In the 1920s, the Reichsbahn introduced the concept of express express transport in order to get the relatively small amount of urgent goods quickly to their destination. Initially, tank locomotives were used, which were actually intended for passenger transport, and they were used to pull short freight trains with a maximum of twelve axles. Since these ran faster than regular freight trains and ran directly to the handling facilities without stopping at platforms, short travel times could be achieved. In order to further optimize this approach, in 1930 initially three four-axle diesel railcars were procured for freight transport from the Wismar wagon factory. These allowed more effective deployment of personnel than steam-hauled trains, could turn back at the terminus when traveling solo without being turned and optionally also pulled a small number of freight cars.

The exterior of the railcars was partly reminiscent of express train baggage cars, with the exception of the jackshaft and coupling rods on the powered bogie. It was powered by a Maybach diesel engine, which initially produced 150 hp and was soon adjusted to 165 hp. A further development of this engine with 175 hp followed later. Power was transmitted through a four-speed mechanical gearbox. 

The low price of coal at that time is assumed to be the reason why no more railcars of this type were procured. The three pieces were assigned to the Aachen and Osnabrück depots and labeled as freight cars. In action, it was observed that they sometimes ran alone and sometimes with up to three two-axle cars. After the war, all were taken over by the Bundesbahn and designated as VT 69 900 to 902. In order to continue to have a suitable power output, they got new engines with 210 hp there. Eventually two of them were retired in 1960 and the third in 1962.

These vehicles, also known by their later DB designation ETA 179, were put into service by the Reichsbahn from 1926 dubbed the “six-axle storage railcar”. A total of only 17 units were built, but these were used very extensively, especially on branch lines. Some locomotives achieved mileages of almost 10,000 km per month in the thirties.

The railcars consisted of two parts, each of which had three axles approximately equally spaced. The inner axle was driven, the energy for it came from accumulators mounted under the floor. With the state of the art at the time, these accounted for a considerable part of the total weight and, with their total capacity of 225 kWh, allowed operation for around three hours. With an output of 142 to 172 kW and a service weight of at least 70 tons, the cars reached 60 km/h, which was sufficient for branch lines and spared the batteries.

All but one survived the war and were then used by both German railway administrations. The Bundesbahn received eleven units and used them as ETA 179 until 1960. The Reichsbahn received the remaining five and continued to operate them with the original numbering. They were last used in the Gotha area and were retired in 1968. One of these is the only survivor today, having returned to its last operational area in 2001 in a very badly weathered condition. Since then it has been painstakingly restored to its original state.

Between 1935 and 1937, the Reichsbahn had three different electric railcars manufactured in order to evaluate the optimum propulsion technology for future high-speed railcar service. Thus, the electrical equipment of each vehicle came from a different manufacturer and the mechanical part came from a total of two manufacturers. What the trains had in common was that they consisted of two self-supporting car bodies with a total length of around 43.5 meters. These not only had rounded front sides to reduce air resistance, the paneling was also partially pulled over the bogies and unevenness in the edging of windows, doors and signs was avoided. As with the express diesel railcars, the planned top speed was 160 km/h.

The three sets were initially given the numbers elT 1900 to elT 1902, but were eventually renamed ET 11 with the running numbers 01 to 03. While the car body of the 01 came from Maschinenfabrik Esslingen, the car bodies of the other two examples were built by MAN. BBC supplied a Buchli drive for the 01, SSW nose-suspended motors for the 02 and AEG a helical-spring drive for the 03.

The vehicles were used on long-distance routes in southern Germany, especially on the Munich-Stuttgart route. For later production models, the not yet electrified connection from Munich to Berlin was also planned. Except for a few improvements to the bogies and the ventilation, they were considered a successful design, but the outbreak of war meant that no series production took place. All three survived the war unscathed and then joined the Bundesbahn. In the network, which was not yet or no longer fully electrified, it was difficult to cover long distances with these vehicles. Eventually, connections between Munich and Salzburg and later between Munich and Frankfurt were established, but these were discontinued in 1961. Only the ET 11 01 was used as a service vehicle until 1971 and was then preserved to this day, the numbers 02 and 03 were scrapped.

The ET 165 is a class of pre-war railcars for the Berlin S-Bahn, which to this day has the highest number of railcars in Germany. They were built in a short period of time between 1928 and 1931 and were in daily use until 1997.

The vehicle concept envisaged that two cars, which always remain coupled together in everyday life, form a so-called quarter train and up to four of these quarter trains are connected depending on demand. Since each part had its own power train, the same power-to-weight ratio was available for every train length. Each quarter train consisted of one motor car and one control car. Later, the control cars were replaced by trailers and all existing control cars were converted to trailers. The power supply via third rail had the advantage that the vehicles were supplied directly with 750 volts DC and no longer needed their own transformers. Each of the two bogies of the motor car had two nose-suspended motors connected in series, which were each operated with 375 volts. Furthermore, weight was saved by making the load-bearing parts in a new alloy and the cars were around seven to nine tonnes lighter than their predecessors.

638 motor cars, 465 control cars and 173 trailers were built, which quickly dominated traffic on the Berlin S-Bahn. There were still a few teething problems, such as the wooden doors, which often warped, and the bogies needed improvement, but these were gradually fixed. As a result of the war, some vehicles came to various eastern countries, where some of them remained in use for a long time.

In the post-war period, traffic in both parts of Berlin was rebuilt with these vehicles. In West Berlin in particular, their number fell continuously in the 1970s and 1980s, as large numbers of new vehicles were procured and the existing vehicles were only modernized to a limited extent. Nevertheless, some were still in service after the takeover by Deutsche Bahn AG and were used until 1997 as the class 475/875 together with their sisters from East Berlin.

In the east, a large part of the vehicles had been reconstructed from 1979, as had already happened with the successor class. In addition to the interior design, the front sides were also modernized. The vehicles converted in this way were renamed from class 275 to 276¹ and were only retired in 1997 together with the West Berlin vehicles.

The Reichsbahn designated a series of multiple units designed for urban express services as ET 25. Initially they had consecutive numbers from elT 1801 onwards. Their procurement began in 1935 in parallel with other multiple units designed for different speeds. One power car and one control car were provided for each set, with the transformer and other equipment only being in the power car, but the outer bogie was powered in both parts. The power was provided by two nose-suspended motor per bogie, each with an hourly output of 230 kW. With a maximum speed of 120 km/h, they were below the express multiple units, but were fast enough to offer efficient connections between cities further apart.

A modified variant was made up of one set that was converted by a private operator after the war for use on the Höllentalbahn. The grid there was based on 20.000 Volts alternating current at 50 Hertz in order to be able to use the frequency of the national electricity grid. In addition to a total output increased to 1,540 kW and a top speed reduced to 90 km/h, this vehicle also had a dynamic brake and a magnetic rail brake. It was finally used by the Bundesbahn as the ET 255 and restored to its original version in 1962.

Most of the 39 units built were also operated by the Bundesbahn at this time. They had been modernized together with other, similar types and some intermediate cars were created from defective motor cars and control cars. The original round shape of the front ends was replaced by a new, more angular one with slightly slanted windows, as was also seen on other vehicles. They were renamed class 425 in 1968 and were used until 1985. On the territory occupied by the Soviet Union, all roadworthy multiple units had to be handed over to the Soviet Union immediately after the end of the war. The only ones left were two motor cars and a control car, from which a three-part set was restored. This one-off was renamed the class 285 in 1970 and was retired two years later. It remained in Wurzen station for another 20 years, until the scrapping was finally tackled.

The elT 1301 to 1313, which were designated as ET 31 from 1940, were one of the classes of multiple units for intercity traffic at speeds of up to 120 km/h. In contrast to other railcars of the time, the sets each consisted of three parts, each of which had its own drive. In the years 1936 and 1937 a total of 13 trains were completed and distributed to Munich, Nuremberg and Breslau. Each of the three cars had two nose-suspended motors in one bogie, each with an output of 275 kW over an hour. This enabled them to achieve an acceleration that would have been relatively good even for suburban multiple units.

Towards the end of the war only one of the Silesian train sets could be saved to Bavaria. A total of four had been destroyed in the war, four were in the western zone, two had gotten stuck trying to save them in the eastern zone and the remaining three remained in Poland. The two sets in the eastern zone and two of the three in Poland had to be handed over to the Soviet Union. 

At the Bundesbahn, the train sets underwent an unusual conversion. The initial situation was that there was a shortage of functional multiple units, but a number of ET 25 control cars were still available and it was also believed that two powered cars out of three would be sufficient. So the four three-car ET 31 were taken, divided into six groups of two and an ES 25 was added to each of them. Now there were six multiple units designated as ET 32, each of which had the wheel arrangement B-2+2-B+2-2 or B-2+B-2+2-2. A special feature was that there was a gangway between the control car and the adjacent motor car, but not between the two motor cars.

The latter disadvantage was corrected from 1963 with a thorough modernization. The end faces were given a new shape, which could also be found in other post-war vehicles of the Bundesbahn. Two of them were converted again, with the control car becoming the middle car and the second motor car being equipped with a driver's cab. From 1968 these vehicles became the classes 432 and 832. They were retired in 1984 and scrapped except for one example, which suffered the same fate in 2010.