The name derives from Wartburg Castle on one of the hills overlooking the town of Eisenach where the cars were made.

         The Wartburg was a car marque known for its East German manufactured models, but has its origins dating to 1898. From the 1950s, Wartburgs were a three-cylinder                        two-stroke engine with only seven major moving parts (three pistons, three connecting rods and one crankshaft). Production ended in April 1991, and the factory was                          acquired by Opel.

 

Headquarters Eisenach, Germany

311

The Wartburg 311 was a car produced by East German car manufacturer VEB Automobilwerk Eisenach from 1956 to 1965. The 311 model was manufactured in a number of variations, including pickup, sedan, limousine, coupé, and as a two-seat roadster. The two-stroke engine was enlarged to 992 cc in 1962. An interim model, called the Wartburg 312 and featuring the chassis developed for the succeeding 353, was built from 1965 until 1967.

311 1956-1965

Production of the Wartburg 311 was already underway at Eisenach by the end of 1955. The car was a development of the existing EMW 309. This was the car previously identified as the IFA F9, which, in turn, had been based on the 1940 DKW F9 scheduled for launch in 1940 until the Second World War intervened.

The name "Wartburg" came from the very first model (Wartburgwagen) produced in 1898 at the Automobilwerk Eisenach factory, three decades before that company was acquired by BMW, and nearly five decades before the plant's location, following the defeat of Third Reich, in the Soviet occupation zone placed it under state control.

The use of a separate chassis facilitated the adaptation of the car to a range of differing body shapes. On the other hand, the use of a separate chassis with the frame rails running under the passenger compartment's floor during a period when automakers elsewhere in Europe were increasingly standardizing on self-supporting car bodies, left the Wartburg approach looking increasingly dated, and also added to the car's height, while "low-long-sleek" was becoming the order of the day in car styling.

Between1956–1965 288.535 cars have been produced.

353

The Wartburg 353, known in some export markets as the Wartburg Knight, is a medium-sized family car, produced by the East German car manufacturer AWE for their Wartburg brand. It was the successor of the Wartburg 311, and was itself succeeded by the Wartburg 1.3.

353 1966-1988

The Wartburg 353 was powered by a 1-litre displacement, 3-cylinder unit that took almost two decades to refine. It developed 50 to 55 PS. The 353 was a reasonable success throughout the Eastern bloc, with front-wheel drive.

Noteworthy characteristics of the model are: simple design, dependability, occasional and cheap maintenance. 

In 1968 the Wartburg 355, equipped with a 1.4-litre Renault engine, was developed but only six were built until the project was cancelled in 1973.

Wartburg 353 (youtube.com)

353 kombi 1966-1988

The Wartburg 353 was produced from 1966 to 1988, becoming the Wartburg with the longest production run.

Domestically, it was used for all types of government transportation, sometimes as a Volkspolizei police car. However, due to the nature of the planned economy, deliveries to private owners could take ten to fifteen years.

Wartburg 353 Kombi (youtube.com)

1898-1991