Roshake77 posted several Trabants still on the streets in what I assume is Budapest, including this wagon on the go. Like so many cars from the 60s or so, it looks mighty small in today’s traffic.
This one is a 1990 601 Hycomat, which had an automatic clutch for disabled drivers.
And here’s one in a lovely shade of green.
It makes a nice contrast with the Toyota Yaris, roughly the modern equivalent.
Here’s the full CC on the Trabi, by Roger Carr:
I like these two featured pictures from today’s CC posts – two white cars driving on busy streets in big cities under an identical blue sky… but a world apart, both in geography and types of cars:
Both with vertical taillights, both ’80s cars that still had tailfins.
I cannot begin to explain my feelings about this car – and it has little to do with the mechanics. The story of the Beetle and the Jeep – also government cars – ends happily. The story of the Trabbi doesn’t. I know today, older East Germans have childhood memories that include these cars, but nostalgic childhood memories cannot erase a life without freedom, the innocent lives lost, and the suffocating STASI-enforced conformity.
Trabbis are what happens when you let governments run your lives.
East German consumer products followed a particular pattern; solidly competitive when launched but never meaningfully upgraded, just allowed to linger as export sales fell off with production never expanded to meet home-market demand. The reason, always, was that the national security state was a massive resource hog that siphoned off all the money from everything else.
All of East Germany was still frozen in time when I was there. They still used pre-WWII font lettering, they used dated words, burned coal and those Trabbis stunk. There was still lots of war damage on the buildings. The newer buildings were a cross between Pruitt-Iago and “The Jetsons”. The roads were very rough and completely worn out. Like living in your great-great aunt’s attic.
I’m familiar with Chicago housing projects and so much of East Berlin reminded me of the empty plazas, vast concrete lots and generic concrete block apartment buildings built by the CHA. The older parts of the city were far more interesting, but it looked like the War had ended only a few years earlier in those parts.
My German Business professor explained to me how important East Berlin was to the Soviet Bloc as a “showcase” for Communism and to think that what I saw was the best – well. The giant public art only made the entire scene feel more dehumanizing and bleak.
Trabbis make me sad.
Behind the “unique” car, the buying experience in East Bloc countries was also something else. . . .
Brings to mind an old Ronald Regan joke about buying a car in the USSR.
Here’s a video tour of the East Germany Trabant factory circa 1983. They did use some unique processes for the body panels. What struck me the most is how poorly lighted everything is. Not even the supplemental lighting while filming improved the bleak interior.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DADm1oPlPAss&ved=2ahUKEwiP_-GThLv5AhVPhIkEHfydBgg4ChCjtAF6BAgCEAE&usg=AOvVaw2CisPAYQZkEfFVTX2O24OA
That green is a most peculiar colour.
Erich has been working on his, a nice anonymous grey-blue.
Great job on the model. My cousin in Hungary had one that seemed to be the same green color. Maybe they simply took a military olive drab and lightened it some. I’ll never forget the floor covering. Multi toned tan linoleum that looked like it came from a public washroom. My cousin kept it immaculate despite that he lived on a dirt road. I think it was original.
My favorite Trabant joke is the early HO scale Mercedes tow truck made by Wiking that came with an HO scale Trabant on the back, because it presumably broke down right after it crossed the border. I should dig it out and post a picture
I’d like to see that!
I’d like to try a Trabant, I imagine they’re a true hair shirt .
-Nate
“…true hair shirt”.
Well, cotton fenders, anyway.
At least you don’t have to iron the fenders.