walnohg posted this picture at the Cohort, whic he says he found at vintag.es, a source of some previous old snapshots shown at CC. He didn’t identify it, so I did a bit of Googling. It turns out to be a homebuilt sports car, which is of course inevitable as Russia wasn’t exactly building sports cars in the 50s. Arkadij Dmitrievich Babich was the builder, and needless to say, it got a lot of attention in Russia at the time. There’s even a video of it in action.
I found this info and video at a post on kinja.com, and the source there say that it was Babich’s third home built car, and that it was powered by a 90hp 3.5 L six cylinder engine from a GAZ-12 (ZIM) limousine. Apparently Babich went on to build a lightweight tube frame for the succesful KVN2500S sports racing car, a car no one in the West was familiar with as it only raced in iron Curtain countries.
Remarkably, the Babich still exists, and will supposedly be restored “some day”.
Quite interesting. It looks like the windshield structure was radically changed from the top photo. The tops of the front fenders look to have been shaved down some as well. It would be fascinating to see more documentation of the changes that were made during the car’s life, I’ll bet there were quite a few of them over the years.
Interesting. It was quite a looker back in the day. Very low and wide.
The other three in the video are interesting as well. More crude but interesting none the less. Thanks for sharing.
I suppose it’s time that CC got into the cars from the USSR. I suppose there is a grey-market Zil out there somewhere in the USA just waiting to be written up.
I may have a few entries to write up along those lines quite soon… haven’t seen a ZIL yet, but I’m in the former USSR for a few days yet!
The LeMay collection in Tacoma Wash., has a Chaika and Zil (both looking like Packards with Imperial limo roofs, and pushbutton trans, and other assorted pieces) looking like 55-56’s but much later
Here’s a pic of the Chaika in the Lemay Family collection. That place is definitely worth visiting.
I did see a couple of ex embassy cars in a museum workshop here in NZ awaiting restoration however those pics are in a long dead harddrive
Amazing find, Paul! Also note the much more prosaic ZIS-154, a GM “Old Look” coach clone in the top photo. They were 4.65 liter diesel electric hybrids and built from approximately 1947 to 1950.
Gene, it’s actually a ZIS 155. The one number made a huge difference, in that ZIS took the Old Look body and stuck it on a front engine truck chassis. You can see the radiator, and this bus had the rear doors set almost all the way back.
The ZIS 154 was as you described, except I believe it was license-built, not simply a clone.
Thanx for the clarification, TPG. I did notice a few obvious differences like the door placement but figured if I’d seen one Zis “Old Look” clone, I’d seen ’em all, LOL!
The resemblance is uncanny.
…and when you open the “hood” you’ll be greeted by a GM 2-stroke diesel clone, made by the Yaroslavl motor works (JaMZ).
And how ’bout that bus in the background? Odd entry door location.
How was he able to build this? Or even allowed? Did he have pull with the regime? From what I ever read about the USSR back in those “fun filled” days of yesteryear, seems like this would have been a miracle.
I think you have a somewhat too simplistic view of live in the USSR. He obviously had more privelages and access to resources than average. There was no law about building your own car, in fact, there were a number of home built cars and sports cars back then. And as I pointed out, there was an Soviet bloc racing circuit back then, so folks were building cars to race too.
Watch the video; there’s a section where folks are showing off their home-built cars.
” He obviously had more privileges and access to resources than average”
Was exactly my point. And my view of the USSR in the 1950’s is NOT at all “simplistic” The average Ivan, made very very little in the way of cash, They had massive amounts of free social services to make up for it.,according to Soviet history in the Khruschev era. There where “reforms” implemented by the government starting in 1956.But real income lagged way behind the free worlds per capita income. Just sayin’
Well if he could pass it off as “technical research” he would have had a lot easier to obtain parts.
The homebuilt car movement in the USSR was called Avtosam. The Leningrad was(or is) one of the famous ones. At some point in time the engine campacity was limited to 1.5 liters or even less, so 99% of homebuilt cars were small, otherwise they would not get a title.
Here is a pic of my favourite car from the avtosam movement it had a V8 sourced from a Chaika and a tube frame. And by the looks of it those wheels came off a helicopter.
another picture
…and it had gullwing doors
That is really impressive. Looks better built and designed than modern kit cars.
It also looks to have been partly inspired by the East German EMW 340/1 prototype, which was sort off development of the BMW 328 made at the old BMW factory in Eisenach.
Great detective work Paul. I had no idea where to start but was sure someone at CC could/would identify it.
Thanks.