As part of the German reparations after World War II, the Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe had to cede 120 vehicles of Class C to the Moscow Metro.

To continue services of this route, Kleinprofil (narrow profile) vehicles of Class AI were transferred from route U2 and had wooden running boards, popularly called Blumenbretter ("flower shelves"), attached to their sides.

[citation needed] As a continued operation of narrow profile cars on the wide profile line was economically not viable in the long run, BVG commissioned a new class, later designated E, for Berlin U-Bahn.

Prototypes of a new class of U-Bahn trains were drawn up beginning in 1952, and after the West Berlin BVG was permitted to take exact measurements and detailed photographs of one of their Class C vehicles in 1954, LOWA in Ammendorf designed and built two new motor cars from 1955 to 1957.

[2] The new vehicles were a steel frame construction with a rounded roof and four double sliding doors for passengers on each side.

[4] Because of the steel construction, the vehicles weighed almost 40 tonnes each and were, therefore, heavier than those of Class C. This and various other shortcomings were the reason why no production models of those trains were built.

Although the RAW in Schöneweide was tasked with fixing some of the faults and building two matching trailers, a lack of capacity prevented this, and the vehicles were stabled in 1961.

The dimensions differed only little from those of the vehicles of the Moscow Metro, signifying plans to export such cars.

After the opening of the Tierpark station, there was a need to increase capacity on Line E. Therefore, the BVB had to convert five more trains which is from the DR Class 275.

The BVB needed to order new trains because of the extension of line E from Tierpark to the Hellersdorf area and Hönow.

It had contracted several trains from the Berlin S-Bahn and those selected D57/D60 units from the BVG which was originally destined to be scrapped.

For safety reasons, the ceilings of the manufacturer plate were given after the trains were burnt out at the Klosterstraße station.

On the other hand, enormous efforts have been made by the industry to develop a modern S-Bahn train.

Most of the trains were also serviced in the Wannsee depot in the meantime before transferring to the reunified Deutsche Bahn on 1 January 1994.

The vehicles had received no major studies, the last unit 1818/1819 left on 11 January 1993 from the RAW in this state.