BarkasB 1000-1

01

Origins

Like the Trabant 1.1, the Barkas B 1000-1 of 1990 was East German industry modernising at the precise moment modernisation stopped mattering: the elderly van received a licence-built Volkswagen four-stroke engine, ending three decades of two-stroke haze, along with the upgrades needed around it. It was the van the DDR's drivers had wanted since the 1970s — and reunification made it unsellable, as used Western Transporters flooded east at prices no Barkas could meet. Production ended in April 1991 after roughly 2,000 of the improved model, closing the marque. The B 1000-1 survives as a collector's oddity and a tidy parable: the plan-economy's habit of deferring improvement until 'later' finally met a later that belonged to someone else.