Waggon Union
Waggon Union (WU) was a mechanical engineering company based in Berlin-Borsigwalde and Netphen ( Siegen-Wittgenstein district ) that manufactured rail vehicles and bus bodies.
It was created in 1971 through the merger of the companies Deutsche Waggon- und Maschinenfabriken (DWM) Berlin, SEAG Waggonbau Dreis-Tiefenbach and Rheinstahl Transporttechnik and was bought by ABB Henschel in 1990 . ABB Henschel later became part of the Adtranz company, which in turn later became part of the Canadian company Bombardier . In 1997, the new location in Berlin-Wilhelmsruh was built, which, however , had to be split off at the instigation of the Federal Cartel Office . The Berlin-Wilhelmsruh location was sold to Stadler Rail . The plant in Borsigwalder Miraustraße was closed. The plant in Netphen continues to belong to Bombardier. In the past, complete freight cars were manufactured there, for example bulk freight cars , tank cars and sliding-door cars .
Products
The Waggon Union has numerous types of passenger cars designed and wagons and manufactured, including the cars of TUI Holiday Express . A well-known railcar is the NE 81 developed by Orenstein & Koppel and built by Waggon Union for several German private railways . In addition, Waggon Union was involved in the construction of the Klv 53 and Klv 96 heavy-duty cars and the development of the Klv 54 . The research projects also included the construction of the passenger cabins for the Berlin M-Bahn .
The largest customer, however, was the Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe (BVG). At the Berlin location in Miraustraße, among other things, subway cars, the S-Bahn series 480 , bodies of double-decker buses for the BVG (type MAN SD 200 and type MAN SD 202 ) were built, as well as general inspections by the BVG in January 1984 taken over Berlin S-Bahn car . WU also supplied trams for the Karlsruhe transport company ( GT6-D and GT8-D ), the Darmstadt transport company HEAG and the Albtal-Verkehrs-Gesellschaft ( railcars 22 to 25 and GT6-80C ).
The Netphen location was responsible for the production of all types of freight cars, including tank and bulk freight cars. In addition, bogies for freight cars, passenger cars as well as light rail and trams are still produced there today as a Bombardier factory . Among other things, the bogies for the intermediate car of the ICE 1 were developed there.
Around 1990 Waggon Union was also involved in the production of the first light rail vehicles with low-floor technology, the VÖV low-floor prototype . However, these never came into service. The last railcar of this type is owned by the Düsseldorf Rheinbahn .
At the end of the 1980s, Waggon Union built ten B80D railcars for the Kölner Verkehrs-Betriebe (KVB).