When you can't afford a Messerschmitt Kabine Scooter.
As one of the most critical military production sites in the Third Reich, the Messerschmittwerkes of Regensburg came in for sustained aerial bombing from 1943. The Germans creatively distributed production across many sites around the country, but by wars end the destruction was total. The huge Messerschmitt factory was a bombed out ruin and its principle, Professor Willy Messerschmitt, was on a list of industrials to be arrested and prosecuted for war crimes. He would eventually be sentenced to two years in prison in 1948 for the use of slave and forced labour in the company's factories.
Despite this and being banned from aircraft manufacture, Willy Messerschmitt was determined to save his company. The war was scarcely over than he set his workers to clearing the rubble and repairing the damage. For Messerschmitt, it was essential that a technically skilled workforce be maintained for the day when he could restart aircraft production, so he opened up this enormous plant to entrepreneurs and manufacturers who did not have the production facilities. The Messerschmitt plant was soon turning out pots and pans, lampshades, prefabricated building materials. In most cases these products had nothing to do with Messerschmitt, but received the Messerschmitt name as kept the company's name alive and it helped sales due to name recognition.
The most well-known post-war Messerschmitt product was, of course, the Messerschmitt KR175 and KR200/1 Kabine Roller (cabin scooter). The Kabine Roller started as an invalid carriage for legless veterans, originally designed and built by former Messerschmitt aeronautical engineer, Fritz Fend. From a very basic tube frame tricycle, the 'Fend Flitzer' evolved into a powered three wheeler with a cabin. Transport was so desperately needed in war shattered Germany that unimpaired people also sought them. Fend was unable to cope with the demand so he approached Messerschmitt to use his company's production capacity.
The production agreement allowed Fend to significantly improve the Flitzer from a cobled together backyard construction into the iconic Messerschmitt Kabine Roller. The KR175 and later KR200 were built by Messerschmitt from 1953 to 1956, when Messerschmitt was finally allowed to begin manufacturing aircraft again. Messerschmitt sold the factory premises to Fend, who continued manufacturing the Kabine Roller under the brand name FMR until 1964.
Another stop gap product from this time was the Messerschmitt Mokuli light delivery triporter. The Mokuli shared a few components with the Messerschmitt KR but was largely an entirely separate vehicle. https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2023/05/fmr-messerschmitt-mokuli-delivery.html
And then there was...the sewing machine. In the early 1950s Messerschmitt began manufacturing sewing machines. Messerschmitt himself had nothing to do with production. The design was bought to the company by a local firm and they leased production space in the vast factory floor in return for branding and commission fees. Several different versions were built over the years and production seems to have shut down in 1956 when Messerschmitt returned to the aircraft business. Details are very sketchy. The CL.54 sewing machine was widely exported. I acquired my example in South Africa.
Instruction Manual in English
Instruction Manual in French
