#FunFactFriday π Did you know that the Trabant, also known as “Trabi,” was the absolute car sensation in East Germany during its heyday? ππ¨ It was so popular that the average worker there had to patiently wait for an incredible 10 to 13 years to get their hands on one! π² Can you imagine the anticipation?! βοΈ
Fast forward to the totally rad 1980s, and you’ll find that the Trabant was manufactured with some quirky features. π It had no tachometer to show the engine’s RPM, no external fuel door π ββοΈ (talk about a seamless look!), and astonishingly, no fuel gauge either! π± Drivers had to rely on an old school dipstick to gauge their remaining fuel levels. π Who needs a fancy display when you have a dipstick, right? π€·ββοΈ
So picture yourself cruising down the streets in an iconic Trabant, feeling the wind in your hair π¬οΈ and the dipstick twirling in your hand π. You’re counting on your trusty Trabi while making sure you don’t run out of fuel in the middle of nowhere. It’s like a real-life adventure! ππ₯³
Communism, F yeah!
Makes me think of the scene in Goodbye Lenin where the mom is thrilled that they got a Trabant after waiting only three years!
We saw them driving from Berlin to West Germany in the 80s. Big cloud of blue smoke, going to beat hell, about 50-60 mph.
It should be noted that they used a 2 stroke engine you had to mix the oil with the fuel
“Hey dipstick, come over here.”
[“An Introduction to my Trabant”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhpIgM6TpwA&ab_channel=AgingWheels) Careful though, if you like quirky cars you might end up watching a lot more.
>no external fuel door, and no fuel gauge and drivers had to use a dipstick to measure the remaining fuel.
But why? How could anyone think this was a good idea?
Reminds me of an old joke about the Soviet Union. A man goes to a mechanic to see about fixing his car. The mechanic says that their next opening is ten years from today. The man asks if itβs ten years from today in the morning or the evening? The mechanic is confused and asks why it matters, itβs ten years from now. The man responds βwell Iβve got the plumber coming in the morning.β
These remind me of those cars they use in Siberia that they then winterize and modify to essentially run forever with no need to turn it off (they do oil changes while car is running)
21 seconds zero to 60
And the body panels were made of recycled cotton and textile dye resin iirc.
I was an exchange student in Leipzig back in the early 2000’s which was ex-DDR. One of the Trabant jokes I picked up from that trip was:
A man discovers his Trabant’s windshield wipers need to be replaced. He goes to the mechanic, walks in and says “windshield wipers for a Trabant”
The mechanic sits for a moment and says “This is a fair trade, I’ll take it”
Sheβll go 300 hectares on a single tank of kerosene
There was joke in Poland about availability of cars and stuff during communism:
A man was finally able to order his car. He went to dealership, paid in full and was informed that the car will be ready to pick up on May 14th, 8 years from now.
-is it going to be in the morning or the afternoon?
-Why would it matter? Its 10 years from today!
-because I have a guy scheduled on that exact date to connect my phone line!
I drove one in Budapest years ago. It’s a challenge to say the least but I got the hang of it. And my inner cold war geek loved it.
Old joke:
Q: How do you double the price of a Trabant?
A: You fill the tank
Put it in H!
I owned one for a few years! A 602 ‘De Luxe’ model, complete with chrome bumpers! I’d best describe it as driving a chainsaw on wheels, it was absolutely hilarious fun.
Filling up at petrol stations and popping the bonnet, watching people bog eyed watching you seemingly fill your engine with petrol (the fuel tank was above the engine).
Doing the ‘trabi shake’, after dosing the tank with 2T oil and rocking it on its – single leaf spring front suspension – to slosh the oil around in the tank to mix it.
4th gear had basically zero engine braking by design, so youd sort of coast in it
It had a really nifty digital (LEDs!!) Fuel flow meter that lit up as you revved to get you to drive economically
Two pistons (600cc!) and a separate HT coil for each spark plug. I had a coil failure on a long trip and no spare so i just drove on one cylinder. It actually worked because its a two stroke so all that unburned fuel is just lubrication. No cat to worry about either!
The body was incredibly strong – huge square section chassis like a bloody agricultural vehicle. And that ‘paper mache’ body was actually super stiff – i once dinged a parked car and duffed their wing in, the trabi wasnt even scratched.
Miss that ridiculous thing. Sold it to a N Welsh production studio at S4C who were making a show called ‘Trabant a ni’ (A mutation of ‘arbant a ni’ or ‘away we go’). I look at the MOT search every now and again to see if someone put it back on the road…its been 15 years now and no dice…shame!
Keep in mind the 10-13 years were the waiting times for an official order. Mostly everyone who was eligible would put their name on the waiting list, whether they needed a car or not and thus inflate the demand. If they somehow got a car, they could trade it on the black market in exchange for whatever they needed, for example construction material.
Aging Wheels has one
I have an east German friend, Claus, he waited 8 years to get his Trabbi!
3 months later the wall fell and everyone else were driving big Volkswagens, he kept it for 3 years out of spite! π
It’s basically a fiberglass shell with a lawnmower engine!
The youtube channel Aging Wheels has one, he’s done a number of cool vids about them.
The Spy Museum in DC has a display for how the Trabant would be modified to smuggle people through check points and borders.
Edit: My bad.This video is how they modified the Trabant car door to take infrared pictures at night. Also, cool. You can probably search for more Spy Museum + Trabant videos if you’d like to know more.
Aside from the fuel door and fuel gauge, no tachometer was rather common before, say, 1990.
Was my parent’s first car. I remember riding around in it as a kid and having to push it up the hill sometimes in the winter lmao
Good old times.
We used to nick name them Eastie Beasties.
“Put it in H!”
East German orders the car.
” that will be delivered in 10 years sir ”
East German, ” morning or afternoon? ”
” what difference does it make?”
East German, ” my refrigerator is coming in the morning “
First you hear it , then you smell it and finally see it!
“no tachometer, no external fuel door, and no fuel gauge and drivers had to use a dipstick to measure the remaining fuel.”
You know, that perfectly describes a Model T.
No tachometer was pretty common in Europe at the time, even on more expensive cars. My dad’s first BMW didn’t have a tach, it had a clock where the tach was supposed to be
U2 hung a bunch of these from the rafters of their ZooTV stage to function as stage lighting. They’re still in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
They had done some recording in Berlin just as the Wall came down, and I read somewhere they were in literally the last plane into West Germany before it became just Germany.
>In the 1980s, it was manufactured with no tachometer, no external fuel door, and no fuel gauge and drivers had to use a dipstick to measure the remaining fuel
That’s not true. We had one in the beginning of the 80s and nothing of this was true
Average of 13 years delivery and East Germy was only a thing for 40 years.
Sheβll go 50 hectares on a single tank of kerosene!
Honestly, the trabant is such an odd, ugly stepchild of a car… I want one.