History of the West German commercial vehicle industry from 1945 to 1990
This article deals with the history of the West German commercial vehicle industry from 1945 to 1990 . Since the commercial vehicle market in Germany has become increasingly international since the mid-1970s, this also includes influences from the foreign commercial vehicle industry on the German commercial vehicle sector. The earlier development is presented in the article History of the German Commercial Vehicle Industry from 1895 to 1945 and the further development in the article History of the German Commercial Vehicle Industry from 1990 to Today .
The immediate post-war period from 1945
The German commercial vehicle industry on the ground
During the Second World War, 75% of the facilities in the German commercial vehicle industry and 50% of the production facilities for the manufacture of commercial vehicle parts were destroyed. However, some businesses remained, such as B. the commercial vehicle production of Krupp , which had been relocated to a protected location during the war, spared from destruction. Many of the facilities that remained intact were dismantled as reparations by the victorious powers. Some entrepreneurs were temporarily interned because of their collaboration with the Nazi regime. The start of production required the permission of the Allied control authorities. Incidentally, after the war the lack of raw materials, semi-finished parts and fuels and the destruction of infrastructure and traffic routes shaped the production conditions. Due to the emerging division of Germany , some companies lost their factories, such as For example, Adam Opel AG has its Brandenburg truck plant , which used to be a leader and was particularly innovative.
Due to the lack of gasoline, wood gas generators became very important. By the end of 1948, Imbert alone had built 32,000 such systems. After the war, the trucks were spartan; The type L 4500 built by Daimler-Benz since 1935 with a payload of 4.5 t had an improvised driver's cab made of pressed cardboard.
Trucks were urgently needed for the reconstruction. The Allied Control Council only allowed a maximum of 150 hp, limited the number of newly built trucks and banned the construction of all-wheel drive vehicles and vehicles with more than two axles.
On May 2, 1945, Büssing AG delivered another truck. By the end of the year, 3,500 employees had assembled 37 buses and 995 type 4500 trucks with 105 hp. Magirus-Deutz first repaired army vehicles of the occupation forces before commercial vehicle construction was resumed at the end of 1945, including a war-time caterpillar tractor , which was offered as a slightly modified "forest tractor" and of which around 1,500 copies were built by 1947. Vidal made his three-wheeled delivery vans again and the Cologne Ford works started again with the production of small, light trucks. One year after the war, the Opel Blitz , a 1.5 ton truck, was built in Rüsselsheim . This type was also manufactured under license at the Daimler-Benz plant in Mannheim. During the war, Daimler-Benz was obliged to produce the Opel for reasons of war. From 1945, Daimler-Benz began production at the Gaggenau plant. At MAN , which had to suffer considerably from the dismantling in Augsburg and Hamburg , the first 4.5 t payload 110 HP type MK truck was assembled in Nuremberg at Christmas 1945. Henschel & Sohn in Kassel only received a permit to build new vehicles in 1948 and repaired war-damaged vehicles and converted American military trucks to diesel engines . Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz, Kämper, MWM , Selve and Wehrmann were active in the same field. Faun resumed truck production in 1946, initially with designs from the war and pre-war periods. Krupp again produced trucks in Franconia in 1946 under the name Südwerke .
In contrast, the Adlerwerke in Frankfurt stopped manufacturing trucks and automobiles. The once renowned Vomag company could no longer produce because of the dismantling. The Borgward Group also suffered significantly from the dismantling of its factories.
The development in other countries
Renault truck was taken over by the French state. The Austrian company ÖAF was separated from its parent company MAN in 1946. In 1946, Volvo had also developed a diesel engine for the truck ready for series production.
Regeneration of the commercial vehicle industry from 1947 to 1950
Framework conditions in Germany
In West Germany, funds from the US Marshall Plan favored economic development from 1948 onwards. At the same time, the currency reform stabilized the economic framework for the West German commercial vehicle industry, as foreign business was permitted again. The “Transitional Act to Change the Law on Long-Distance Freight Transport with Motor Vehicles” (GFÄG) of September 1949 limited the number of long-distance freight transport concessions to 12,295 contingents so that fewer trucks could be registered. By 1950, almost 200,000 trucks and 5,300 tractor units were produced in Germany. In 1950, almost 70% of long-distance traffic was still carried out by rail.
The European transport ministers passed a convention in Geneva in 1949 that set the maximum weight of trucks to 32 tons and the maximum truck length to 18 meters. However, the Federal Republic did not initially accede to the convention.
technology
The equipment of the vehicles hardly changed until the early 1950s, with the exception of the air brake , invented in 1923 , which was now installed almost everywhere. The typical truck of that time was a long-boned truck , with front-wheel drive vehicles only a few. The cabs usually had no heating, which was still considered a luxury. Long-distance vehicles usually had a so-called swallow's nest behind the driver's cab on the loading area - the sleeping place for the driver. Tricycles z. B. Goliath and Tempo as simple, cheap means of transport were in great demand and widespread. Due to the often still inadequate tire quality, the poor condition of the roads and frequent overloading of the vehicles due to a lack of alternatives, flat tires were not uncommon in the post-war period. In 1948 in Gummersbach , the " Bergische Achsfabrik " ( BPW ) -Kotz & Sohn began building roller bearing axles with spread lever brakes for commercial vehicles. In 1949, Bosch built flashing lights as an alternative to the direction indicators that had been common up until then.
Manufacturers and vehicle models
In 1947 the economic situation was so bad that Büssing had to close the plant from January to March due to a lack of electricity, gas and coal. MAN had to cut working hours by 3½ hours a day because the workers were too weak because of the inadequate nutrition.
Faun came onto the market in 1948 with its first new truck design after the war with a payload of 4.5 t and 100 hp. In the same year, Henschel & Sohn was the last of the major German manufacturers to receive permission from the Allies to build new vehicles again. Magirus-Deutz switched its entire commercial vehicle range to air-cooled diesel engines, which was to remain the trademark of this manufacturer until the 1980s.
In 1948 there were also over 200 manufacturers of semi-trailers , trailers and commercial vehicle bodies. These included well-known names who had felt a connection with commercial vehicles for many years and whose customer relationships should not be lost, for example Kässbohrer , Kögel , Bunge, Schenk, Ackermann , Schmitz , Blumhardt , Eylert, Aurepa and Wackenhut. The company Eylert z. B. started manufacturing aluminum body superstructures in Wuppertal as early as 1947 . Kässbohrer in Ulm was again able to deliver all kinds of bodies, such as trailers, savings bank and toilet vehicles. The Willy Scheuerle vehicle factory in Pfedelbach began to build low loader combinations with a load capacity of up to 100 tons.
Also in 1948 was of Albert Friedrich designed Unimog ( " Uni salinization Mo gate G et up instrument") presented at a DLG Show. The vehicle was to be used primarily in agriculture and as an all-wheel-drive all- purpose tractor . There were 150 spontaneous orders at the exhibition. Later continued by the Boehringer works and Daimler-Benz, the Unimog is still on the market today.
In 1949, Henschel was the first to build a new Langschnauzer truck with 140 hp and a real long-distance driver's cab with two loungers after the war. This truck had an easy-to-use double four-speed gearbox , with gears 3 and 4 already synchronized . In addition, the model had a preselectable speed level on the steering wheel, which meant that eight gears could be shifted by changing the gas without having to use the clutch. A spare wheel holder (pull-out slide) was also available, which was a great relief for the driver in the event of a wheel change . Büssing built its first newly developed truck as the 7000 S type with 6.5 t payload and 150 hp - at that time a dream of many transport companies. Faun also built the “L 7” type in 1949 as a classic long-nosed truck, which was advertised with two trailers (which was still allowed at the time) as the “Freight Train on the Landstrasse”. The model had a payload of 6.5 t and a 150 hp engine from Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz . The "L 7 V" was also available as a modern forward control "L 7 V", of which 318 were built in the same year and which remained in production until 1951. The Büssing company presented a front control arm with an underfloor motor as type "5000 TU" located behind the front axle . Daimler-Benz built the “L 3250” type again in 1949 with the round wooden frame steel cab that had been available since 1938. With certain modifications, this truck was available as the L 321 with over 10,000 units until 1961.
In 1950, VW entered the market with a light commercial vehicle known as the “VW Transporter” or “ Bulli ”. Just like the light three-wheeler vans from Goliath and Tempo , this vehicle was aimed at small business owners. After the war, many new manufacturers tried to get involved in commercial vehicle construction and brought light trucks and delivery vans onto the market, such as B. Harmening , Manderbach , Econom , Wendax , Betz , MIAG , Ostner , Prengel , Triro and Orion . Most of them, however, could not prevail against the established brands and soon had to give up again due to small quantities.
Also in 1950, Krupp presented a new long-hood truck which clearly set itself apart from the competition with its modern design and which had the most powerful engine at the time that there was in German truck production: the "Titan" type with a bi-engine ( 2 × 3 cylinders), which had 210 hp from 1951. The top speed was 66 km / h. This construction of two 3-cylinder two-stroke diesel engines connected together was intended to circumvent the Allied limitation of 150 hp, as each of the two engines had less than 150 hp. The Titan had a large engine hood based on the American model, which was decorated with aluminum strips, and a long-distance driver's cab with loungers, which the Binz vehicle works had produced a total of 976 times up to 1954 . At the end of 1950, Büssing separated from the AEG subsidiary NAG, with which they had previously worked under the brand name Büssing-NAG. The Hanomag in Hanover presented since 1950 also a model in the American Design ago, the small trucks Hanomag L 28 . This model was offered in large numbers in many different variations from 1.5 - 2.5 t payload, also to prevent VW from entering this truck class. A total of 22,800 L 28 vehicles were built by 1956, around 50% of which were exported to 48 countries. Vehicles of comparable size and comparable American designs also came from Opel and Borgward during the same period. The small manufacturer Kaelble achieved a sales record of 300 vehicles with its long-hooded vehicles in 1950.
MAN built its "F 8" with 180 hp and the typical MAN hood, which, due to the V-shaped design of the eight-cylinder engine, was a little shorter than comparable types from other manufacturers. The F 8 was recognizable by the headlights embedded in the fenders and its relatively short hood became the MAN trademark. A total of 3,019 F 8s were manufactured up to 1963. Kässbohrer built the first car transporter in Ulm . Faun started building 20 ton dump trucks . In the same year, at the Geneva Motor Show, Henschel presented the new type HS 190 S with a twin engine that developed 2 × 95 hp. This truck, known as the “Bimot” and only built in three copies, was equipped with a curved blunt nose and was serviced through the front, hinged, so-called “cabinet doors”.
Henschel also built a 140 HP front control vehicle with a large long-distance driver's cab, the HS 140 T (tram chassis could also be used for bus production). This very spacious driver's cab already had a long cabin and was equipped with four reclining seats.
The development in other countries
Scania launched its first diesel truck in Sweden in 1949 and was able to increase its production. Berliet was able to bring the large truck type "GKR" with a total weight of 13.5 t to the market in France and manufacture it for many years.
The start of the economic miracle
Framework conditions in Germany
As a result of the reconstruction and the beginning economic upswing, the demand for trucks in Germany rose sharply. Commercial vehicle construction and the sale of commercial vehicles were, however, significantly influenced by regulations governing the nature of vehicles, their approvals and their use.
In 1951, the Allies lifted the horsepower limit for engines so that more powerful engines and heavier trucks could now be built.
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In the same year the Federal Motor Transport Authority was established in Flensburg - Mürwik in West Germany . a. was responsible for the approval of vehicle types and vehicle parts and for quality assurance in the automotive industry. The Federal Agency for Long-Distance Freight Transport, which was founded in 1953, was intended to create uniform national guidelines for freight transport and compliance with them.
The StVZO , which came into force on April 1, 1953, reduced the maximum permissible length of a lorry train from 22 to 20 meters, and from 1958 even to 14 meters. Attaching a second trailer was prohibited except for tractors . The gross vehicle weight decreased for new registrations from 1958, otherwise from 1960 from 40 tons to 24 tons, the axle loads were limited from 10 to 8 tons per axle. Two-axle trucks were only allowed to weigh 12 tons and three-axle trucks only 18 tons. In addition, since 1953, all trucks over 7.5 tons had to be equipped with a tachograph . A minimum speed of 40 km / h was prescribed on motorways. The Sunday driving ban has been in effect since 1956 . For freight charges were again levied according to the Reichskraftwagentarif (RKT). From 1955, the state raised the motor vehicle tax for commercial vehicles, the tax for the work of long-distance transport was five cent per ton / km.
The Road Freight Transport Act of October 17, 1952 limited commercial road transport by setting quotas , which privileged the transport of goods by rail. From then on, trucks with a payload of over 4 t and tractors over 55 hp had to be registered. There were 11,850 long-distance licenses (red), and 4,000 district concessions granted (blue). Local transport remained concession-free if it did not exceed a radius of 50 km. Also, the traffic was not a quota, but later introduced a reporting requirement for the work of long-distance transport. The licensing restricted the sales opportunities for the commercial vehicle industry; only in the case of works traffic were higher growth rates possible.
Gradually, the structure of the transport business changed. In the 1950s, 60% of all commercial trucks were still driven by self-driving entrepreneurs. More and more of these small businesses could not afford the investments for the necessary conversions of the trucks or even for a new acquisition. Many haulage companies and one-man haulage companies therefore joined forces to form the Association of German Motor Transport . They now drove on behalf of companies that often owned the vehicles and took care of the concessions. This is how many home and factory forwarding agencies came into being, some of which have survived to the present day.
Bus trips were very popular during the “ economic boom ”. They were inexpensive and most Germans didn't own a car. This led to an upswing among private bus operators and tour operators and, as a result, to a heyday of bus manufacturing in Germany. Touring buses with panoramic glazing were trendy.
technology
The post-war years were characterized by optimism and technical experiments for bus construction. Until then, the bus body was usually built by a body shop on a chassis from a bus chassis supplier such as Büssing, Daimler-Benz, Magirus-Deutz, MAN, Borgward and Opel. The company Kässbohrer but built in 1951 as the first bus builders a tour bus with a se lbst tra constricting body (hence the brand name "Setra"), which was also developed in-house. Now bus manufacturers such as Kässbohrer and Auwärter have increasingly become full-service providers and thus more independent of chassis deliveries from large manufacturers: In bus construction, there was often no longer a separate chassis for building a body, but the body itself took on the static function. Conversely, this development also led to the need for previous bus chassis suppliers to increasingly body their buses themselves and deliver them in full. The “panoramic view” in the form of all-round roof glazing was typical for coaches of the 1950s, but it also led to the interior heating up strongly in the sunshine. But the comfort often left a lot to be desired in other ways as well: Was in a bus e.g. B. installed a folding roof, which enabled driving in the open air when the weather was nice, it often turned out to be leaky when it rained and exposed the passengers to dripping moisture from above.
In the case of trucks, too, it was still quite common at the time for the chassis with the engine and, if necessary, a bonnet to be built by a truck manufacturer, while the driver's cab and its interior fittings were made by a body shop, for example by Wackenhut, Schenk, Aurepa, Orion , Gaubschat , Kögel , Blumhardt, Thiele, Kässbohrer, Ackermann and Binz . Initially, this was particularly the case with forward control vehicles. The example from Mercedes-Benz is classic, where there was no factory-fitted cab control cab until 1957 because the cab was considered a “short-term fad” and therefore the concept of the hooded car was retained. Customers who nevertheless wanted to purchase a cab from Mercedes-Benz were dependent on buying a Hauber chassis and having it built up by a third party to make the cab. So it came about that numerous different and z. Sometimes visually daring-looking constructions by many different bodybuilders with Mercedes stars were on the road, some of which hardly looked alike to one another. The usual construction method for truck cabs at the time was still a load-bearing frame, usually made of wood, which was then planked with sheet metal parts - the most important materials for truck construction were sheet metal, wood, rubber, glass and paint. A few producers already had cabs made entirely of steel. The English manufacturer Bristol used plastic or GRP for the first time in the construction of cabs, otherwise plastic was still a long way off in truck construction. The cab was spartan. Above all, it was critical that the driver's seats did not have suspension and, for the most part, there was no adjustment option. Power steering aids only gradually emerged and the transmissions were usually not synchronized, so that intermediate clutches with double-declutching when shifting were part of everyday life for truck drivers. ZF presented the first fully synchronized truck transmission (S 6–55) in the world in those days. The windshields, which were usually split (i.e., made up of two separate panes of glass for the driver and front passenger), could be opened to the front on some types to let in fresh air. The noise in the truck cabs was considerable. The maximum speed was between 60 and 70 km / h, fully loaded trucks on inclines were significantly slower. The rearview mirrors were still very small and vibrated while driving. The truck manufacturers have meanwhile built in tachometers, thermometers, oil pressure gauges and compressed air manometers. A fuse box and a radiator shutter were mandatory. The truck driver who already had a real bunk built into the driver's cab and allowed himself “a long house” where many others only had a “swallow's nest” was envied. This sleeping place was not in great demand because there was no insulation and the second driver had to sleep very uncomfortably on the bench with the truck stationary.
In 1953, Michelin brought a full steel radial tire for trucks onto the market. As a brake manufacturer, Knorr developed the dual-circuit brake and a rodless parking brake ( handbrake ) ready for series production.
The legal length reduction for trailer trains ( Seebohmsche Laws ) to favor the Federal Railways in comparison to the truck presented the transport company with the problem that with the same length of the front end with the driver's cab and bonnet, less loading length was available and the transport journeys were therefore less economical. As a result, there was an increased demand for short-nosed vehicles and forward control vehicles , which, thanks to a shorter front end compared to long-nosed vehicles, opened up more freedom in terms of loading length. This started the triumphant advance of the forward control in truck construction, which has completely displaced the Hauber from the construction of medium to heavy trucks to this day ( see also the main article forward control ). The problem with the front-wheel drive was initially the poor accessibility of the engine for maintenance and repair work, because it was usually installed under the driver's cab, as well as the increased annoyance of the driver through engine noise, vibrations and smells, as they were sitting on the engine. The period from the beginning of the 1950s to the end of the 1960s was accordingly a time for technical innovations to find a new and practical truck design instead of the traditional long-hood. The designs by Magirus-Deutz (prototype of a tiltable cab from 1955), MAN (short -nosed cab as standard from 1956) and Krupp (tiltable cab as standard from 1965) were groundbreaking . Büssing equipped its front control vehicles with underfloor motors , which were arranged behind the driver's cab under the loading area. However, this construction was not suitable for all-wheel drive vehicles and also not for the increasingly important semi-trailers. At the same time, the era of the road tractor slowly but surely came to an end. It was increasingly displaced by the trailer train (which in turn is increasingly being replaced by the articulated truck ).
Manufacturers and vehicle models
Daimler-Benz built its heavy Mercedes-Benz truck type "L 6600" with a long hood and 145 hp. The “six-six”, known as the “bread and butter truck”, was designed for a payload of 6.6 tons and had a driver's cab of such a simple design as standard that it was nicknamed “dog house”. This construction was sufficient for transport tasks in local transport, but the truck was also available with a special driver's cab from Wackenhut, Schenk, Kögel or Kässbohrer for an additional charge . The L 6600 was similar to the "L 6500" type, which was built from 1935 to 1940, but had a rounder sheet metal driver's cab, a central lubrication system and a heater. With the six-sixs, Daimler-Benz wanted to belong to the “royal class” of the “big seven”, that is, to the heavy long-haul trucks that were manufactured by Büssing , Faun , Henschel , Kaelble , Krupp , Magirus-Deutz and MAN and around Had 200 hp. A truck of this class normally cost around 50,000 DM, but only 35,000 DM were charged for the L 6600, so that the haulier could buy not only the motor vehicle, but also a three-axle trailer for 50,000 DM . In this way, Daimler-Benz was able to build very large numbers and, thanks to the simple and robust construction of the L 6600, compensate for the price difference.
In 1951, Krupp moved its southern works in Franconia back to Essen and resumed production there. In April 1951, at the first post-war IAA , Büssing presented its huge twelve-ton, three-axle underfloor truck 12000 U with 175 HP (later 180 HP) as a forward control to the public. However, due to its enormous size and the high purchase price, the hauliers were hesitant to buy this long-haul truck.
In 1951, Magirus-Deutz came up with a construction that differed significantly from the competition in terms of its design and that was to remain current for around 15 years: the new round hood. This construction with a rounded "alligator hood" was possible because only air-cooled Deutz engines were built into the Magirus-Deutz trucks. These did not need a rectangular water cooler in front of the engine. Kaelble presented the large truck type K 832 as a long-nosed truck, which already had 200 hp with a 19.1-liter V 8 engine. MAN tried turbocharging the diesel engine . Faun was able to convert its new L 8 V with 175 HP into a deep cab from the special body builders Kögel and G. Auwärter . Daimler-Benz took over the Unimog from the Boehringer works and brought the vehicle onto the market under its own name.
The long-hooded 8000 S with 180 hp built by Büssing was probably the best long-haul truck of its time from 1952. This mature model, which was designed in its basic features as early as 1935, had been continuously improved over the years. This truck was also available as a semi-trailer. The Büssing & Sohn cab on the 8000 S 13 was also available as a large, long long-distance driver's cab. However, almost only the self-driving entrepreneurs drove this large Büssing long-nosed truck, which was built in around 2900 units until 1958, because hardly anyone else could still afford the 60 cm reduction in the loading area.
The "big" Büssing three-axle underfloor truck 12000 U could not establish itself on the market, only 39 units were built. This is why Büssing built a two-axle underfloor front control arm of the 8000 U type with 180 hp from 1952. This truck had a payload of 7.8 t and the cab could be built and equipped by Büssing & Sohn , Ackermann , Eylert, Kässbohrer or Kögel. This gave the same type of truck at least four different looks and interior fittings. In 1952, the Eylert company built their first thermo-train with a light metal body with a Faun L 8 chassis and a three-axle trailer. Opel was able to come up with a rounded look, based on the style of American cars at the time, for its bestseller “ Opel Blitz ” (like Hanomag and Borgward at the time) and continue the success story of this high-speed truck.
From 1953 Magirus-Deutz modified its hooded wagons: The round hoods of the round hoods brought onto the market in 1951 showed excessive torsion in off-road use, so that Magirus-Deutz also offered corner hoods for all-wheel drive vehicles, especially for the construction industry, from 1953, which in many versions were almost unchanged until 1971 were built. For the same purpose, Faun had the three-axle L 900 truck, which could transport a payload of up to 16 t.
In Hamburg built Strüver an airfield - tankers up to 50,000 liters. From 1953 Ford in Cologne built the FK 1000 delivery van - the forerunner of today's Ford Transit as a competitor to the VW Transporter.
At the 1953 IAA, MAN presented its F 8 with a slightly wider cab, which was now fully suitable for long-distance transport and won a silver medal in Paris a year later. The new MAN hood cab with its standard equipment has thus become a prime example for other truck manufacturers. MAN has now equipped its 750 TL truck with a turbocharger as standard, which was tested as early as 1951 and which increased engine output by up to 30 percent and reduced fuel consumption.
After an innovation by Karl Kässbohrer , the first silo structure with a tiltable container and pneumatic emptying was presented in 1953 . Daimler-Benz had built a lighter forward control arm than the Mercedes-Benz LP 315.
Henschel presented the “HS 170 T” type as a “tram” front-link truck (8.7 t and 170 hp) at the IAA in 1953, but it only went into series production from 1955. The word "tram" is because of that visual similarity of the front link to the tram . The truck had received an award from the Paris Motor Show for the (then) spacious cabin .
The first large numbers of forward control vehicles were built by Büssing as the 7500 U type. From 1956 Faun added to the range for heavy trucks and tractors, which were now also available with all-wheel drive. Faun got along better by building off-road heavy-duty and special vehicles for the German armed forces as well as heavy truck cranes in the weight class between 10 and 12 tons, whereby the focus of the entire company was placed on this vehicle segment in the next few years. Kaelble (always a rather small manufacturer) finally lost touch with the length and weight restrictions of the Seebohm era - the company's models were traditionally large and heavy. The last long bonnets such as the Mercedes-Benz L 6600, the Büssing S 8000, the Krupp Tiger, the Faun 170 Deutz, the Henschel HS 170, the MAN F 8 and the Magirus-Deutz S 6500 were removed from the Long-distance drivers cherished and cared for. The long-distance drivers hoped that the transition period regarding the upcoming truck length shortening would be extended beyond 1960.
The development abroad
Berliet was able to bring the large truck type "GKR" with a total weight of 13.5 t, which had been manufactured for many years, onto the market in France. In 1950, DAF had a truck program in the Netherlands “only for the home market”, which also included military trucks. Volvo has now also installed a turbo in its Titan hooded tipper.
The development in the new European Economic Community from 1957
Framework conditions in Germany and Europe
By the end of the 1950s, road freight traffic in Germany had fallen by almost half. This also halved sales of commercial vehicles. The diverse regulations in the field of road freight transport, such as length and weight limits for vehicles, also forced manufacturers to change their products. In particular, the smaller manufacturers, such as B. the company Kaelble , had big financial problems to make the necessary investments in the further development of the vehicles, so that it came to a concentration of the manufacturers. Smaller manufacturers who did not focus on specific niche products had difficulties asserting themselves in the market.
Manufacturers who also produced for export, such as Henschel , Magirus-Deutz , MAN and Mercedes-Benz , were forced to maintain at least two different product lines due to the foreign regulations that differed from German regulations, which was correspondingly expensive.
With the establishment of the " European Economic Community " (EEC) in 1957, the harmonization of framework conditions and markets in Europe moved into the focus of German politics, which had set itself the goal of creating a common internal market with European partners within twelve years . This led to a relaxation of the restrictive regulations for the German market. From July 1960 onwards, in accordance with the EEC sizes, a semitrailer was allowed to be 15 m long, a truck trailer 16.5 m and the maximum permissible total weight increased again to 32 tons. The width was set at 2.5 m and the height at 4 m. At the same time, trucks had to have an engine output of 6 hp per ton of total weight. In addition to the driving brake and the parking brake, heavy vehicles had to have a third brake in the form of the "engine brake" (exhaust throttle valve).
technology
The technical development of the trucks was very quick at that time. In the case of the new forward control arms, the engine was usually located under the cab. As a result, there was a smaller amount of space in it than in the previous hoods: a voluminous engine box rose between the driver and front passenger seats. The generally inadequate insulation of these engine boxes led to a high level of noise in the cabin, so that reasonable conversations were hardly conceivable. Vibrations, heat, and smells entering the cabin from the engine created additional problems. In addition, due to the lack of a hood, the accessibility of the engine for maintenance and repair work was also impaired. As a result, the driver and mechanic were not very impressed by the new design. Another difficulty for the truck manufacturers of the new forward control was when it came to sales that the long-distance drivers wanted to keep their "built-in life insurance" in the form of a long hood in front of the driver's seat and didn't want to drive a new Plattschnauzer. Some hauliers could only keep their truck drivers because they let the drivers build a spacious luxury cab. With the concept of the underfloor motor , which is installed behind the driver's cab under the loading area, Büssing gained a competitive advantage despite the higher purchase price.
Because of the warmth of the engine in the driver's cab, ventilation flaps were also installed on the right and left of the engine cover in front-wheel drive vehicles to let fresh air in from the front. Mercedes-Benz installed the filler neck for the cooling water inside the driver's cab in the center front on the dashboard below the split windshield. If this boiled over, the whole cabin was filled with hot steam in seconds . In the first "Seebohm-compatible" front control vehicle from Kaelble , the exhaust pipe was located directly under the cab floor. As a result, the heat of the exhaust gases melted the soles of the drivers' shoes after a certain driving time. The truck manufacturer Magirus-Deutz was one of the first providers with its "Merkur F" and "Saturn F" (F for forward control) trucks, built from 1957 , to offer a large, continuous panoramic windscreen as standard . However, this was only available from the front control vehicles, the parallel built hoods from Magirus-Deutz retained the split windshield until 1971. To protect against engine noise, additional sound insulation as a so-called "Silencecab" was developed for Magirus-Deutz front control vehicles. At Krupp (like Magirus-Deutz, a manufacturer with particularly loud engines), complex sound insulation and a one-piece windshield were also early on. With the exception of Büssing, where air suspension systems were already being installed in buses and trucks at that time, there was no truck on the market at the time that had everything that a long-haul truck needed for a long-distance truck as standard. Kaelble tried a turbocharger that produced up to 300 hp. However, turbocharging in continuous operation had not yet achieved the reliability required by all truck manufacturers. The installation in the vehicles was therefore only gradually resumed in the mid-1960s. At the manufacturer Büssing, the underfloor engine with 192 HP was swiveled out to the side for repairs. The driver's seats retained the character of a driver's seat; it was still a matter of seat frames without special suspension and adjustment. In order to shorten the time-consuming loading and unloading, the first Euro pallets were brought onto the market. There were no tail lifts on the truck. Articulated truck types became more and more important and pushed themselves alongside the traditional trailer trucks. The Magirus-Deutz type "Saturn FS" was built as one of the first three-axle vehicles (drive formula 6x4) with 195 hp as a front-link semitrailer.
Manufacturers and vehicle models
During this time the Krupp Mustang had its heyday in long-distance transport. It was considered one of the best vehicles on the highways. Nevertheless, Krupp has also developed front-link vehicles for the new length regulation, including the new “Büffel F” truck type with 160 hp. Also, Mercedes-Benz delivered at the time of even the larger type "LP 326" with 192 hp as a forward control, but who had an inadequate entry because of the front slightly tapered cab. In 1958 Hanomag in Hanover became a subsidiary of Rheinstahl in Essen. Up to 1958, 55,732 vehicles were produced of the light hooded truck "L 28", which was last equipped with a continuous panoramic window. It has now been replaced by the forward control type "Kurier" with 1.9 tons. This forward control was also sold from 1959 as "Garant" with 2.5 tons and as "Markant" with 3.2 tons of payload. In 1958, the Swabian tractor manufacturer Kramer began to manufacture various two- and three-axle tractors for different purposes, although truck production was not profitable due to the small number of units. Kramer therefore limited himself to the production of construction machinery from 1975 onwards.
From 1958, Daimler-Benz built the Mercedes-Benz type "LP 333", which was also called "three hundred and thirty-three" or "millipede" by long-distance drivers because of the two steered front axles. This model could be ordered with good standard equipment from Wackenhut in Nagold as special luxury equipment "Hamburg". In 1959, a completely new generation of hooded wagons and front control vehicles appeared at Krupp, whose cab was very modern and ahead of its time. However, the unreliable and noisy two-stroke engines from Krupp hampered sales.
In 1960 MAN presented the new blunt-snouted truck “10.210 TL”, which was quickly given the nickname “chubby” because of its design. In 1960 Faun presented the “F 687” front control vehicle, which had a V8 engine from Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz with 195 hp and was available in several variants such as B. was built as a tractor-trailer, whereby the cab could not be tilted, as was usual at the time.
The development abroad
Mack in the USA decided to build a cabin that could be moved vertically upwards and completely released the engine. The truck manufacturer Alfa Romeo from Italy made repairs easier on the front control because the front frame was easily removable; then the machine could be pulled out to the front. Scania built a forward control truck with a compressed air operated "dual circuit brake" and a servo-assisted parking brake.
First market adjustments in the early to mid-1960s
Framework conditions in Germany and Europe
The period from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s went down in history as the economic miracle . It was a time when the domestic and export economy flourished in Germany and, accordingly, so did the transport sector. The commercial vehicle industry had worked very hard since the harmonization of the regulations within the framework of the establishment of the EEC and at the IAA 1961 all German heavy truck manufacturers were able to present a modern 16-ton long-distance truck according to the new regulations of the StVZO with at least 192 hp. In 1961 there were 19,250 long-distance transport permits in commercial long-distance freight transport. Of 42,500 transport companies, 6,980 were involved in long-distance freight transport. In 1963 there were a total of 25,932 permits for commercial long-distance freight transport, but they formed a unit with the chassis and the approval of the truck. For this reason, some transport companies regularly changed the license plates of their trucks in order to be able to drive more trucks than allowed, because the chassis number was not always checked. From July 1, 1963, instead of the "winker", only the turn signals that are common today were permitted as direction indicators. On May 1, 1965, the second amendment of the StVZO changed the truck lengths and weights with a view to the European internal market and cross-border transport in commercial goods traffic. The maximum truck length has been increased to 18 meters and the gross vehicle weight to 38 tons. The ratio of towing to towed truck units was set at 1: 1.4. The length of the articulated lorries remained 15 meters. With the “6 HP / t” formula, the heaviest trucks now required at least 228 HP engine power. No manufacturer immediately offered a suitable engine for the 38-ton truck. All designers therefore had a lot to do to take into account the customers' commercial vehicle needs.
In 1959, the Hamburger Hochbahn suggested designing a German standard type of regular service bus in order to simplify procurement, maintenance and repair and thereby reduce costs for the operators. The Association of Public Transport Companies (abbreviated: VÖV) dealt with the implementation of this task . The companies Büssing , Magirus-Deutz , Mercedes-Benz and MAN , and later also Gräf & Stift , Ikarus and Heuliez , dealt with the VÖV bus as manufacturers . In 1967 the first VÖV standard bus was presented by Büssing. Regardless of which manufacturer they came from, the vehicles were largely identical, the engines and the vehicle fronts below the windshield were individual. Important parts such as B. window panes, doors, lighting devices and target sign boxes, however, were the same regardless of manufacturer and therefore interchangeable. The standard buses determined the German streetscape until the 1990s.
The commercial vehicle market in Europe and, accordingly, also in Germany became increasingly international: German truck exports reached 95,767 units, with Mercedes-Benz, Magirus-Deutz, MAN and Henschel leading the way (in that order). The German hauliers were gradually on truck models from other countries in Europe attentive, brands like DAF from the Netherlands and Fiat from Italy entered the German market. It became increasingly important for manufacturers to offer a complete range in all payload ranges. The Renault subsidiary Saviem from France worked with Henschel on this. So Saviem could fall back on the heavy trucks from Henschel and Henschel on the lighter vehicles from Saviem. The brand name for the cooperation models was Henschel-Saviem-Renault. Büssing worked together with the Italian OM for the same purpose from 1964 , Büssing was responsible for heavy and OM for light vehicles. The first real full-range supplier on the German truck market was not to emerge until 1969 when Hanomag and Henschel merged to form Hanomag-Henschel .
technology
In 1964, Krupp stopped producing two-stroke trucks and switched to four-stroke engines from Cummins . The two-stroke engine disappeared from German truck construction. In 1965, Krupp was the first German manufacturer to equip its cabs with tilting cabs as standard to facilitate maintenance and repair of the engine. Magirus-Deutz had already produced a corresponding prototype in 1955, but it had not gone into series production. In 1965 MAN, Henschel and Faun followed the example of Krupp, Magirus-Deutz came onto the market in 1967 with tipping cabs.
Faun presented a truck with a steering wheel gearshift at the IAA. This had a preselector switch that was operated electro-pneumatically with a synchronized ballast group. This advanced but expensive construction was not pursued after the exhibition. In many trucks, new hydro driver seats were installed as special equipment for increased driving comfort, in which the hardness of the suspension could be adapted to the driver.
In 1963 Büssing tested the "LU 5/10" as a completely new creation that had been developed together with Rationorm in Zurich. The type of truck, also known as the “Supercargo Decklaster”, had a very low driver's cab underneath the loading area and an underfloor engine. This meant that the entire length of the three-axle vehicle could be used as a loading area. The payload was 14.7 tons with a dead weight of 7.3 tons. This complex and expensive development by Büssing was a failure and hardly sold. The commercial vehicle manufacturer Ackermann in Wuppertal had more success : In 1964 this company presented the first " swap bodies " for trucks and trailers to the public . The so-called swap bodies saved the freight forwarder from reloading the load and the long-distance drivers could continue with the same truck after they had been “reloaded”. Euro pallets also came onto the market more and more and the time-consuming repackaging of the transported goods when changing the means of transport became superfluous.
Manufacturers and vehicle models
At the German Ford plant , truck construction, which had been ongoing since 1928, was discontinued in 1961. Ford manufactured light trucks and also some buses in Cologne in the post-war period. However, the technology of the vehicles was no longer competitive since the end of the war: Ford largely relied on gasoline engines , while customers increasingly demanded diesel engines. In addition, the vehicles were usually significantly underpowered and consumed too much. Since every means of transport was needed to rebuild Germany and because Ford pursued a downright low-cost strategy, the company was still able to sell its commercial vehicles in acceptable numbers. However, that changed from 1955 when Ford came out with newly developed valveless two - stroke diesel engines that were not yet mature enough and thoroughly ruined the reputation of Ford trucks. The previously rather weak sales figures collapsed as a result. The offer remained vans Ford Transit , which is still successful.
In 1961, Borgward from Bremen filed for bankruptcy. The company had built small vans, tricycles and light to medium-weight trucks in the commercial vehicle sector. Büssing took over a plant from the bankruptcy estate and continued to produce the Borgward Kübelwagen there in its own name for the Federal Border Police until 1969. The Borgward plant in Bremen-Sebaldsbrück was taken over by Hanomag .
In 1962, the DKW high-speed truck from Ingolstadt came to an end . In the commercial vehicle sector, DKW had manufactured the F 89 L forward control small van from 1949 . However, DKW held on to the two-stroke process for too long . Competitive products such as the VW bus and the Ford Transit with more modern four-stroke engines increasingly cost DKW customers. From 1959 the sales figures plummeted, in 1962 DKW withdrew from commercial vehicle construction in Germany. The attempt to later return to the market with new types built in Spain failed.
In the post-war period, Kaelble from Backnang produced heavy trucks and tractors (in small numbers compared to other manufacturers). Due to the restrictive length and weight restrictions of Seebohm's laws, however, Kaelble lost its niche in the market for heavy vehicles in the 1950s, as these could no longer be used economically by customers. Although the restrictions were lifted or relaxed in 1960, most of the regular customers of Kaelble had switched to other brands. The heyday of the road tractor, the second mainstay of Kaelble, came to an end, and the trailer truck and articulated truck instead prevailed. The type "K 652 LF" with 192 HP and a long cab should help Kaelble to regain a foothold on the truck market. However, the vehicle came onto the market too late, because customers had already reoriented themselves and was therefore not very successful, only 42 units were built. So it was decided at Kaelble to stop truck construction in 1963 and to concentrate on special vehicles and heavy-duty tractors from then on.
Henschel from Kassel came onto the market in 1961 with new hoods and matching front control arms, which had a completely new, cubic, all-steel driver's cab on the German market . The Frenchman Louis Lucien Lepoix was responsible for the design, who was to provide a similar style for Magirus-Deutz in 1963 and at Büssing in 1966. The hoods and front control arms at Henschel were designed in such a way that they could be built from a kind of construction kit made up of a large number of identical parts. Starting in 1963, Daimler-Benz also built a newly developed, rectangular, front-link cab in the heavy weight class, corresponding models in the medium and light classes followed in 1965. After the cab (in contrast to the competition, which mainly had tilting cabs on offer from 1965), the heavy Models could not be tilted until 1969, the maintenance and repair of the engine had to be done through many flaps and doors around the vehicle. This earned the model the nickname “Advent Calendar”. In 1963, the trend towards cubic cab shapes from Lepoix also reached Magirus-Deutz: the progressive “TransEuropa” cab with a bent edge in the roof came onto the market. For this model with its air-cooled diesel engines, additional heating was required for the interior. Büssing presented a newly developed angular steel cab with 210 hp, also designed by Lepoix, in 1966; Heavy-duty forward control trucks with underfloor engines in front of the front axle were also built, and access to the engine was made easier by a removable front center section. The driver's cab had a very short nose in which the underfloor motor was located. For maintenance, the front center section and the side panels could be folded away to the front axle. The development costs of this complicated construction were high, but the market success was only slight.
In 1963, the tractor manufacturer Eicher from Bavaria also tried to gain a foothold in truck construction and produced a light “FarmExpress” tractor with a Tempo -Matador cab. The light truck "TransExpress" with a cabin developed in-house had already appeared in 1962. However, the model was difficult to sell through Eicher's agricultural machinery sales network. Therefore, the design was handed over to Magirus-Deutz, where a light truck model was missing in the product range. Magirus-Deutz offered the so-called "Eicher types" after slight technical and visual changes, particularly in the area of the front of the driver's cab and the chassis from 1967 to 1976. The vehicles were equipped with air-cooled engines from Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz, the parent company of Magirus-Deutz.
The large Büssing with the high Büssing & Sohn wooden cab was sold as a Commodore U 11 D underfloor truck from 1963 with a continuous, slightly curved panorama windshield and side vent windows . In terms of equipment, it could be ordered with a large bench or a passenger chair with armrests and headrest , and the loungers were widened to 68 centimeters. Faun was still hoping for a recovery for European long-distance transport at the IAA 1963 and presented its large truck type "L 10 Eurotrans". The front-wheel drive truck, with a gross vehicle weight of 19 tons, had a payload of 10.6 tons and a water-cooled Deutz diesel engine with 275 hp including exhaust gas turbocharging. Faun also brought a long-haul truck of the type "F 610 V" onto the market as a forward control, which was very modern, spacious and very well sprung with its new cab that could be tilted from 1965 onwards. This truck could be shifted with the "self-thinking Symo gears" by pressing the clutch. However, the prices had reached the upper limit of pain at the time, which is why the model was unsuccessful.
Henschel , taken over by investors around Fritz-Aurel Goergen in 1957 after economic difficulties and largely refurbished by 1963 (including the discontinuation of bus production in 1963 and the complete renewal of the truck range with the cubic Lepoix types from 1961) was established in 1964 under dubious circumstances taken over by the Rheinische Stahlwerke : Goergen was arrested in 1964 at a dinner with Ludwig Erhard . The entrepreneur, who was in poor health and mental health, was released on bail and declared that he wanted to part with his majority stake in Henschel; Rheinstahl struck. As it turned out in 1971 that the charges against Goergen accusations had been unfounded, the time for Henschel but was already expired: 1969 truck production was by Henschel with the which also belongs to the Rhine steel company Hanomag to Hanomag-Henschel together. Hanomag-Henschel was sold to Daimler-Benz AG until 1971 , which discontinued the Hanomag-Henschel brand name in 1974.
The development abroad
DAF , a truck manufacturer from the Netherlands, began in 1962 to build a simple, simple truck for the European market as the "2600" type for long-distance freight transport. In Sweden, Volvo built a small forward control truck "Raske TipTop", which was equipped with a tilting cab. The truck manufacturer FIAT from Italy had started its sales program at the end of the year in Germany and throughout Europe, after a complete dealer and service network had been available. Volvo built a new type of truck called the "F 88" based on the US model. Its cab was jokingly called "dog house" by truck drivers. Nevertheless, it set new standards: In terms of safety, increased cab stability set new accents, which brought enormous advantages in the event of a rear-end collision. The so-called Sweden tests are still an important safety test for the stability of the driver's cab and its safety. There was a crumple zone in the rear area of the Volvo cab .
End of the economic miracle and effects of European competition from 1966
Framework conditions in Germany and Europe
In the mid-1960s, the reconstruction of Germany, which had been destroyed in the war, was largely complete and the economic miracle also came to an end. In the years from 1966 onwards, this led to the first significant economic downturn in Germany. The demand for commercial vehicles in Germany also declined as a result, with simultaneously increasing competitive pressure from foreign suppliers, who increasingly pushed into the German market as part of European unification : foreign makes did not play a role on German roads until the mid-1960s, but things changed this now increasingly. Cooperation across national borders increased in importance and foreign manufacturers such as DAF , Volvo , Renault and Fiat began to gain a foothold in Germany.
But this was not the only change that was to bring numerous German manufacturers into economic difficulties in the period that followed: In 1967, after the Seebohm era, a second "black era" for the commercial vehicle industry began in German politics. On September 20, 1967, Federal Transport Minister Georg Leber announced his so-called “ Liver Plan ”. Restrictive measures to limit freight traffic on the road to protect the Federal Railways should be implemented over the next three years. A “road freight tax” should be introduced for all road transport in order to make freight transport by truck more expensive than by rail. A transport ban for 28 different goods by road, a minimum engine power for trucks of 8 HP / t and a reduction in concessions by up to 25% have been announced. So-called piggyback traffic or container rail loading were propagated and, together with the planned changes in the law, should have a positive effect on the railways. 18 associations joined spontaneously, u. a. DIHT , BDI and VDA joined forces to form the “Action Group on Rational Transport” and announced considerable resistance. Nevertheless, at the end of the year, production in the entire commercial vehicle industry had declined by 17.5%, at Krupp by as much as 34%. Many new commercial vehicle purchases were withheld from customers and a generally wait-and-see attitude adopted. The Leber Plan was passed on June 20, 1968 in the German Bundestag. On January 1, 1969, another amendment to the StVZO came into force in order to promote European harmonization. The length of the truck was limited to 18 meters and the gross vehicle weight to 38 tons. The “road freight tax” also came into force, but it only lasted until 1970. At the IAA , so-called “liver cars” based on the new formula of 8 hp / t appeared at almost all truck manufacturers . They had at least 304 hp for the maximum possible 38-tonne truck, at Magirus-Deutz z. B. the forward control type 310D with 305 hp. The export-oriented truck manufacturers also had to take into account that different regulations applied in other countries, e.g. B. in Switzerland 10 HP / t. In 1972 the last step of the Liver Plan was implemented and a new licensing or permit procedure was introduced for works traffic , but this could not be implemented by May 1, 1986 due to the extremely difficult negotiations with the participation of the Federal Railroad .
During these years, a “ driver's cab directive ” was introduced in Germany, the first country in Europe. Safety was only taken into account in this guideline to the extent that objects slipping and falling out of storage compartments and the driver's field of vision were taken into account. The driver's seats, which were still very primitive by today's standards, were not considered important. In the truck tachograph , speedometer disks became compulsory throughout the EEC and the maximum driving time was reduced from 10 to 8 hours per driving period. The Holiday Travel Ordinance came into force in Germany: During the holiday travel season, the motorways were no longer allowed to be used by heavy trucks in order to improve the flow of traffic.
The changed framework conditions led u. a. to the fact that numerous German manufacturers of commercial vehicles gave up production or were taken over by competitors.
technology
In 1966, the first large truck comparison test with the 210 hp customary at the time showed that the individual manufacturers could still learn something from the competition. The vehicles of the brands Büssing, Henschel, Krupp, Magirus-Deutz, MAN and Mercedes-Benz were tested. There were u. a. the cab ergonomics, the climbing ability and the average speed were tested. The Büssing won the test, in terms of fuel consumption Magirus-Deutz and Krupp proved to be the most economical brands.
Sea freight containers and swap bodies were increasingly introduced in Germany. For the commercial vehicle industry, the focus was on concepts for the new so-called "combined transport" and new swap bodies, container systems and accordingly rail-compatible trailers had to be built quickly. Air-sprung chassis with a lifting device also had to be developed in order to handle the loading process for the swap bodies on the railway. With the engines, speed increases and turbocharging were the order of the day in order to achieve the horsepower required under the Leber plan . The Ministry of Defense required truck manufacturers to have a multi-fuel engine and standardized components such as B. axles and V-engines for the military trucks of the Bundeswehr .
At that time, most of the new trucks had a car radio . Büssing had installed a raised exhaust behind the cab for the first time on his Commodore 210 S tractor unit . Knorr presented the first hydraulically applied disc brake for heavy commercial vehicles, which was initially only installed in coaches. The first compact brake according to the EC directive was prescribed as a dual-circuit brake . The manufacturer Hanomag-Henschel , which emerged from the merger of Hanomag and Henschel in 1969, had an anti-lock braking system (ABS) ready for the market in 1969 so that the wheels no longer lock in the event of an emergency stop and the vehicle remains steerable. However, the new owner of Hanomag-Henschel, Daimler-Benz AG, blocked the series production of this safety-relevant innovation in order to be able to bring the ABS onto the market itself (which was not the case until many years later).
In 1971, the hooded wagon came back late in Germany: since the Seebohm Laws, the trend in German commercial vehicle construction has been towards the front-wheel drive . The last newly developed long-nosed car for the time being was published by Henschel in 1961 , Mercedes-Benz and MAN kept their short-nosed cars, which had been on the market since the mid to late 1950s, up to date only through certain model upgrade measures , and they no longer dared to develop new hoods . The remaining other German manufacturers behaved similarly. In 1971 , Magirus-Deutz surprised the trade audience with the presentation of a new generation of long-hooded trucks, which replaced the corner-hoods produced since 1953 and which were to gain importance in the construction industry in particular (this series was built until 2003, making it the last hooded truck from German production ; the short-nosed cars from MAN and Mercedes-Benz disappeared from the market in 1994 and 1995).
Manufacturers and vehicle models
From 1967, Magirus-Deutz sold a light truck model developed by the tractor manufacturer Eicher under its own name. Eicher had tried his hand at truck construction, but could not sell the self-developed vehicle well through its own agricultural machinery sales network. From 1967 the model was sold as Magirus-Deutz with slight visual and technical changes and continued to be manufactured by Eicher. This cooperation turned out to be very successful.
At the 1967 IAA, MAN presented a new tilting forward control cab of the type F 7 (later F 8 and F 9), which came from a cooperation with the French company Saviem , which is part of the Renault group , and which had been developed in France. In return, Saviem was able to offer MAN-Hauber in France under its own name, MAN got access to light Saviem types for the German market. Under the externally still separate names Hanomag and Henschel , the Rheinstahl group had the widest range of trucks in all payload classes at the IAA. Büssing built a fully air-suspended tractor unit.
Krupp improved its long-haul trucks again in 1967 and offered the "LF 980" type with a V8 engine from Cummins with 265 hp. Krupp thus had the most powerful German truck of that time on offer. However, this measure could not prevent Krupp truck production from being discontinued in 1968 due to chronic unprofitability. Krupp trucks were widespread in Germany in the post-war period and were powered by two - stroke diesel engines developed in-house. By sticking to this type of construction, however, the Krupp vehicles sold increasingly poorly in the course of the 1960s: the engines were loud and prone to failure. This, the end of the rapid economic growth in Germany and the corresponding overcapacities on the market, as well as a growing need for comfort on the part of drivers and entrepreneurs, led to a significant decline in sales of Krupp trucks. Even the switch to Cummins four-stroke engines in 1963/64 and the tilting driver's cab from 1965 could no longer stop the drop in truck sales: Krupp became one of the smallest truck manufacturers in Germany, while Krupp was only important in the construction of long-distance vehicles still marginal and truck production became a loss-making business for the entire Krupp Group. When this was restructured in 1968, u. a. the end for Krupp's truck construction, Daimler-Benz took over the sales organization.
Also in 1968 the beginning of the end of the renowned truck brand Büssing from Braunschweig begins . One of Büssing's specialties were vehicles with underfloor engines , which could also be sold well for long-distance transport. However , the underfloor motor could not be used on articulated lorries , construction site dump trucks and all- wheel-drive vehicles due to the design. For these applications, classic long- nosed vehicles and front control vehicles with a front-mounted engine were offered in parallel with the underfloor models, which caused considerable additional effort in terms of design and manufacture. This also applies to the newly developed short-nosed vehicles with an underfloor engine in front of the front axle, which Büssing had developed at great expense and which, however, practically did not sell. Büssing also only had a small market share in local transport vehicles for distribution traffic. In 1960 Büssing made a profit for the last time. In 1962, Salzgitter AG joined the company. The development of the “Supercargo deck truck” up to 1965, the entire length of which was made available by a driver's cab installed under the loading area and an underfloor motor for standardized transport containers, cost a lot of money. Büssing came too early with its pioneering design and did not have any economic success. By 1968, Salzgitter had taken over Büssing completely. When the enormous costs that Büssing devoured began to endanger even the new parent company, it gradually sold its daughter to its competitor MAN between 1968 and 1972 . MAN manufactured buses and trucks under the name MAN-Büssing until 1974 , when the name Büssing finally disappeared from the market. Even at the time when Büssing was completely with MAN, there was still the most powerful truck in Germany with an underfloor engine with 320 hp, which was continued to be built until 1973.
From 1969 a similar development took place at Hanomag and Henschel . The manufacturers Hanomag (the Tempo brand also belonged to Hanomag ) and Henschel were merged into Hanomag-Henschel in 1969 by the common parent company Rheinstahl . Until then, there had been a clear division of labor in German commercial vehicle construction: Manufacturers such as Borgward, Opel and Hanomag had served the market for light to medium-weight trucks and local transport vehicles, while manufacturers such as Daimler-Benz, Magirus-Deutz and Henschel mainly built medium to heavy vehicles for hard vehicles Loads and long-distance transport. With the merger of Hanomag and Henschel, the first full-range supplier was created on the German commercial vehicle market, offering everything from small vans to 26-ton trucks from a single source. Right from the start, the merger was intended to enable a financially strong partner to join the company. Negotiations with Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz about a merger of Hanomag-Henschel with Magirus-Deutz failed. The partner finally found himself in 1969 in Daimler-Benz AG, which contributed 51% of the capital of the new company Hanomag-Henschel Fahrzeugwerke GmbH. By 1971, Daimler-Benz took over the remaining 49% of the shares in Hanomag-Henschel from Rheinstahl and promised that both brands ( Mercedes-Benz and Hanomag-Henschel) would exist in parallel. However, Daimler-Benz withdrew this statement as early as 1972, which heralded the end of the new brand. Vehicles were built under the name Hanomag-Henschel until 1974, when these two brand names also disappeared from the world of commercial vehicles.
Also in 1969 came the end of Faun's truck production in Lauf an der Pegnitz . The vehicles from Faun were technically up to date, but the number of units sold in normal truck construction and the turnover generated by them were too small to be able to afford an expensive truck development department and a corresponding sales network. By the end of the 1960s, faun no longer played a role in long-distance transport. Therefore, in 1969, the decision was made to concentrate entirely on the design and construction of special vehicles that were only produced in small numbers. These included tractors , heavy-duty transporters, fire brigade and airport vehicles , dump trucks , excavators , wheel loaders , vehicle cranes and crane girders as well as vehicles for municipalities such as B. Garbage trucks . The last normal trucks were delivered in 1971.
The development abroad
The Austrian truck manufacturer Steyr built a cubic, tilting driver's cab for the European market. The Swedish commercial vehicle manufacturer Scania built its new cubic, tilting driver's cab as type "110". The driver's cab was relatively narrow or low, had a very hard suspension and was also referred to as the “torture chamber” among drivers. At Scania, the "110" was soon built as the "140" with 350 hp, which was enormous for the time. That is why this truck was dubbed the “ King of the Road ”. Mack from the USA was the first to build an air-suspended truck cab. Volvo built a 16-speed split transmission for its new truck under development, which was shifted with an "over-drive" . Daimler-Benz had its plants in at least 19 countries around the world. In Sweden, Volvo launched the F 88 truck with 330 hp as the F 89, and in Great Britain the truck manufacturer Seddon Diesel took over its competitor Atkinson . In France, Berliet presented a new type KB 2400 truck with a tilting cab with steering wheel, the lower part being made of GRP . Scania built a new hood truck. Pegaso , a manufacturer from Spain , brought a new heavy series up to 354 hp with an angular cab with cab on the European market. The commercial vehicle manufacturer International Harvester from the USA took a 33% stake (until 1984) in DAF in the Netherlands.
The energy crises of the 1970s and their effects
Framework conditions in Germany and Europe
In 1973 the first oil crisis shook the world economy. As a result, the demand for commercial vehicles in Germany fell. In addition, there was an increase in raw material prices and exchange rate fluctuations. As a result, manufacturers carried out rationalizations , e.g. In some cases, the market adjustments that had been going on since the mid-1960s were accelerated. The second oil crisis at the end of the 1970s therefore hit an already significantly impoverished commercial vehicle market in which there were only two independent German truck manufacturers, Mercedes-Benz and MAN.
On January 1, 1973, the vehicle-related permits were revoked and converted into an owner permit. Since then, the same trucks could be used in local and long-distance transport, which significantly increased vehicle utilization. After the snow disaster in Northern Germany in 1978 , the demand for parking heaters and CB radio devices increased.
technology
In the 1970s, plastics conquered commercial vehicle construction and increasingly replaced wood and sheet metal, e.g. B. on dashboards, radiator grilles, door handles and bumper panels. This was particularly evident in 1973, when Daimler-Benz presented its " New Generation ", which replaced the cubic cab from the 1960s, and when Magirus-Deutz brought its heavy forward control vehicles onto the market in a revised form.
When Opel stopped manufacturing gasoline-powered trucks in 1975, the gasoline engine disappeared from German truck construction. In Friedrichshafen , ZF launched the HP 500, the first automatic transmission for commercial vehicles. From the 1980s onwards, the turbocharger , which most truck manufacturers have now installed, is now increasingly being joined by charge air cooling . You could thereby increase the service life and reduce fuel consumption by lowering the speeds . Mercedes-Benz launched a turbo-charged V8 engine with 330 hp. ZF brought out its “Ecosplit” transmission with double H shift, split group and 16 gears. In 1981, Daimler-Benz presented a heavy truck equipped with ABS to the public in Finland on a mirror-smooth ice surface - the ABS developed by Hanomag-Henschel in 1969 had not gone into series production due to interventions by Daimler-Benz. Seat belts, which are now standard equipment in some cars, were rarely used in trucks.
At the IAA, MAN presented the model "X 90" as a pilot object, which, due to the legally prescribed truck length and the Euro pallet size, had a sleeping compartment on top of the driver's cab in order to be able to load the maximum possible number of pallets with the loading area length. The commercial vehicle manufacturer Ackermann-Fruehauf in Wuppertal was the first to build a standard volume truck with a roof-top sleeping cabin ("top sleeper"), but this was generally rejected by the drivers. A plastic sleeping cabin was placed on top of the Mercedes-Benz Europa driver's cab , but it still had to get by without insulation , emergency exit and auxiliary heating and also had no proper ventilation. To sleep, the driver had to climb through a small roof hatch and use the mattress to close the hole under him. This roof sleeping cabin was very narrow in the upper roof area due to the sloping windshield of the Daimler-Benz local transport Europe cab. An amendment to the driver's cab directive introduced in 1966 contained a recommendation for a separate fresh air supply. An additional berth ordinance was necessary, because the boom in the new roof sleeping cabins posed a risk for passengers who were sleeping in the event of an accident. Because of this, sleeping was forbidden while driving. In general, the rear section of truck cabs in Germany and Europe was designed and built shorter and shorter for volume transports in order to be able to use as much vehicle length as possible for loading. The cabs with loungers have been shortened so much in the rear that one could almost speak of standing cabs. The climax of this development was represented by the so-called “Philips Bak trains” with 2 × 8.2 meter interchangeable platforms on which 40 Euro pallets could be loaded. However, this brought with it the problem for the driver that, due to the repeated shortening in the driver's cab, there was no longer enough space to be able to adjust the backrests of the seats. In 1978, the truck manufacturers offered air-sprung driver's seats for a surcharge and, as a special accessory, the seats could even be ordered with air cushions for the back or to support the spine . If the seats were very good, the use of the horizontal suspension made it possible to automatically adjust to the weight of the driver. Scania , Volvo and IVECO had air conditioning as standard , which other truck manufacturers offered as an accessory that was very expensive or not available at all.
Manufacturers and vehicle models
In 1973, in Werlte in Emsland , the agricultural machinery manufacturer Krone started with its first three-axle trailer as a commercial vehicle manufacturer .
Daimler-Benz presented its " New Generation " (NG) in the heavy weight class at the 1973 IAA . In 1975 the NG cab also replaced the cubic cabs from the 1960s in the medium weight class. For many truck drivers, the cab was a step backwards: the new generation was designed to be simple, simple and cheap for a planned export to Siberia . The cab entry was almost no improvement compared to the front-link type from 1953, because the entry was designed unfavorably due to the sloping front from the lower edge of the windshield. In the medium and large truck types, all components were standardized using a modular system, which reduced the number of parts by around half. In 1974, however, the order for the delivery of around 9,500 trucks to Siberia did not go to Mercedes-Benz, but to Magirus-Deutz (so-called Delta project ).
As a special vehicle specialist, Faun built around 1,000 vehicles and tank transporters for the paratroopers of the German armed forces, which ensured that Faun's capacities were well utilized. Also Kaelble could in specialty vehicles further assert and z. B. build 250 very heavy tank transporters with up to 525 hp for the army in Libya .
In 1974, with the end of Hanomag-Henschel , came the end of the Hanomag “F series”, which was only introduced in 1967. However, the construction went to Steyr in Austria , where high-speed trucks could still be built for some time. Those Hanomag-Henschel types who filled the gaps in the Mercedes-Benz program were there, for example. In some cases beyond 1974, which were then offered as Mercedes-Benz. By taking over Hanomag-Henschel types into its own program, Daimler-Benz also became a full-range supplier, offering everything from small vans to heavy trucks. In 1977 Daimler-Benz discontinued the Harburger Transporter, the last series that could be traced back to Hanomag-Henschel, after a successor model was ready for series production. At the same time, Daimler-Benz adopted a low-price strategy in the 1970s to penetrate markets below the traditional range and to force the remaining competitors out of the market.
In 1975, Opel stopped manufacturing trucks . In the post-war period, Opel was one of the most successful manufacturers of light trucks on the West German market with the Opel Blitz . For years, however , the vehicles were only available with gasoline engines, and customers' requests for more economical and therefore more economical diesel engines were met far too late. Mercedes-Benz also penetrated the Opel market with its light LP types and the T 2 large transporter , which were both offered very cheaply, and also had a model below with the Harburg transporters that Hanomag-Henschel had taken over into their own range of the Opel model range and was therefore able to meet more diverse customer requirements than Opel. For these reasons, sales of the Opel Blitz went down inexorably. In the early 1970s, Opel’s parent company, General Motors , decided to separate the tasks of its European subsidiaries more clearly. The British Bedford plant was supposed to be responsible for commercial vehicles, while Opel in Germany only built passenger cars. In 1975, the production of trucks in Germany was given up, but since 1998 small vans have been offered again ( type Movano ).
1975 was also the fateful year for Magirus-Deutz : Magirus-Deutz had been very successful in the 1950s and 1960s, especially with construction and fire fighting vehicles. The specialty of the trucks, buses and fire-fighting vehicles of the Magirus-Deutz brand were air-cooled diesel engines, which in the meantime could no longer be sold because they were still quite loud compared to the water-cooled engines of the competition, despite design improvements that had been made in the meantime. This shortcoming was particularly noticeable in long-distance transport, where Magirus-Deutz's market share (also because of the cheap Mercedes-Benz NG models) fell to below 10% in the 1970s. A focus of the Magirus-Deutz product range was also on construction vehicles with hoods, while the trend in the commercial vehicle sector was towards the front-wheel drive and the construction industry in Germany consolidated as a result of the end of the economic miracle and the first oil crisis. High investments and a. In addition, the parent company of Magirus-Deutz, Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz (KHD), had weakened financially in a new plant and losses in the field of bus production , so that further necessary investments were no longer possible. Therefore, by 1975, KHD decided to outsource its commercial vehicle production in the form of Magirus-Deutz AG and to bring it into IVECO , a company newly founded by Fiat in 1974 . IVECO was an amalgamation of several European commercial vehicle manufacturers in which KHD held a 20% stake. In 1980 Fiat bought the remainder of KHD's stake in IVECO after Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz had decided to enter the air-cooled diesel engine business in the USA and needed money for this expansion. As a result, Fiat became the sole owner of IVECO and thus also of Magirus-Deutz. The Magirus-Deutz brand was then gradually discontinued until 1983, and the Ulm plant still produces for IVECO today. IVECO was the first “European manufacturer of commercial vehicles”: it merged commercial vehicle manufacturers from Italy, France and Germany, the headquarters of the new company was (and is) in the Netherlands.
By 1980 Mercedes-Benz had "survived" all German competitions except MAN, and MAN also saw it until the mid-1980s due to the competitive prices offered by Mercedes-Benz (which were possible because Mercedes made the trucks with profits from the car division Division was able to cross-subsidize) and is now looking bad due to the second oil crisis. The new company IVECO was interested in taking over MAN. In this situation, Daimler-Benz decided to buy a subsidiary from MAN in order to make MAN “liquid” again, instead of letting the foreign competitor IVECO take over MAN's market share. As a result, MAN recovered and has held its own to this day.
The designer Colani presented a futuristic "truck of the future" at the IAA in 1977 , which was equipped with a glass dome cab like a huge one-eyed insect. The focus was on the advertising effect. VW brought the Transporter T 3 onto the market and, together with MAN, built a light truck that was offered as " MAN-VW ". In 1979 Mercedes-Benz presented its large-capacity driver's cab with a V 8 turbo engine and charge air cooling with up to 375 hp on the German market. Steinwinter , a special truck manufacturer, built a “roof load semitrailer truck” with an 18 meter long overhead trailer.
The development abroad
Even before the establishment of the first "European commercial vehicle manufacturer" in the form of established of Italian, French and German manufacturers in the Netherlands company IVECO called the set of four club of DAF in the Netherlands, Magirus-Deutz of Germany, Saviem from France and Volvo of Sweden represents a milestone in the internationalization of the commercial vehicle market. The companies mentioned came together in a cooperation in 1971 to develop and build a new light to medium-weight truck. Each of these manufacturers would have lacked the strength for this alone. In 1975 the vehicles came on the market and were very successful there.
Ford built the "Transcontinental" truck type ( called "Transconti" by long-distance drivers ) in Great Britain in 1975 with a very tall truck cab from Berliet in order to gain a foothold again on the European commercial vehicle market. However, this attempt turned out to be in vain until the early 1990s.
The merger of Berliet and Saviem created a major international truck manufacturer in France. Scania again brought a "King of the Road" with 375 hp onto the market. The truck manufacturer FBW from Switzerland brought a four-axle type "85 V" with 280 HP onto the market and in Russia the KAMAZ truck plant started production to build 150,000 trucks per year.
IVECO built the first Euro cab in 1977, which was used by all brands belonging to IVECO, and Volvo also presented a new truck with the “F 10” type. With these two trucks you could clearly see the cost-saving measures in development as a result of the energy crisis, because these cabs were designed simply and economically.
In Korea , Hyundai built its first truck using old British vehicle technology . Daimler-Benz acquired shares in the Swiss commercial vehicle manufacturers FBW and Saurer .
In 1979 Volvo brought out the "F 12" type with a "Globetrotter" high-roof driver's cab and set new standards in long-distance transport with the installation of large storage compartments. The "Globetrotter" cab is a model for the development towards today's cab standards for all European commercial vehicle manufacturers. DAF followed with its high-roof version as a half-cabin and was the first truck manufacturer to bring a top-sleeper (roof sleeping cabin) for heavy trucks to the market as standard. The English truck manufacturer Leyland Motors built a large driver's cab that was partly copied from the MAN pilot project “X 90” , and MAN built an underfloor F 8 with a self-developed underfloor engine with 320 hp and charge air cooling . Scania launched the GRPT program with the 2 series. Nissan from Japan took over the truck manufacturer "Motor Iberia" (with the Ebro brand) in Spain . Fiat , Peugeot and Citroën had agreed to co- produce a delivery van to use the same components. The English truck manufacturer Foden was taken over by Paccar . Ford tried again with the Ford "Cargo" to enter the mid-range truck class. As with the Transconti, the experiment failed until the early 1990s. The first international " trucker festivals " are also starting in Germany and the commercial vehicle industry supported these spectacles . Many brightly painted and visually pimped up trucks were presented to a wide audience at large truck stops. In the USA , Daimler-Benz took over the truck manufacturer Freightliner and Euclid Trucks and Volvo took over the American truck manufacturer White . The Austrian truck manufacturer Steyr built its truck with a high roof and Volvo now produced its F 12 with a roof that was about 12 cm higher. IVECO built the TurboStar for European long- haul transport and now had 1,700 mm headroom and up to 420 hp with a V8 engine with 17.2 liters displacement. The truck had a wide range of equipment as standard, including air conditioning and, as the first truck, a cockpit - like dashboard built around the driver . Renault built the type "R 370" (with Berliet cab) now also with a high-roof version.
New developments up to German reunification in 1990
In 1983, a member of the European Parliament , Horst Seefeld , brought an action for failure to act before the ECJ . On May 22, 1985 (case 13/83) he was right, which led to the fact that the free movement of capital, services, people and traffic had to be made possible within the EEC until 1992. The commercial vehicle industry hoped that this would generate additional business. The truck drivers in Europe had new driving and rest times, which also meant more kilometers allowed. The total weight of the trucks was increased from 38 to 40 tons in 1986. Recently, hauliers for commercial long-distance haulage trucks have also been able to rent and lease .
MAN presented an automatic transmission “Velvet” from Eaton and ZF showed its automated gearshift for trucks in public. At Daimler-Benz, the semi-automatic gearbox "EPS" ( electropneumatic gearshift ) was built into the trucks , although it still had many teething problems. For example, the electronics often failed when they overheated when driving downhill . Scania had been the first to introduce its automatic electronic gear shift "GAG" a year earlier.
The Mercedes-Benz long-distance truck now had a standard top sleeper from Ackermann-Fruehauf , which truckers also called the “plastic coffin”. DAF built the “Space Cab” with a short high-roof version and Volvo built a “Eurotrotter” with a half-deep high-roof cab. MAN had previously brought its F 8 forward control vehicle with a 360 hp underfloor engine onto the market, which enabled a large interior with full standing height and bus comfort while driving.
A new MAN truck of the type "F 90" came onto the market. Most truck manufacturers now had semi-automatic and fully automatic transmissions and ABS as extras for their trucks. Renault built a "truck of the future" "VIRAGES" with a large cab and presented it to the public. This truck, which came onto the market in 1990 as the “Magnum AE”, was designed in such a way that the driver's cab was completely separated from the engine and had a completely level floor with no engine box between the seats. Ackermann-Fruehauf , Kässbohrer and many other manufacturers experimented with the innovative trailer close coupling systems. It was achieved to reduce the space between the motor vehicle and the trailer to up to 15 cm. The first safety tank trailer called "Topas" was built with additional safety devices and a special double steel belt around the container.
DAF came onto the market in 1987 with a modern new truck series "95" and took over the English truck manufacturer Leyland . The largest cab version was offered as a space cab (high roof). Scania presented its model 143 "Topline" as a new 3 series with 1700 mm headroom. The 470 hp in the V8 were brought about by the electronic engine control " EDC ". MAN brought out the V10 engine in the F 90 type and thus the most powerful truck in Germany with 460 hp. The medium-weight Ford Cargo got the first disc brakes .
As a result of German reunification in 1990, the eastern German commercial vehicle manufacturers such. B. IFA on the West German market. However, they were quickly taken over by West German manufacturers (the truck division of the IFA in Ludwigsfelde e.g. by Daimler-Benz) and their production, which was unprofitable compared to western companies, was discontinued. So ended z. B. the production of the IFA L60 in 1990.
See also
- History of the German commercial vehicle industry from 1895 to 1945
- History of the German commercial vehicle industry from 1990 to today
Individual evidence
- ^ Lutz Nellinger: The Unimog: workhorse and cult mobile. Komet, Cologne 2016, ISBN 978-3-86941-581-9 . P. 11 ff.
- ↑ § 2 of the law on the establishment of a Federal Motor Transport Authority
- ↑ Law on the Safety of Road Traffic of December 19, 1952.
Literature and Sources
- From 0 to 100 . Chemnitzer Verlag 2001, ISBN 3-928678-70-1 .
- History of the car . Campus Verlag 2002, ISBN 3-593-36575-8 .
- The beginning of all vice . Westermann Verlag 1985, ISBN 3-07-508991-5 .
- MAN from 1915 to 1960 . Kosmos Verlag 2000, ISBN 3-440-08113-3 .
- H. Büssing: Man - Work - Heritage . V & R Verlag 1989, ISBN 3-525-13175-5 .
- The history of German truck construction . Weltbild Verlag 1994, ISBN 3-89350-811-2 .
- Commercial vehicles from DaimlerChrysler . Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-613-02541-8 .
- Magazine: Lastauto Omnibus . United Motor Publishers
- Journal: Historischer Kraftverkehr . Publishing house Klaus Rabe
- Magazine: Load and Power . ETM publishing house
- Werner Oswald : German trucks and delivery vehicles, Volume 2, 1945-1969 . 3. Edition. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-613-01197-2 .
- Werner Oswald: German trucks and delivery vehicles, Volume 3, 1970-1989 . 1st edition. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-613-02446-2 .
- Bernd Regenberg: The most famous German trucks from 1896 until today . 4th edition. Podszun publishing house, 1997, ISBN 3-923448-89-9 .
- Bernd Regenberg: The German trucks of the sixties . 2nd Edition. Podszun publishing house, 1992, ISBN 3-923448-68-6 .
- Halwart Schrader : German truck classics . 1st edition. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-613-01802-0 .