Built in East Germany in a factory were Audi’s were once built before WW2. The Sachsenring Trabant started life in 1957. Several models were produced but the most famous one was the P601 that began production in 1967 and was sold relatively unchanged until after the fall of the wall to 1991.

Trabant P601

Its styling was very simple and to conserve expensive metal its body was made from a plastic similar to fibreglass called duraplast the styling of the car remained unchanged over the years and retained the small 60’s inspired mini fins on the rear until 1991. there were a few minor grill changes and a few mechanical improvements including improved brakes and electrical systems during its life.

The Trabant’s two stroke engine was one of the noisiest and most polluting engines ever to be put under the bonnet of a car, it also featured very bad performance with quoted top speed of 100klm its only good feature is that it was very simple with only 5 moving parts and could be removed and lifted out of the car by one person

The last upgrade came in 1990, as the west started to see the Trabant emerge from East Germany, the engine was replaced with a four stroke 1.1 VW polo unit. Despite the much needed performance increase the Trabant’s days were numbered. It was no longer being exported to eastern block country’s and now the East Germans had access to many more modern cars.

In 1991 after over 3,096,000 Trabant’s produced the Trabant production stopped, the factory were the Trabant’s were produced in Zwickau is now a car museum.

Today to own a Trabant is to own the ultimate souvenir from communist East Germany many people are buying up the unwanted Trabants from Germany and exporting them all around the world, a process that would cost much more than it would to buy the car when it was new.

It can be fair to say the humble trabant will be around for quite a while if not in museums or peoples private collections but also in junk yards across Germany. The Trabant’s plastic body has become a bit of an environmental disaster to try and dispose of, where other cars can be melted down or simply rust away the trabant’s plastic like body will stay with us forever making a non running travant just as bad for the environment as a running one.