BERLIN—German industrial orders fell more than expected in August on weaker demand from abroad following two months of unusually strong gains due to major contracts, data showed on Wednesday. The figures published by the Federal Statistics Office showed orders for goods ‘Made in Germany’ were down by 7.7 percent on the month in seasonally adjusted terms. A Reuters poll of analysts had pointed to a drop of 2.1 percent on the month. German car companies are struggling to meet a post-pandemic surge in demand since the start of the year due to a lack of microchips and other intermediate products which is holding back the recovery of Europe’s largest economy. The steep drop on the month was partly caused by previous orders for planes, ships, and other large vehicles which had pushed up orders by 4.9 percent in July and 4.6 percent in June, the office said. Without this distorting …