MAYBACH / GERMANY

 MAYBACH MOTORENBAU GmbH / Friedrichshafen / Germany      (1921 - 1940)

Prof. Dr. Ing. Karl Maybach, the son of the famous engine and automobile designer Wilhelm Maybach and a partner of the German automotive pioneer Gottlieb Daimler, became a designer of airship engines and founded the luxury automobile brand MAYBACH. Maybach vehicles were manufactured from 1921 to 1941. Among the models were the large 5.7-liter 6-cylinder engines and the 12-cylinder versions, which were introduced in 1929. This large model was given the additional designation “ZEPPELIN,” and approximately 330 units were built between 1929 and 1940.

In 1966, the brand name was revived, and even today there is still a particularly expensive, luxurious Mercedes model called MAYBACH.

  

unrestored MAYBACH emblem with traces of decades of use

 

Size	8.0 cm x 5.7 cm
Year	1924 - and following
Estimate

 

unrestored MAYBACH seen in a German Museum

 The following advertisement dates from October 1921; it is the oldest one I was able to find. In it, the Maybach emblem is shown in blue, a color that never actually existed:

 

a blue Maybach emblem was never see; it is a matter of artistic freedom

 

 

 

This photograph shows the first Maybach model from 1921, the W3. The emblem is barely visible. Not a single vehicle is believed to have survived, only one radiator of the type W3 is left:

 

W3 radiator seen in a Germn museum

 

Even the following year in 1922, the emblem was depicted in blue in two different advertisements:

 

 

 There was a small and a large version of the MAYBACH emblem. Here the large version still missing the enamel:

 

 

 

 

 

backside of an original emblem ( without makers mark )

 

 Anything that is rare and expensive gets reproduced. The same goes for the MAYBACH emblem:

reproduction of the large MAYBACH emblem

 

backside of the large repro emblem

 

 

 

 And here is the small version:

 

 

Size	5.2 cm x 3.7 cm
Year	1921 - onwards
Estimate

 

 

backside of the small original MAYBACH emblem ( no makers mark )

 

repro of the small MAYBACH emblem

 

 

In the following advertisement from 1927, the MAYBACH emblem is depicted in the correct colors, with a white border and an orange background for the letters MM:

 

MAYBACH did not patent the emblem's design until eight years after production of the vehicle had begun:

MAYBACH motor emblem made of aluminium

1928 advertisement for the MAYBACH with overdrive  (Schnellgang)

this 1928 advertisement shows the motor emblem

The ANSBACH Fahrzeugfabrik A.G. also installed the 6-cylinder Maybach motor.

MAYBACH with flat emblem on the back

You find the MAYBACH logo also on the gas cap

All too often, the story ends with a plastic emblem:

MAYBACH LANDAULET ( 2008 - 2009 )

For more emblems see older posts or top right ( list of car makers ).

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