Soviet cars

Almost all cars created in the USSR were copies of foreign models. It all started with the first Ford licenses. Time passed, copying became a habit. The USSR Scientific Research Automobile Institute bought samples for study in the West and after a while produced the Soviet analogue. However, by the time of release the original was no longer available.

Volga, Lada, Gas or Moskvich. These are the most famous Soviet car brands in the days of the USSR. Despite this, you will not find many enthusiastic owners of old cars who were satisfied with owning Soviet vehicles. The thing is that most cars manufactured in the Soviet years were very unreliable due to the build quality.

The reason for the dubious reliability is that most cars created in the USSR were based on foreign analogues. But due to the planned economy of the Soviet Union, car factories were forced to save on virtually everything. Naturally including savings on the quality of spare parts. Despite the quality of the fleet in our country, we have a rich history of the auto world. 

Unfortunately, many Soviet automobile brands ceased to exist after the fall of communism and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Fortunately, some of the auto brands of the Soviet era survived and exist to this day.

Nowadays, the popularity of Soviet vehicles has grown again, as many car models are now of collectible and historical value. Of particular interest to the public arises to rare and sometimes strange cars that were produced during the Soviet era.

 Some of these models existed only in the form of prototypes, which never went into series. Particularly exclusive are cars that were built by private engineers and designers (homemade products).

We have collected for you the rarest Soviet cars that appeared in the Soviet Union and make the history of our domestic auto world much more interesting.

GAZ is the most famous automobile brand in our country. Cars under this brand were produced at the Gorky Automobile Plant. In 1952, the GAZ automobile plant introduced the GAZ-62 car, created to replace the Dodge “three quarters” military utility vehicle (WC-52), which was used by the Soviet army during the Great Patriotic War.

Car designers used several innovative solutions to create the GAZ-62. So the car was equipped with airtight drum brakes, as well as a fan for heating the passenger compartment.

 The car was equipped with a six-cylinder engine with a capacity of 76 hp. This allowed the car to accelerate to 85 km / h.

It is worth noting that after the creation of the prototype GAZ-62 passed all the necessary tests. But some design problems did not allow to start the car in mass production. As a result, in 1956, GAZ began working on a new prototype.

In 1954, a small group of engineers was tasked with building a special military vehicle for military purposes. The order came from the USSR Ministry of Defense.

On the instructions of the Ministry, it was supposed to be a truck with four axles of wheels, which would be able to drive through almost any terrain, carrying with it a large amount of heavy cargo.

As a result, Soviet engineers introduced the ZIS-E134 model. As requested by representatives of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR, the car received eight wheels, four axles located along the entire length of the body, which made it possible to create a pulling force that was similar to the strength of armored tank vehicles. As a result, the ZIS-E134 truck easily coped with any rough terrain, which allowed him to go there where no equipment could reach.

In 1963, the ZIL-E167 off-road military vehicle was built in the USSR. The machine was designed to move in the snow. ZIL-E167 was equipped with three axles with six wheels. On non-snowy sections of the road, the car could accelerate to 75 km / h. In the snow, the truck could only accelerate to 10 km / h. Yes, his speed was very slow. Nevertheless, the car had an amazing cross in the snow. So for ZIL stuck in the snow, something incredible had to happen.

It is often called the first passenger car of the USSR, although NAMI-1, which received a short ticket to life thanks to small-scale assembly, is more correctly considered a prototype. This phaeton is a prototype of a mass passenger car for the needs of the young Soviet republic. And for the “first pancake” everything turned out well. It is respected, for example, the development process itself. After all, NAMI-1 was not a licensed or, as often happened, unlicensed copy of a foreign analogue, but was an example of creative understanding of the technical and engineering trends of the era. Hence, by the way, the accusations of copying Tatra 11 (spinal frame) or Lancia Lambda (general body design).

Another plus of NAMI-1 is its initial fitness for operation in the USSR. We note a huge 26-cm ground clearance, the curb weight is almost half a ton, which provides good cross-country ability on bad roads, and the simplicity of design, expressed, for example, in the absence of a differential, an air-cooled motor and a complete rejection of control devices (on the first versions of the model) . With good basic qualities, NAMI-1 lacked only a gloss of engineering refinement. It is this circumstance, as well as difficulties with the preparation of mass production, that got in the way of an interesting machine. They decided to start motorization of the USSR with cooperation with the overseas concern Ford, and NAMI-1, after several hundred copies issued in a semi-artisanal way, moved from roads and streets to museums and storerooms.

At present, this project would be called the defense of the dissertation, rather than a concept car. But you just look at these forms and correlate them with the year of release! In the early 30s, aerodynamics in automotive engineering only got up off its knees and took its first timid steps. And it is so nice that in this progressive movement there is also the contribution of domestic talent.

In fact, the A-Aero of the Moscow engineer Alexei Nikitin was an exquisite aerodynamic body worn on the chassis of a standard GAZ-A. The car was not just unusual and attractive. All of the Aero’s main beauties, such as integrated headlights, closed rear arches and an enlarged keel, worked to reduce drag. And they worked not only in theory, but also in practice. During the tests, “Aero” concept car, to put it mildly, surprised others by a quarter with reduced fuel consumption and a maximum speed that increased by almost 30 kilometers per hour compared to the base “gazik”. It is a pity that this wonderful aerodynamic story has not been continued. The A-Aero itself disappeared without a trace.