That's one fancy lawn mower!

Back when I was a poor student in Eastern Europe I had one of these. It was an estate and painted it light blue. From all the cars I owned over the years, I think I had the most fun in that one. I still miss it after twenty odd years....

“…such cute little Buzz-Bombs…!”

G'day Rich, That was fun seeing the littltle Trabi giving it's 🐎Best Horsies🐎 a gallop & have subbed to see the road test when you upload it, I'll also have a look at some of your older videos too. I've been watching Jon's Auto Shennanigans as I enjoy his sense of humour (The 2nd Small Disagreement😂👍Copyright Approved) & learning about the REAL Motorways I drive on when playing Euro Truck Sim 2, I only found Jon's videos about 6 months ago looking for something to watch when I wasn't well & have been catching up on his older content too, I guess YT has recommended this one as I watched Jon's vids where you did the Saab Suspension & Dyno run a couple of weeks ago. Wishing you & your family a 🎄Wonderful Christmas🎄& 🥳🎉Very Happy New Year🥳🎉 from Nowra New South Wales 🙃👎

I drove one as delivery van for while. Because is light and FWD I felt very confident on show roads.

Well done are you the first person to actually put a Trabant on the dyno and what a power machine 29 hp as Hubnut says less is more and l am impressed

Some obscured results there....🤔 Rings conspiracy police

Vauxhall did that wanky 1.2 8v in Corsa b that made 44 bhp so this ain't that bad really. It don't half flatten out quick considering it's a 2 stroke. I'm guessing they were setup this way to increase longevity and fuel. You can make that sort of power with under 100cc 2t stroke which is mad.

Fifty 'torques' from a mere 600cc? Now that IS impressive!

Well done little Trabbie. Not a simple engine, in fact rather sophisticated. I hope Ed checks out the wheel wobble shown in the video. Fixing that might make the car much nicer to drive.

I acquired a 1986 Trabant 601 in 1994, rebuilt the engine in 2018. When the question was asked of how much horsepower, I said in my head closer to 30 than 26. Fantastic little car, well engineered, made largely from recycled materials and still going strong 38 years on.

Superb!

just put 13B and u have rocket man

Everyone's always laughing at the Duroplast body panels, but I think they're kinda brilliant. I mean, it's a composite material as is fiberglass for example. It's just made with cotton, because apparently they could get their hands on a lot of it in DDR.

Surely putting black tape on the headlights can't be enough to have an lhd car registered in the UK?

👍‍‍🌟👍‍‍

I have a heavily modded zetec s if you wanna run it lol

When i went to rebuild East Germany in 1990 there was thousands of these littering the roads where people leaving east Germany when the wall fell, packed a case and drove till it ran out of fuel then they went on foot. We had some whacky races in these things 😂

Got to say it's definitely got a nice muff under the bonnet. Excellent research and interesting test on a car I least expected to see dynoed.

Whats with the roll of duck tape on the suspension turret?

The longest production car in the world 3,56m body and 15m smoke cloud. 😂

Transverse leaf spring not ideal?? Isn't that what the Lancia Delta Integrale had ?

Soo Nice , now I'm curious to know how much real HP my 1976 IFA Wartbourg 353 Tourist S (3cyl 2stroke 992cm3 50HP/100Nm , dual carb sequential opening) , I also have a free wheel but on all 4 gears , and I have a lever to lock it to use the engine brake, but only in case of very slippery road (snow) or going down a mountain , if abused , because there is no fuel/oil, we use the engine and risk of seize and damage it . mine haves a sequential double circuit Front 4 piston calipers and ventilated discs ,non assisted and drums on the back .

I had one of those! Now I want one again!

I love eastern bloc/cold war motors... Now we need a Wartburg and a Moskvich lol...

i can smell it from here

I would recommend to locate a wartburg, another east german gem

Elly was worried for a moment! (She was 602cc as tested. Still haven't got the 652 fitted...)

Should it not trump the 2CV? -1 HP but when you compare the book figures it’s +2 up.

I enjoyed all this video - except each time it accelerated in 4th gear when the poor things' noise made me wince!

Take the 'ion' off the Sirion badge & just call it Sir...

You must do a Wartburg 353 next =.

There is a company that does guided tours of Berlin with Trabant's. You drive the Trabant in convoy with the tour guide. If you ever do that, you could have the bragging rights of being the first eccentric person in the UK to put a Trabie on the Dyno.😂

Bet this two stroke Trabant has more power at wheels than a 850 or 998cc factory spec Mini has! And thats from a Mini enthusiast 😉 Another thing, every SAAB up to and including the earliest SAAB 99's had freewheel which works in all gears!

"Sonderwunsch" apparently means "special request".

Very cool! An east german car on a west german rolling road. What a »Sonderwunsch« (special request)! We call the Trabant also »Renn-Pappe« which means racing cardboard. Love and peace and two stroke forever! Thanks Kitch and edsplasticcars.

Just think, someone probably went on a 10 year waiting list to buy that car!

Did you say Capri ? 😂😂

"Sonderwunsch" means "Special Request" in German I think? Porsche have a "Sonderwunsch" division which makes custom cars for people who have WAY more money than their average customer - Harry ('s Farm/Garage) Metcalfe has a Sonderwunsch car in-fact... This isn't that

i reckon it makes 26bhp edit: 5:24 i promise i made my guess before you stated that it was supposed to be 26

Some years ago I visited Berlin. And saw that there would have been option to do city tour, in convoy driving Trabant. Sadly my time was all planned up. Still cool to see some of these driving around in a line :D

Does it still live in Chelmsford where it was registered?

point of order- isn't wobblers 2cv running someone elses 652cc donkey? ergo it's modified! 😂

You made a mistake here... Trabants need to rev big time. You have shifted trough the gears way too fast. You shouldn't shift it like a normal car. That's why it didn't want to rev when you put your foot down. Revving it higher before shifting resolves that problem and provides a better power band without the dips. You are just choking the engine on low revs and putting your foot directly down. There is not really an accelerator pump, it needs to pull the fuel trough the carburator itself. So if you just put on the gas it falls on it face if the revs are too low. Only the latest (sparvergaser) have a (sort of) accelerator pump and its very weak because there are some jets smaller than normal (like the main jet) so its only a compensation for that on full trottle. It is often replaced by an older one to give it a better performance. But you really need to rev these engines... Also, i don't think its running quite right. But video sound can be deceiving.

That wheel wobble was a bit disconcerting. Also I see Ed's Plastic Ears stores his panel repair kit, aka a roll of duct tape, in the engine bay.

"sonderwunsch"? As an avid german car "option list"-hound I know that means "special equipment/options" or similar.... So being a trabant its at least probably not a base model this one then, I take it?

I can't help feel you may be wasting your talents merely talking about cars. I can see a new series in which you tackle all the big historical and geopolitical topics. You could be the next Philomena Cunk!

Any car with a handy supply of Gaffer tape under the bonnet would worry me.

The one thing I did spot with that Trabi was the wobble of the offside wheel...

sonderwunsch = special request. aka it was ordered with some of the handful of _advanced_ extra options like... an odometer. or foglamps... or something else that would probably be standard if it wasn't a trabant lol