I would like to import a trabant from Germany but am told that the reg plate stays with the owner and I don't fancy driving back with no reg plate or insurance. Could somebody let me know how this is done?
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Not quite. You need to get export plates from the local Zulassungsstelle.
Andy Bairsto will have more precise info for you.
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Thank you for your response, how would I get in contact with Andy Bairsto?
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When you buy a car in Germany the seller has to deregister it, unless you buy from a dealer in which case the car will have already been deregistered. The buyer then registers the car in their name and gets a new registration number.
Unless you have a permanent address in Germany you basically have 2 options to export it:
1. You can register it and get temporary (red) number plates from the vehicle registration office in the locality where you buy the car. You have to send these back once the car has been exported from Germany.
2. You can arrange for the non-registered car to be transported and then register it in the UK.
You can arrange for insurance from a UK company based on the VIN number of the car.
In order to register in the UK you will need to change the speedo for a mph one - a friend of mine did this by simply covering the km/h on the existing speedo with an mph scale. Additionally you will need to change the headlights for rhd and I'm not sure about emissions requirements - the older Trabants are 2 stroke.
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autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/IFA-club/
is the yahoo GB Trabbie owners club, maybe post there too for advice.
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Thank you all for the help I am on the case.
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You can get three day transit plates from any garage these cover tax and insurance you have no chance of getting any red plates the person you are buying of could lend you his plates if he has not deregistered it (thats the Common way)you then send him them back.I have a Trabbie with the VW polo engine and disc brakes the only one to own and they are still horrible to drive .Also at the moment they are fetching silly money as there are very few left as you will have to buy one that is TUV tested to get the plates.Are you sure you can test a two stroke in the UK or anybody daft enough to insure it ,also what about spares and the odd size tyres.Example prices would be Trabbie 1.1 polo engined estate with TUV around 8000euros, a 2 stroke car with TUV around 1000 for a rough one and 2k for a decent motor with spare.Petrol tank in front of the driver vitually no brakes ,no performance,heavy on fuel,rust like hell under the panels you have my sympathy.
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Wow. Just checked Autoscout24.de. Andy's right, they are making silly money. There's one on there for 20,000 Euros! Admittedly it's a rare model, but why would anyone want to spend 20,000 Euros on a rare Trabant?
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Why would anyone want to spend anything at all on any Trabant? If you want a vintage runabout why not get a real one?
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Many years ago I was in the Army - and it was a req. that all who joined my regt. had to go to Berlin by tarin (through E Germany) stay in Berlin, and then go into E Berlin for the day with one of the regular patrols that were allowed under the Four Powers agreement.
We'd see the Russians comin into W Berlin in Ladas - the British used Range Rovers, shiny black, on raised suspension (to see better over the walls of barracks etc. and with a chequerplate ali platform on the roof, for even better spotting.
I remember see the Ossies (E Germans) in the Trabants staring at us in the RR as if it had arrived from Mars. At their level all they could see were the wheels!
Personally I wouldn't want one. I prefer W German engineering of that vintage. A Trabby with a surfboard wouldn't look right, and you can't sleep in it....
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you can't sleep in it....
Yes you can, I've done it for most of summer of 1992. Seats stretch far enough and open fully, all you need is one of add-on headrest mods and voila. You can even hang bottom of a sleeping bag on gear handle sticking out of a dashboard to stop kicking steering wheel.
Oh, how I loved my trabbie....
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[Nissan 2.2 dCi are NOT Renault engines. Grrr...]
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