Gentlemen,
as it might be interesting for you, I like to show some impressions from the Sauer plant in Suhl and how it developed in the last years. First of all, a map of the Sauer plant will help to get an overview. The basis of the map are two maps we found in the Suhl Archive – I combined the two maps to have a map of the buildings in 1936. The colors do indicate the development: dark red/brown: buildings already vanished in 1998; red: buildings still present in 1998, but demolished after our trip; yellow: severe amendments; green: still present today.
My first trip to Suhl and the Sauer plant was in 1998 together with Jim Cate. In 1998 demolition work already was in progress. More than half of the buildings of the Sauer plant already had been demolished, the other buildings still were standing, but most of these buildings were waiting to be demolished.
During our time there (it was a lousy cold and rainy summer) no workers were present and we saw only very few persons there. We were free to do there whatever we wanted to. So, we walked in every building, took photos and picked up some souvenirs. One of the buildings was burned out, but one room in this building was filled up with hundreds of personnel cards of workers of the firm Sauer/Fortuna/VEB Ernst Thälmann. Most of these cards were ruined by fire or water, but some were good enough to be rescued from being trashed (what happened with the rest soon after our visit).
While most buildings are made of bricks, a building in the centre (with four floors) is made of concrete. This is the "Karabinerhaus" (Carbine house) build in 1936 ("N.B." in the shown map). In this house the K98k was assembled. We were also free to visit this house.
Some photos from our 1998 trip:
Photo 1: A view from the 4th floor of the carbine house. The white half-timbered houses in the background (still existing today) are the oldest buildings of the plant. There, the management and the administration were located. The buildings left to these (with the two turrets) are the buildings of the typewriter production and do still exist – buildings #55 and #58. The buildings (partially painted white) on the left and in front of the typewriter buildings do not exist anymore. The bridge in the background (border of the Sauer plant) with the train on it is called “Viadukt” and always was a motive for postcards.
Shown here is a postcards of the WWI period with said bridge from the other side. The Sauer plant (at least the half-timbered houses) are visible, including Sauer’s legend.
Photo 2: Not a brilliant photo of building 8a, I've to admit. It's one of the buildings which do not exist anymore. The die-casted house number "8a" was the main reason for taking the photo. The “8a” sign still does exist – the building vanished.
Photo 3: A view from the (not longer existing) canteen or building #53 on the carbine house. The red bricked house on the right is building #48, in which the Sauer pistols were produced. The rubbish dump on the left contains the remainders of some buildings already demolished in 1998, i. a. the shooting range and the lab.
Photo 4: A view from the carbine house on building #48 (pistol production).
Photo 5: Inside building #48.
Photo 6: a view on the generator houses (#11, 44) and on the pistol house #48 on the right.