Motor vehicles become roadworthy

Right-hand drive originated from the age of the horse and carriage, when the coachman sat on the right-hand side. In September 1921 Audi became the first German car manufacturer to present a production car with left-hand drive, the Audi Type K. By giving the driver a better view of oncoming traffic, consequently making overtaking manoeuvres in particular safer, left-hand drive became established by the end of the 1920s.

In 1922 the company Zschopauer Motorenwerke started manufacturing its own motorcycles. The sporting successes of the lightweight motorcycles with 2.25 hp two-stroke engine were remarkable. Victories in the Berlin Avus race in 1922 and the triple victory by the DKW team in the ADAC Reichsfahrt the same year made people sit up and take notice. The first DKW motorcycle was consequently called the “Reichsfahrt”. Over the next six years Zschopauer Motorenwerke/DKW established itself as the world’s biggest motorcycle manufacturer.

In 1926 Horchwerke AG of Zwickau presented the Horch 303 Berlin. This was the first German eight-cylinder car to go into volume production. The engine designed by Paul Daimler had double overhead camshafts driven by a vertical shaft. With a displacement of 3132 cc, the engine initially developed an output of 60 horsepower.

Rasmussen finally had access to a powerful engine for the DKW car (600 cc, 15 hp) in the form of the two-cylinder motorcycle unit (1927). The vehicle, which had a load-bearing body covered in imitation leather, had rear-wheel drive. It was produced in the Spandau district of Berlin from 1928.