IRBIT

The history of the “Irbit Motorchair” began with the Russian’s pre-W.W.II planning. Russia knew it would soon be going to war against the Third Reich and Hitler. The military was ordered to gear up in all areas, including the ground forces that would be defending the Russian "motherland" from the invading German Panzer, ground troops, and German special forces. The German special forces had thousands of the BMW motorcycles with sidecars that the German Army loved for their maneuverability, reliability, economy, and ease of maintenance. Carrying a machine gun and soldier plus supplies, the sidecar as a "weapon" was feared by the otherwise "fixed" Russian ground troops.

Back in the U.S.S.R., in 1939, Russian engineers in Moscow were busily dismantling 5 BMWs purchased from Germany through some Swedish intermediaries. The engineers found that while the BMW design worked well as a motorcycle, it was very large and conspicuous. They needed a small, quiet, highly maneuverable vehicle that could carry a soldier and his gear into battle. Soon a factory was set up in Moscow producing hundreds of “motorchairs.” As demand and appreciation for the Russian motorchair spread throughout the military, the top Russian strategists worried that the factory in Moscow was within easy range of German bombers. The decision was made to move the motorchair plant further east, out of bombing range, and into the middle of the resource-rich Ural mountain region.

A site was chosen in the small trading town of Irbit, located on the fringe of the Siberian plains. The only building on the site was a brewery, and it soon was converted into the first research and development building to prepare for the construction of a massive new production complex to build the "Irbit Motorchair.” Over 5,000 “Irbit’s" as they came to be known within the military, (they still had no official name), were produced for the Russian Army during W.W.II.

The Irbit featured front-wheel drive, a small gasoline-powered engine, and mechanical steering. The Russians soon found that the Irbit was an ideal tool in bolstering their ground troops. Rather than placing injured soldiers in an infirmary, they had a way to keep all but the most seriously injured soldier fighting through the use of an Irbit. It wasn’t uncommon for a soldier to have his leg amputated one week, and then be in an Irbit, fighting in battles the next. They fought against the Germans in many sectors, and must have mightily surprised the German sidecar gunners when they came up against wounded Russians riding “motorchairs" with mounted machine guns. The history of the Irbit began with the glory of helping to defeat the terror of Hitler's armies on the Russian and European battlegrounds.

Until the late 1950's, the Irbit was built exclusively for the military, when the Russians built another plant in the Ukraine, and the Irbit Motorchair Works (IMW), began to concentrate on motorchairs for domestic consumption. The popularity of the Irbit grew steadily with the Russian disabled population; however, do to the development of refined electric mobility products in the 1960's, IMW closed its doors in September of 1968, allowing the Irbit Motorchair to find its resting place in history. The Irbit has all but disappeared after over three decades; however, if you ever get a chance to wander about Moscow, you may still see one traveling down the road.