars.”
Well, when talking Sovietized autos, “normal” is a relative word. Their “normal” is our “deeply weird and undesirable.”
Here’s a “normal” Skoda from the mid-1980s. The Bolshies knew better than to try them on Ronald Reagan’s America — but they did inflict them on the Canadian market; where the Lada (a Fiat screwed together by guys who guzzle vodka for breakfast — what could go wrong?) had been a modest sales success a few years earlier. Promoted as “the lowest-priced new car you can buy”, the boxy, bumpy Lada had struck a Canadian chord with two small niche markets: one was cheapskates, of course; and the other was ponytailed Marxist college professors who liked the idea of sending some hard currency to their comrades in the Proletarian Paradise.
Unfortunately for the Russians and their Czech puppets, there’s only a finite number of pro-Moscow misers to go around — and by the time their pockets had been picked, word had spread far and wide about what complete pieces-of-crap these “bargain” cars were. Skoda and Lada are now both long-gone from the Great White North — and I don’t just mean gone from dealerships, but gone from the roads too. Gone, gone, and never to return.
And here’s a 1985 Skoda Rapid 130, complete with Ontario plates.
Check out that sideways-opening hood — who says collectivized auto industries don’t innovate?
However, it makes for awkward loading in RHD markets. A friend had one He bought a Skoda so his car wouldn’t get stolen – it worked!
That engine compartment looks more than half empty.
It’s completely empty. The engine’s at the back of the car.
I just saw a Skoda Rapid at a car show in Victoria BC this past weekend, and it was a Canadian market car. Minty too.
Did you take pictures? I’d love to see a CC of a Canadian Skoda.
You know what, I didn’t! Sorry about that Paul.
I remember Skodas from when Jay’s British and European Motors in Vancouver and Nanaimo sold them (1984-1986) so to me they’re nothing especially unusual. Jays also sold used Peugeots as well as new parts. It was a fun shop to be in, until his shop on Seymour downtown was shut in 1993.
One other thing, if it’s any consolation, my late father bought a new 1997 Lada Niva up here in BC and I probably have some digital photos of it, if you are interested.
That was a fun vehicle. His next (and last) car was a 2002 Mercedes-Benz C 230 K with a 6 speed manual. The Merc was also a fun vehicle.
Those skodas. Quality a bit sketchy but they were fun to drive and had good traction. Ladas were a total piece of crap. Beyond cheapness they had very little going for them (I actually owned one)
What no Aro 240??? One of the US 4×4 magazines in 1980 tested one and There were plans to import them to US with Ford 4 cylinder engines in the 90s . Ford backed out at the last minute. 50 sat at the port in Texas for 10 years when the importer went belly up. Engineless . Some were sold and repowered. I’ve seen 2 .
The East German police had them as patrol cars!. Lada 1500 for highway patrol. Saw them a year before the wall came down. Still have the photos…
I have a soft spot for Iron Curtain Iron,had 6 years happy motoring in an FSO 125p.
The 353s were pretty big in Benelux and in Greece, too. Cheap to buy, easy to fix, FWD, lots more room than a Fiat 500… Not a bad package, if you can stand the looks. That’s the Achille’s heel, IMHO. The 311-312 looked very good. Even the EMWs were interesting. This one is bland, slab-sided and clumsy. And that’s the one they had to carry on making for 22 years. Bummer.
Apparently, the folks at Eisenach just spent the whole 70s and 80s proposing new designs, some of which looked very appealing. But the regime was in such economic disarray that any substantial new investment was impossible. Skoda and Lada showed it was possible for some Eastern-block cars to be competitive. The East German car industry was structurally incapable of anything of the sort.
For a ’66 car, they weren’t at all bad. Roomy, cheap, reliable, reasonably quick and they looked totally contemporary. But like the trabant, they never moved with the times until it was too late. They were sold here in the U.k up until 1974 (the year I was born) in reasonable numbers until emissions legislation killed them off virtually overnight. I’ve been obsessed with all things automotive for my entire life and I’ve never seen one in the flesh. Not once.
The U.K importers abandoned wartburg and turned instead to foisting the newly introduced Lada 1200 on us. I think we got a bum deal.
Reading the more positive western European perspectives on these cars perhaps explains Dacia’s relative success.
Modern Dacias use up to the minute Renault mechanicals meaning they’re quick enough and economical. Yeah the interiors are a bit plain and cheap looking but they are genuinely decent cars, unbeatable for the price if the badge doesn’t bother you.
Quite interested in the various Wartburg and Trabants prototypes that never entered production, also quite a shame both marques never switched from two-strokes to Skoda-derived OHV engines.
Apparently prior to the 1.1-1.3 EA111 powering both the Wartburg 353 and the Trabant, other Volkswagen-based engines considered to replace the old two-stroke engines were a 60 hp 1191cc 3-cylinder petrol for the Wartburg and a 34 hp 1104cc 3-cylinder diesel for the Trabant that was based on the 1471-1588cc 4-cylinder EA827 engines.
‘Wartburg’ has to be the most unfortunate and ugly brand name of all time.
Warts aren’t pretty, so those cars never stood a chance.
I’ll skip most of my political rant and just leave it at those who advocate certain ideas should be forced to endure the products and consequences of their ideas.
I understand the commies took over etc but did they abolish curves as well? That f9 is very curvaceous and decent looking whereas the featured car is both blocky and strangely proportioned. The hood and front end are weirdly styled and weirdly proportioned. What’s with those eye searing colours? I know in America we went through some hideous colours in the 70s but that is a really unhealthy green colour, not like a green growing things colour but a nasty industrial waste/cheap plastic colour and the orange and red are worse. One thing you expect is a communist country to be able to produce red. . .
Those bright colors were very common on European cars during the 70’s and early 80’s.
“Wartburg” is the name of a famous castle (“Burg”) near Eisenach – Hometown of the Wartburg car. The etymological origin of the name is the ancient German word “Warte”, which is related to the English “ward”.
No warts there. Just a blob on a wall where Martin Luther chased the devil hurling a
bowl of ink, as they say.
The Wartburg in the lead and last pics, appears like several exterior parts loosely assembled together, rather than an integrated exterior. Inconsistent body panel fit, reminds me of the Smash Up Derby cars I had as a child.
As a goodwill gesture, this Wartburg should have come with a chip that played ‘Tequila’ for a few moments, upon startup.
The predecessor W311 looked quite nice. Stylingwise absolutely on par with conservatively stiled western cars of the era – as the Volvo Amazon or the Benz “Ponton”. The colour of the pistacchio icecream green unit shown above is as well so typically 50s. May be the nicest “eastern” car of all.
I read on another site that IFA in Zwickau had to completely retool the F9 because the original tooling had been ordered from a supplier in the Ruhrgebiet and completed but not yet delivered before the war.
That tooling ended up with the Western Auto-Union successor organization who in turn had to put it on a reverse-engineered F8 chassis and 2-cylinder engine, hence the DKW F89, while IFA had the original 3-cylinder that had been developed to be a cut above the VW.
Later on, the Wartburg 311 had been conceived with the idea of the standard sedan being a 2-door as was the custom in Germany, but it was changed to a 4-door late in development. Speculation, but with the EMWs going away it was likely that East Germany didn’t want to be dependent on Soviet cars for their taxi fleet.
Both of those make sense. Thanks for the additions.
There was a mustard color DKW on the lower part of our street in W Towson in the 1960s. Weird car I thought at the time. It’s clear where the SAAB 92 came from when you see the DKW F9.
That’s what I always say: “SAAB – born from DKWs”. But nobody wants to hear it.
(:laughter:)