Zündapp

Zündapp was a German motorcycle manufacturer founded in 1917 in Nuremberg by Fritz Neumeyer, together with Friedrich Krupp AG and the machine tool maker Thiel, under the name Zünder- und Apparatebau GmbH, first as a producer of detonators. When demand for weapons parts fell after the First World War, Neumeyer became sole proprietor in 1919 and two years later turned to motorcycles, beginning with the Z22 of 1921, sold as a motorcycle for everyone. The marque went on to build the heavy shaft-driven K-series twins and fours of the 1930s, the KS 750 military sidecar outfit, the postwar KS 601 nicknamed the green elephant, the Bella scooter, the Janus microcar of 1957 and 1958, and later small two-stroke mopeds. Production moved from Nuremberg to Munich in 1958. The company went bankrupt in 1984 and its production line passed to Xunda Motor of Tianjin, China, and in 2017 the name returned to German hands.