When Soviet-made cars roamed Singapore roads(remembersingapore.org)
remembersingapore.org
When Soviet-made cars roamed Singapore roads
https://remembersingapore.org/2025/10/30/soviet-made-cars-singapore-70s-to-90s/
78 comments
I wanted to cross a mountain in Uzbekistan by bike. As I found myself pushing my bike up a dry riverbed full of large stones, I thought, “Who the hell mapped this as a vehicle track on OpenStreetMap? No one could drive this”. And then I was twice passed by locals in some ancient Soviet-era vehicles that coped with the terrain just fine. I had to respect that tech, which could probably be repaired with simple tools.
Not sure what they were, though. LuAZ-1302? Liva Nivas? Simple Lada models (whether praise or mockery) are part of folklore in several countries outside the former USSR, but I feel like Soviet 4WD vehicles are talked about less internationally.
Not sure what they were, though. LuAZ-1302? Liva Nivas? Simple Lada models (whether praise or mockery) are part of folklore in several countries outside the former USSR, but I feel like Soviet 4WD vehicles are talked about less internationally.
Spaniard here. My dad owned a Lada Samara too; but infinitely tweaked in order to fit the standards on security from Spain in the 90's. It couldn't compete with most of the cars made form the West in the 90's (especially on acceleration and top speeds) but it worked without many issues over 20 years.
Yes, upon entering the cars of my friends' relatives it often was like entering an F16 because of how smoothly their hit 100 kph on highways, but I'm sure most of these modern cars with ABS and whatnot had had repairing/fixing issues in the upcoming years (and not cheap to fix).
Yes, upon entering the cars of my friends' relatives it often was like entering an F16 because of how smoothly their hit 100 kph on highways, but I'm sure most of these modern cars with ABS and whatnot had had repairing/fixing issues in the upcoming years (and not cheap to fix).
In the Netherlands the East German Trabant was a fairly populair hipster car in the 1960s and 70s. East Germans were considered the good Germans.
Dutch customers ofcourse paid in hard currency that the DDR desperately needed so they were quite happy to export them.
Dutch customers ofcourse paid in hard currency that the DDR desperately needed so they were quite happy to export them.
Which country was that in? I assume not in Singapore, because you'd probably have just taken public transport to school?
Taking an account “growing watermelons”: either Southern Ukraine or somewhere is Caucasus
beautiful Moldova ;)
delicious food, tasty wine and reasonably priced dentists ;)
i've only ever been to Chisinau but i loved every bit
We had a Lada 1200 when I was a kid. Mid/late 1970s. The car was a 1:1 copy of the Fiat 127 if I remember correctly.
It served my family well for many years, and for us, it was "sort of" rock solid. That a Lada was "rock solid" was in no way the norm. People were saying that we had a Wednesday model, meaning it was assembled on a Wednesday.
The saying goes that the quality of cars built on Monday/Tuesday was impacted by the hangovers the workers had from all the vodka drinking during the weekend. For Thursday/Friday cars, the workers were already mentally gone on the weekend but on wednesdays the workers were fresh and motivated, and did their job proper.
We were lucky and that car took us kids on many road trips all across Europe. I remember that the car seat was covered in plastic, and on our first trip from cold Denmark to sunny Italy, we all got burn marks from the seats and had to stop buying some covers.
It served my family well for many years, and for us, it was "sort of" rock solid. That a Lada was "rock solid" was in no way the norm. People were saying that we had a Wednesday model, meaning it was assembled on a Wednesday.
The saying goes that the quality of cars built on Monday/Tuesday was impacted by the hangovers the workers had from all the vodka drinking during the weekend. For Thursday/Friday cars, the workers were already mentally gone on the weekend but on wednesdays the workers were fresh and motivated, and did their job proper.
We were lucky and that car took us kids on many road trips all across Europe. I remember that the car seat was covered in plastic, and on our first trip from cold Denmark to sunny Italy, we all got burn marks from the seats and had to stop buying some covers.
Export cars were made with some special care, for years buying a car destined for export was preferable to a brand new one built for domestic market, even if "scratch and dent".
My father always carried a bunch of membranes for the fuel pump, a spare accessories belt, distributor, fuses and possibly something else. Every item in the list was a result of limping somewhere with a vague hope of finding the part in stock - crap quality compounded with deficit made pretty much every trip a bit of a gamble. Driving schools also taught maintenance and troubleshooting, having a private car was perceived somewhat like a mechanic hobby.
I doubt it was the norm with Western/Japanese cars by the 70s.
My father always carried a bunch of membranes for the fuel pump, a spare accessories belt, distributor, fuses and possibly something else. Every item in the list was a result of limping somewhere with a vague hope of finding the part in stock - crap quality compounded with deficit made pretty much every trip a bit of a gamble. Driving schools also taught maintenance and troubleshooting, having a private car was perceived somewhat like a mechanic hobby.
I doubt it was the norm with Western/Japanese cars by the 70s.
Probably it’s worth mentioning that the repair shops as we know them today didn’t exist in the world of Soviet cars. So everybody was responsible for his car and the owners were forced to spent weekends under the car in garage blocks sharing tools, knowledge and beer.
The manuals for the Lada were epic. In a quick search for an original one I came upon this [1] which is an English version one, which is even better than what I was looking for! It describes the entire car's operation and mechanism in extensive detail along with descriptions of how to replace parts, what might go wrong, and more.
I'm not sure that 'just send it to the repair shop' was an overall improvement in society in so many ways. In modern times those shops are infamous for exploiting people's ignorance and ripping them off to an absurd degree, and it primarily affects the lower socioeconomic groups within society, since the upper groups tend to cycle through relatively newer cars more regularly, in part to avoid having to deal with long term maintenance issues.
[1] - https://archive.org/details/manualzilla-id-6025672/mode/2up
I'm not sure that 'just send it to the repair shop' was an overall improvement in society in so many ways. In modern times those shops are infamous for exploiting people's ignorance and ripping them off to an absurd degree, and it primarily affects the lower socioeconomic groups within society, since the upper groups tend to cycle through relatively newer cars more regularly, in part to avoid having to deal with long term maintenance issues.
[1] - https://archive.org/details/manualzilla-id-6025672/mode/2up
My dad would always buy a "Hanyes" manual for our second hand cars in the UK, as inevitably there would be something to fix. These were comprehensive 3rd party manuals.
I have also gotten them for newer early 2000s cars. Never had to use one for my 06 Vauxhall though. Apart from some standard things that really need a repair shop (replacing the exhaust for example) I've never had an issue or breakdown.
The cars I see on the side of the motorway are always new, feels like there was a period before electronics really took over that most cars were pretty bulletproof.
I have also gotten them for newer early 2000s cars. Never had to use one for my 06 Vauxhall though. Apart from some standard things that really need a repair shop (replacing the exhaust for example) I've never had an issue or breakdown.
The cars I see on the side of the motorway are always new, feels like there was a period before electronics really took over that most cars were pretty bulletproof.
You’re looking at a repair manual, which would be expected to describe operation and function in detail. These are available for all cars if you know who to ask.
I recall looking through owner’s manual for a domestic VAZ 2101. It was standard stuff, but certainly didn’t go into detail about knolling your car.
I recall looking through owner’s manual for a domestic VAZ 2101. It was standard stuff, but certainly didn’t go into detail about knolling your car.
Why can't we have both?
Ability to self-service your car but repair shop if you don't have the skills, tools or don't want to do it yourself.
Ability to self-service your car but repair shop if you don't have the skills, tools or don't want to do it yourself.
Repair shops are a necessity.
Not everyone can learn even the basics of car maintenance. There are a lot of drivers on the roads today who wouldn't be able to do even something as simple as top up the oil or change the tires. And actual repairs, even on older simpler cars, even with an exhaustive technical manual and modern learning aids like video tutorials or AR overlays? Fat fucking chance.
There are ways around that. You can keep the cars simple to repair and also expensive and unavailable, so that only the people with tech know-how and/or willingness to learn it get them. Make cars as tools for professionals and tech enthusiasts, like PCs were in the 80s or construction equipment is now. Or you can make the cars cheap and disposable enough that if one fails, you can just send it to a scrapyard and get a new one.
I don't like either of those workarounds, so repair shops are the least bad option.
Not everyone can learn even the basics of car maintenance. There are a lot of drivers on the roads today who wouldn't be able to do even something as simple as top up the oil or change the tires. And actual repairs, even on older simpler cars, even with an exhaustive technical manual and modern learning aids like video tutorials or AR overlays? Fat fucking chance.
There are ways around that. You can keep the cars simple to repair and also expensive and unavailable, so that only the people with tech know-how and/or willingness to learn it get them. Make cars as tools for professionals and tech enthusiasts, like PCs were in the 80s or construction equipment is now. Or you can make the cars cheap and disposable enough that if one fails, you can just send it to a scrapyard and get a new one.
I don't like either of those workarounds, so repair shops are the least bad option.
> Not everyone can learn even the basics of car maintenance.
Why do you think? Outside of extremely rare disabilities, I do not understand why you would believe this.
Why do you think? Outside of extremely rare disabilities, I do not understand why you would believe this.
A lot of users have an extreme level of resistance to learning tech. Which applies even to the most simple of instruction-following operations.
They aren't clinically retarded. They could learn those things if someone forced them to. But you, as a product developer, can't force them. It's utterly impractical to overcome that resistance for a mass market product.
It's easier to make a car that doesn't require oil changes than it is to make every car owner learn to perform oil changes.
They aren't clinically retarded. They could learn those things if someone forced them to. But you, as a product developer, can't force them. It's utterly impractical to overcome that resistance for a mass market product.
It's easier to make a car that doesn't require oil changes than it is to make every car owner learn to perform oil changes.
>It's easier to make a car that doesn't require oil changes than it is to make every car owner learn to perform oil changes.
No, it's not. There's fairly low level physics and chemistry reasons you can't make a car that doesn't need oil changes. Oil changes could be about as difficult as swapping out toner cartridges if they cared to make it that way though.
Please keep your Prius out of the left lane.
No, it's not. There's fairly low level physics and chemistry reasons you can't make a car that doesn't need oil changes. Oil changes could be about as difficult as swapping out toner cartridges if they cared to make it that way though.
Please keep your Prius out of the left lane.
EVs are on the roads right now, and most of them don't require oil changes at all. The oil in sealed in the gearbox, with no combustion to foul it, and is rated for the lifetime of the entire car.
And, have you ever seen a user? Like, an actual user, in person? 1 user in 5 is capable of swapping out toner cartridges. Kicking the can to the tech support dept (for oil changes: to the service shops) is how it's done in real life.
And, have you ever seen a user? Like, an actual user, in person? 1 user in 5 is capable of swapping out toner cartridges. Kicking the can to the tech support dept (for oil changes: to the service shops) is how it's done in real life.
>EVs are on the roads right now, and most of them don't require oil changes at all. The oil in sealed in the gearbox, with no combustion to foul it, and is rated for the lifetime of the entire car.
You're being misleading. Nobody is changing the comparable oils in their ICE car with any serious regularity either. When people talk about oil changes they're talking about motor oil.
>And, have you ever seen a user? Like, an actual user, in person? 1 user in 5 is capable of swapping out toner cartridges.
99/10 can probably read the instructions and do it themselves if they care to try.
>Kicking the can to the tech support dept (for oil changes: to the service shops) is how it's done in real life.
Yes, that's how it's done in the office where you have people who's job it is to do those things. Are you incapable of emptying your trash can because the janitor does it? Even the most useless people living within the highest touch HOAs are changing their own printer ink and cleaning out the garbage collector in their dishwasher and the filter in their HVAC. There's no reason the basic stuff on a car couldn't be on that level of complexity.
You're being misleading. Nobody is changing the comparable oils in their ICE car with any serious regularity either. When people talk about oil changes they're talking about motor oil.
>And, have you ever seen a user? Like, an actual user, in person? 1 user in 5 is capable of swapping out toner cartridges.
99/10 can probably read the instructions and do it themselves if they care to try.
>Kicking the can to the tech support dept (for oil changes: to the service shops) is how it's done in real life.
Yes, that's how it's done in the office where you have people who's job it is to do those things. Are you incapable of emptying your trash can because the janitor does it? Even the most useless people living within the highest touch HOAs are changing their own printer ink and cleaning out the garbage collector in their dishwasher and the filter in their HVAC. There's no reason the basic stuff on a car couldn't be on that level of complexity.
> if they care to try
You need to have that "if" reviewed by a regulatory body - with how much load you make it bear.
The issue isn't that 99 users out of 100 are actually retarded and incapable of doing a thing. The issue is that they don't want to. And wouldn't want to. And you would need multiple generational leaps in mind control technology to change that at scale.
You need to have that "if" reviewed by a regulatory body - with how much load you make it bear.
The issue isn't that 99 users out of 100 are actually retarded and incapable of doing a thing. The issue is that they don't want to. And wouldn't want to. And you would need multiple generational leaps in mind control technology to change that at scale.
Some 45% of current Americans around 25 years old hold an Associate degree or above.
Looks like you're telling us that US college is on par with changing car oil.
Looks like you're telling us that US college is on par with changing car oil.
I visited Rumania around the year 2000. I remember being surprised by the sight of a whole bunch of similar Dacias at the end of a (muddy) street, in various state of disrepair. The person we visited explained that people were repairing their cars by taking parts from other cars, as there were no spares, or they were very expensive (the average Rumanian was pretty poor at that time). And since nearly everyone drove a Dacia 1300 (tried to guess the model; they looked like a Renault 12), there were plenty of donor cars around, and people learned how to fix their cars from their neighbours.
That can't last forever, of course, but it shows there are other ways.
That can't last forever, of course, but it shows there are other ways.
The Canadian export versions of the Lada full-size sedans had doors reinforced with beams for increased safety. So structurally, they were indeed built a little better.
There were several other features like western carburetors and emissions controls, but these were likely be a “temporary” improvement for the domestic market as those parts wear out and would likely be replaced with local parts.
The thing about JDMs is they tend to be more desirable than export versions, because of whatever quirkiness that gets left behind at the time of export.
There were several other features like western carburetors and emissions controls, but these were likely be a “temporary” improvement for the domestic market as those parts wear out and would likely be replaced with local parts.
The thing about JDMs is they tend to be more desirable than export versions, because of whatever quirkiness that gets left behind at the time of export.
There's no such thing as a Lada full-size sedan. The longest one was something like 4.15m long. Contemporary American "mid-size sedans" were over 5 meters long and even "compact sedans" were quite a bit bigger.
My mistake, I meant the 2106/2107s that were sold in Canada. I am not sure if wagon variants were part of the lineup as well.
I said full-size to mean the “largest” RWD sedan offering to contrast with the 2121, 2108 and variants that were also sold in Canada. Make no mistake these cars were small compared to contemporary offerings.
I said full-size to mean the “largest” RWD sedan offering to contrast with the 2121, 2108 and variants that were also sold in Canada. Make no mistake these cars were small compared to contemporary offerings.
Anything with “export” variant was considered better (in consumer goods 100%). Even butter
Which has now looped around because you can get cheap 'export' beer in grocery stores here (western Europe) which is pretty much guaranteed to be produced in the same breweries as the premium brands like Heineken. These breweries never stop producing because empty tanks are wasteful.
> We had a Lada 1200 when I was a kid. Mid/late 1970s. The car was a 1:1 copy of the Fiat 127 if I remember correctly.
Ladas were common over here until the late 80'ies. They all but disappeared during the 1990'ies. They weren't exactly known for quality compared to Western cars, but they were cheap, and easy to fix by yourself if you were so inclined.
And yes, the story behind the Lada was that the Soviets made a deal with Fiat to acquire an obsolete factory. So the entire factory was dismantled and shipped to the USSR. And then they just kept producing the same model, with extremely minor changes, for decades.
Ladas were common over here until the late 80'ies. They all but disappeared during the 1990'ies. They weren't exactly known for quality compared to Western cars, but they were cheap, and easy to fix by yourself if you were so inclined.
And yes, the story behind the Lada was that the Soviets made a deal with Fiat to acquire an obsolete factory. So the entire factory was dismantled and shipped to the USSR. And then they just kept producing the same model, with extremely minor changes, for decades.
> And then they just kept producing the same model, with extremely minor changes, for decades.
That's not true, though. The first models were, practically, Fiats, but then they diverged and the second generation (produced in the 80s) had significant changes. Niva had nothing to do with Fiat from day 1, it was developed internally
That's not true, though. The first models were, practically, Fiats, but then they diverged and the second generation (produced in the 80s) had significant changes. Niva had nothing to do with Fiat from day 1, it was developed internally
The Niva was actually a very modern car when it was released. I think it was one of the first unibodied AWD.
I'm not sure when the Niva was initially made but I have memories of rusted Nivas from the late 80s to early '90s already.
It was released in 1977 and afaik is still sold under the "niva legend" name in several countries while the "niva" name is also used for the rebranding of some GM based models.
It is not the car you'd want to commute on, or drive in highways but it is a super decent offroader. I'd probably choose the Suzuki Jimny over a brand new Niva Legend though.
It is not the car you'd want to commute on, or drive in highways but it is a super decent offroader. I'd probably choose the Suzuki Jimny over a brand new Niva Legend though.
> I'd probably choose the Suzuki Jimny over a brand new Niva Legend though.
Semi-offtopic, but what decent 'proper' off-road vehicles are available on the market these days? Seems many (most?) of the 'traditional' brands like Jeep and Land Rover as well as most pick-up trucks have long since switched to the 'luxury SUV/truck' market rather than actual off-road vehicles.
Semi-offtopic, but what decent 'proper' off-road vehicles are available on the market these days? Seems many (most?) of the 'traditional' brands like Jeep and Land Rover as well as most pick-up trucks have long since switched to the 'luxury SUV/truck' market rather than actual off-road vehicles.
> 'traditional' brands like Jeep and Land Rover
Well that ship has sailed long ago no? I am 45y old and since I was a kid I have always seen them more as urban toys than anything despute their real off road capabilities.
To me traditional off-road vehicles brands are more like Toyota, Isuzu, Santana, Nissan and Mitsubishi. These are the ones you really see off the road frequently.
Well that ship has sailed long ago no? I am 45y old and since I was a kid I have always seen them more as urban toys than anything despute their real off road capabilities.
To me traditional off-road vehicles brands are more like Toyota, Isuzu, Santana, Nissan and Mitsubishi. These are the ones you really see off the road frequently.
I recently came back from a safari in Africa and the standard vehicle for it is a Toyota J70.
According to a bit in one of Arthur Haley's potboilers, American manufacturers would ensure that VIPs got "mid-week cars", with the notion that the last weekend's drinking would have lost its effect by Tuesday, and that the next weekend' drinking wouldn't start until Thursday night.
Assuming that this is so, I wonder what effect Monday Night Football had on Tuesday quality.
Assuming that this is so, I wonder what effect Monday Night Football had on Tuesday quality.
It would’ve been great if it was a 1:1 copy, but the soviets made the design cheaper to produce and less reliable.
There were Lada dealers up until the nineties here in NL, but few people drove them. I've never heard anyone describe them as reliable though. To the contrary.
Loved the Lada jokes. "How do you double a Lada's value? Fill up its tank" could apply to quite a few modern cars with terrible depreciation curves
What do you call a Lada with a sun roof?
A skip.
Why do lada’s have heated rear windows?
To keep your hands warm while pushing them.
Ladas and skoda’s where reasonably common in the UK in the late 80s/early 90s, I always had a bit of a soft spot for them, seeing Skodas resurgence after VW took over was cool as well, Skoda went from a laughing stock to winning car of the year pretty quickly and now people generally like the brand.
A skip.
Why do lada’s have heated rear windows?
To keep your hands warm while pushing them.
Ladas and skoda’s where reasonably common in the UK in the late 80s/early 90s, I always had a bit of a soft spot for them, seeing Skodas resurgence after VW took over was cool as well, Skoda went from a laughing stock to winning car of the year pretty quickly and now people generally like the brand.
Heck, we made that joke about the Yugo.
There is a Yugo parked near a brewery in Queens NYC that always blows my mind. It's still in decent shape for its age and must be driven regularly as it's always in a different parking spot.
Or the one that made it into an Australian TV advert. Guy walks into a service station.
“Got a windscreen wiper for my Lada?”
“Yeah, mate. Sounds like a good deal to me.”
The related Trabi (made of paper, some claim) have had their value multiplied
https://www.thestar.com.my/lifestyle/living/2024/03/27/trabb...
https://www.thestar.com.my/lifestyle/living/2024/03/27/trabb...
The classic claim was that the Trabi was made out of cardboard.
Of course, that's a myth: the Trabi was actually made out of cheap plastic.
The Trabant was actually a decent modern car when it debuted in 1957. The problem is that they produced it until 1991, when it was far from modern.
I was born in Zwickau, where the Trabant was produced. It's no accident that they picked Zwickau for the production, because that's where Audi's predecessor company (Horch) had made their cars before.
(Going on tangent: Audi is Latin for 'listen', and Horch is German for 'listen'.)
Of course, that's a myth: the Trabi was actually made out of cheap plastic.
The Trabant was actually a decent modern car when it debuted in 1957. The problem is that they produced it until 1991, when it was far from modern.
I was born in Zwickau, where the Trabant was produced. It's no accident that they picked Zwickau for the production, because that's where Audi's predecessor company (Horch) had made their cars before.
(Going on tangent: Audi is Latin for 'listen', and Horch is German for 'listen'.)
> the Trabi was actually made out of cheap plastic
Today it would be called an 'advanced composite material', e.g. it's closer to fiberglass than plastic and used recycled materials: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duroplast
Today it would be called an 'advanced composite material', e.g. it's closer to fiberglass than plastic and used recycled materials: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duroplast
The Trabi was made of duroplast. Sussita, the only Israeli car (similar vintage) used fiberglass (only slightly better). I guess both had the advantage of being lightweight (and cheap).
[deleted]
The Trabant was a normal car if you look at what the rest of Europe was driving at the time. In fact the DDR did not economically collapse until the late 1970s.
Ofcourse the real problem was they could not actually make enough of them. You could go to a Citroen dealer and pick up a 2CV the same day.
Ofcourse the real problem was they could not actually make enough of them. You could go to a Citroen dealer and pick up a 2CV the same day.
BMV (which sounds same as BMW is most languages) - Bakelite Motor Vehicle.
"Do you know why Ladas have a heated back-window? To warm your hands while you are pushing."
Singapore is an unusual market when it comes to cars...
To put it in perspective, a Toyota Camry today costs $207,000 (US dollars).
That includes the Certificate of Entitlement - that allows you to actually drive the car for 10 years. After 10 years you can renew the CoE, but that's about $100K so most people don't want to pay that to take a 10 year old car to age 20. As a result there are almost no older cars on Singapore's roads.
The upside is very little traffic congestion.
To be fair, the public transport is outstanding and the services like Grab (think Uber) are ubiquitous and reasonably priced.
To put it in perspective, a Toyota Camry today costs $207,000 (US dollars).
That includes the Certificate of Entitlement - that allows you to actually drive the car for 10 years. After 10 years you can renew the CoE, but that's about $100K so most people don't want to pay that to take a 10 year old car to age 20. As a result there are almost no older cars on Singapore's roads.
The upside is very little traffic congestion.
To be fair, the public transport is outstanding and the services like Grab (think Uber) are ubiquitous and reasonably priced.
It does sound like driving is only for the rich, but then, Singapore is too densely populated for cars to be a realistic large scale transport thing.
I think older cars are becoming rare in other places as well, here in the Netherlands only hobbyists keep older (>20 years) cars around because maintenance gets more and more expensive, mechanics / work hours are easily something like €75 an hour. But also, a huge amount of used cars are exported towards eastern Europe.
I think older cars are becoming rare in other places as well, here in the Netherlands only hobbyists keep older (>20 years) cars around because maintenance gets more and more expensive, mechanics / work hours are easily something like €75 an hour. But also, a huge amount of used cars are exported towards eastern Europe.
The Fiat 124 was actually a pretty good car for its era. Russians improved its suspension, refitted the engine, and messed up the hydraulics. Still, pretty good car for the 60s. And then, they continued to produce the same car with miniscule modifications until 2010s.
That's the problem with authoritarian regimes. You can buy a plant by a fiat (pun intended), but you can't make a decent car by a decree.
That's the problem with authoritarian regimes. You can buy a plant by a fiat (pun intended), but you can't make a decent car by a decree.
They could have done much better if it was a priority. The priority however was tanks, nuclear submarines and missiles. Up to 25% of GDP was outright wasted on the military.
Considering reliability and quality of those tanks and missile platforms - it wouldn't be better.
Not within the socialist system, there was absolute zero incentive to do a quality job. Sometimes there were incentives to do more on the quantity (see "udarnik") with moderate success but these were detrimental to the quality.
I too have fond memories of my dad driving me around in our navy blue Lada. Not sure what the model was, but it was the one with rectangular headlights, not round.
The chassis on that thing was solid metal.
I remember one time when I was in the back and my dad took a rather sharp turn at a major junction and the rear door swung open. I calmly alerted him to the situation and with one hand on the steering wheel and one hand reaching behind, somehow got the door closed whilst I sat semi-afraid for my life.
I remember the horn also broke so he rewired it to a custom red button that he mounted on the driver's door handle.
I remember one time when I was in the back and my dad took a rather sharp turn at a major junction and the rear door swung open. I calmly alerted him to the situation and with one hand on the steering wheel and one hand reaching behind, somehow got the door closed whilst I sat semi-afraid for my life.
I remember the horn also broke so he rewired it to a custom red button that he mounted on the driver's door handle.
I remember getting a Volga taxi to the airport in Bulgaria in the 1990s. The taxi drivers wife sat with me in the back, passing around cigarettes. It turned out that every time it went round a corner it stalled so she was there to help restart it. Fortunately I was not in a hurry and there were not too many corners. I gave them a large tip in the hope they could buy a better taxi.
My father got genuine Soviet Moskvich aimed for soviet domestic market in 1976. Piece of shit and pure comedy.
I tried to start when I inherited it, but eventually needed nearest Soviet Citizen to start it. All you needed to do is to remove a spark plug and pour some vodka in.
Quite obvious on hindsight.
I tried to start when I inherited it, but eventually needed nearest Soviet Citizen to start it. All you needed to do is to remove a spark plug and pour some vodka in.
Quite obvious on hindsight.
For my parents' first car - they were between a Lada Samara and a (then recently re-designed by Bertone) Skoda Favorit. I was more of a Lada person, but one of their friends convinced them that Skoda is much better and they went along with it. I was upset for quite a while - but now looking back at it - although Lada had its appeal, I see that they made the right choice with their limited amount of money.
They were all over the place in Panama in the 1980's.
The Niva model (Lada's SUV) even had a crank starter...just in case.
It still makes me sad that Lada Niva is such a missed opportunity, basically world's first SUV with 4wd, unibody and coil spring independent suspension. The 2-door version looks good even.
Could have been a huge success if not for the quality and compromises in the engine/transmission.
Could have been a huge success if not for the quality and compromises in the engine/transmission.
It is strange. On the first photo of the article I actually don't see a single Soviet-made car.
Meanwhile, in the USSR itself, if you wanted a car, thanks to the planned economy, you couldn't just go and buy one. There was a queue you had to register in and wait for months, maybe years.
The quality was crap. The cars came out of the factory essentially unfinished — you had to take your new car to a workshop to have an anti-corrosion coating applied for example.
The quality was crap. The cars came out of the factory essentially unfinished — you had to take your new car to a workshop to have an anti-corrosion coating applied for example.
Fun fact, there were no commercials in the USSR. No TV advertisements as a genre, so nobody knew how to make these. And one of the first Soviet commercials I saw was already during perestroyka, and it was about Lada. It was 15 minutes long, and it featured a line (sorry, may be misremembering it a bit) "if your brand new car doesn't start, no worries! Just take a 10mm wrench, and tighten the battery bolts. See how easy it is!"
There actually were commercials and they were ridiculous.
"Demand <product> in your local store". If you tried to demand something from the demigods of soviet trades you'd be laughed out of the neighborhood.
"Demand <product> in your local store". If you tried to demand something from the demigods of soviet trades you'd be laughed out of the neighborhood.
> Fun fact, there were no commercials in the USSR.
Actually there were, at least in some parts of USSR. Search youtube for "Harry Egipt" for some fun examples.
Actually there were, at least in some parts of USSR. Search youtube for "Harry Egipt" for some fun examples.
Scarcity wasn't the only reason, there was also poverty. A qualified engineer with 10 years of experience would need to save all his salary for a few years. Very few people could afford cars from their official salary.
The USSR was robbing people of the fruits of their labour to make stupid amounts of tanks, incite guerillas all over the world and build useless railroads to nowhere.
The USSR was robbing people of the fruits of their labour to make stupid amounts of tanks, incite guerillas all over the world and build useless railroads to nowhere.
Yes, one of the paradoxes of Soviet Union was that used cars were more expensive than new cars, at least in the 80s. That was exactly because of the sales restrictions. You needed a special permit for a new car. These were usually distributed by trade union, in quantities like 1 permit per year per your_workplace. Used cars, however, were sold on "free market".
The only car I ever driven was Lada...
They still roam Cuban streets today.
The Venn diagram of people who think capitalism is bad and people who never saw a Lada is a single circle.
My uncle had a Lada 2101 ("Kopeyka", i.e. "1 cent") and that was a rust bucket, but he also drove it on unpaved country hills for decades. He was growing watermelons and he used his Lada to transport the watermelons to the farmer's market. You would be amazed to see how many watermelons fit in that small car.
Both of these were better than my grandfather's Moskvich. I actually liked the rugged feel of the Moskvich, but it had a known design fault with the handbrake causing it to malfunction, so for uphill parking purposes, we always had to carry a brick or two in the trunk.