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Wartburgs came from the pre-war BMW car factory at Eisenach, which, after the war, found itself in the Russian-occupied zone. So the first post-war Wartburgs were really reconstituted '30s BMWs. The first true Wartburgs, built from 1955, were based on a pre-war DKW chassis, which meant a 900 cc, two-stroke engine driving the rear wheels. A few of these 311 models were imported to Britain, but the first Wartburg that had any impact at all in the UK was the Knight. It looked deceptively modern, its angular lines and large glass area influenced by the contemporary BMW saloon. But under the modernist body appeared the same rear-driven, three-cylinder, three-speed mechanisms in a separate chassis frame.
The Knight handled adequately in the dry but disastrously in the wet, with a strong instinct for ploughing straight on given the slightest opportunity. For those who wanted to plod, its 76 mph top speed was probably acceptable, but anyone following in the Wartburg's wake would have been choking in a mist of blue oil smoke. Neither was it especially thrifty, returning 28 mpg. As usual for its ilk, its major attraction was price: here was a Cortina-sized car at a Mini-sized price - just £690 in 1970. No longer able to pass emissions tests - and damned for its handling - the Knight disappeared from the UK market in 1977, although it was still offered in East Germany as late as 1985.
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