Author Topic: Solved: Wendax 1555 - AGEKA (Read 2135 times)

4popoid · « **Reply #25 on:** April 21, 2015, 05:37:37 PM »

Is this truck in any way related to the WWI Daimler Marienfelde Truck?

Bill Murray · « **Reply #26 on:** April 21, 2015, 08:02:29 PM »

I cannot solve this one either, but maybe I can help someone else.

The puzzle truck is, in my opinion, a "subventionswagen".

This type of truck was promoted by a number of primarily European nations as a way of insuring a supply of quasi military transport vehicles for their armed forces after the financial effects of the conflicts of the late 1800's and the costs of changing from horse drawn transport to automotive transport. The economies of many of these countries was in pretty bad shape at the time.

With some variations, the governments basically paid up front up to 25% of the initial cost of the trucks for private owners and a sliding scale of payments for some years thereafter if the owners agreed that in the event of a conflict involving their government, the government could require that the trucks owners would voluntarily surrender the vehicles to the government to be used in their armed forces.

That being said, I still cannot identify this particular truck. My best guess, and I rarely guess, is that it might be a Podeus but they were manufactured in a different part of Germany.

Bill

ropat53 · « **Reply #27 on:** April 21, 2015, 10:30:41 PM »

Nacke?

Wendax · « **Reply #28 on:** April 21, 2015, 11:24:01 PM »

Not Daimler Marienfelde, Podeus or Nacke, but built during WW1.

4popoid · « **Reply #29 on:** April 22, 2015, 02:38:34 AM »

I'll take your answer to mean that the puzzle truck was in no way related to the Daimler Marienfelde (I knew that it wasn't one). Therefore, was the puzzle truck in any way related to MULAG (formerly Scheibler)?

Wendax · « **Reply #30 on:** April 23, 2015, 03:28:52 PM »

4popoid · « **Reply #31 on:** April 23, 2015, 03:35:37 PM »

Did the manufacturer of this truck also manufacture other types of vehicles, such as automobiles, tractors. or railway rolling stock?

Wendax · « **Reply #32 on:** April 23, 2015, 03:46:23 PM »

No, I think this truck was their only attempt at building vehicles. Their main business was a different kind of machinery. The company was taken over by another one which was building the same kind of machinery, but was also building vehicles later on.

4popoid · « **Reply #33 on:** April 23, 2015, 05:20:09 PM »

In anyway related to MIAG?

Wendax · « **Reply #34 on:** April 23, 2015, 05:23:02 PM »

4popoid · « **Reply #35 on:** April 23, 2015, 06:25:30 PM »

So we are looking for a name somehow related to MIAG. How about: Amme, Giesecke & Konegen (AGK)?

Wendax · « **Reply #36 on:** April 24, 2015, 02:49:38 AM »

You are almost there. The company is Amme, Giesecke & Konegen. The brand is an abbreviation of their names, but written like it the letters are named in German. So it is: AGxKx.
Locked for you of course.

4popoid · « **Reply #37 on:** April 24, 2015, 03:35:20 AM »

This will greatly tax my very slight command of the German language Gerd. The reference I have is: Amme, Giesecke & Konegen Aktiengesellschaft I would surmise the German for the ampersand would be und, so the first missing letter is likely to be u. However, I have never seen Aktiengesellschaft abbreviated other than AG, yet you are showing only one X. Therefore, I'll have to guess that the abbreviated name that you are looking for is: AGuKa, even though it seems to me that it ought to be AGuKag.

Wendax · « **Reply #38 on:** April 24, 2015, 03:59:53 AM »

AGxKA

4popoid · « **Reply #39 on:** April 24, 2015, 04:21:39 AM »

Aaargh, I thought that "u" was the easy part Well all I have to go on is the ampersand, and my trusty Google translator tells me that the German word for ampersand is Ampersand, so how about: AGAKA?

Wendax · « **Reply #40 on:** April 24, 2015, 04:36:15 AM »

No, the brand name is the word formed when you spell AGK in German. In English it would be Ay-Gee-Kay (or so), in German it is A Gx Ka. Have another try.

4popoid · « **Reply #41 on:** April 24, 2015, 04:57:42 AM »

I see where you are going, but my German is so poor that I'm not sure I can follow. The missing letter must be a vowel, and we already know it isn't an "a" or a "u" so I'll try: AGEKA.

Wendax · « **Reply #42 on:** April 24, 2015, 05:31:42 AM »

Yes! I think it was the only prototype built. I'll add the unmolested picture tonight.

One more point for you.

Bill Murray · « **Reply #43 on:** April 24, 2015, 11:49:18 AM »

An excellent job of Detective Work, Spence!!

I spent a LOT of time on this one and got nowhere other than I now have photos and information on probably every other "subventionswagen" that was ever made.

I hope Gerd has more background information on this firm that he can share with us.

Cheers

Bill

Wendax · « **Reply #44 on:** April 24, 2015, 02:11:19 PM »

All information I have is this postcard, written by Mr. Amme to the Geheimer Regierungsrat Dr. Stegemann in Braunschweig on September 1st, 1915. Amme writes that after all difficulties have been handled, the first AGEKA truck has been completed and is ready to be driven. Don't ask me for a translation of the text, as I can hardly decipher any words.

Bill Murray · « **Reply #45 on:** April 24, 2015, 05:06:07 PM »

Thanks Gerd!

Sadly, all of my research has come up with nothing more on this particular vehicle made by this company.

Just for the fun of it, though, here is what I found concerning the company itself.

Without going into all of the details, it was a very successful engineering company specializing in things like food processing plants, rolling mill facilities, cement plants and water turbine installations among other things.

I spent a few hours on the Braunschweig city history archives on Wiki and it seems they did installations all over the world. There was no mention in the first 5 pages of links that mentioned this vehicle although reference was made to "armaments production" in the 1914-1918 War.

As Gerd mentioned, they were taken over by the MIAG conglomerate in 1925.

Below are two photos of the type of equipment they supplied to industry.

Bill

Wendax · « **Reply #46 on:** April 24, 2015, 05:08:08 PM »

4popoid · « **Reply #47 on:** April 24, 2015, 05:20:24 PM »

Thanks for the point Gerd, and thanks for posting those great pictures (I can't read the text either, let alone translate it).

And thanks to you Bill for the kind words. The game changer was Reply #32, I don't think I would have ever solved this without it. I never did find any information on the truck itself, but the information that it was manufactured by a company which manufactured other machinery, and was purchased by a company which manufactured like machinery and later manufactured vehicles, put me on the trail. The examination of British WWII aerial targeting maps of major industry in Brunswick led me to MIAG, which took me to the current MIAG website where I discovered that MIAG was made up of five separate companies which merged in 1925, and that the resulting company produced electric wheeled vehicles (lift trucks, etc.) as well as WWII warplanes (hence the British targeting). Once the relationship to MIAG was confirmed, the next step was to decipher which of the original companies made the puzzle truck. Fortunately three of the companies were not located in Brunswick, and thus eliminated. Of the remaining two, AGK was formed by employees of the other, and an examination of patents led me to believe that it was more likely to be the truck manufacturer. With AGK confirmed all that was left was to decipher the brand name of the truck itself. A daunting, but in the end rewarding, task.

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Author Topic: Solved: Wendax 1555 - AGEKA (Read 2135 times)