These photos were taken by me in the fall of 2007, and only recently found in some backup on an old removable hard drive. Very low quality, sorry about that, but they show some very interesting details of a rare factory V8-powered Volga – many details which were often removed later because they were of no use to the “civilian” owners.
There is not very much info about these cars on the Internet, so I suppose even such photos would be of some interest. To the best of my knowledge, 275 cars of this model were built between 1987 and 1993. Very few survived, and none is completely original because a lot of cool “special purpose” equipment was ripped out before they were sold into private hands.
Oh, I’ve warned you, the photos are really crappy… But I just have to show these two. As you can see, outwardly this is just you regular GAZ-24-10 Volga. Appearances are often deceiving…
The two guys on the right, if you are interested are the owner of the car and my Dad, barely visible (Hi, Dad!).
Now on to the more interesting parts. This photo is a bit out of focus – again, sorry about that. At least you can clearly see that it is a V8… and some details of the layout under the hood. That bulbous thing behind the radiator is the oil cleaning centrifuge. These engines did not have oil filters, because who needs an oil filter anyway?
Yeah, I know, should’ve taken some photos of the serial number data plate. I didn’t…I’m not even sure if it existed at all (the place where it should be seems to be empty). I don’t even remember the year of manufacture. Shame on me…
Some details are visible here. This V8 engine is a late one (can’t remember the exact model… must’ve been ZMZ-503, though). Closed crankcase ventilation, cast aluminum valve covers, etc.
The “civilian” ignition coil on the valve cover is obviously a later add-on.
More interesting details. Look at the distributor. It seems that this car still had some remnants of the original ignition system that was shielded against Electromagnetic Pulse. A common thing for Soviet military vehicles (nuclear warfare and all…). When new, it looked somewhat like this (maybe not exactly like this, though, as this is a UAZ version):
The ignition wires were attached via a screw-on plug connector – you can see its female counterpart on this photo.
That roundish silvery thing on the left – I wasn’t completely sure what it was, but it definitely looks like some piece of military equipment. Some Googling revealed that this is a military FR-series Radio Frequency Interference Filter. Cool. I guess resistor spark plug caps just weren’t enough to prevent the ignition system from interfering with radio transmission.
GAZ-13 Chayka 4-barrel carburetor, K-114 model. Nothing special about it other than the prodigious amount of grit and dirt.
Now, to the interior. Once again, abysmally poor photo. But anyway, there is nothing special about it – just a normal 24-10 Volga interior…
But wait! Why is this shifter bent at such an awkward angle (the normal Volga manual transmission shifter is absolutely straight)?
That’s right – this car has a 3-speed automatic transmission. Shift pattern is R-N-D-L (I’m almost sure there was no Park, which is typical for these old GAZ transmissions). Simple enough so you don’t need marked positions, just pull it back one click and go. In D the car starts in second, so you have to shift into L to engage first gear.
These two pedals look pretty normal… Unless you know that both are brake pedals… no clutch pedal in an automatic transmission car, obviously. Just look how badly worn they are. This car must’ve been through a lot.
More interesting details. This is some kind of an inventory number. Remember, these cars were all originally assigned to some vehicle fleets. There are several of these all over the car.
There are several pedestals for some kind of special equipment in the trunk. The common explanation (a better word might be “legend”) is that the pedestal on the second photo is for a concrete block, used to provide some additional traction in winter. Doesn’t seem to be the case, though…
Another explanation (much more realistic) is that it is a pedestal for a mobile radio telephone. Not a modern cell phone, mind you – a big, chunky 1970’s style car phone with an external transceiver in the trunk. The handset, the control head and the loudspeaker would be located between the front seats. Something like this.
According to the owner, the pedestal on the right (not visible) was for a secondary battery.
I really should’ve bought this car when I had the chance. But at least I have the pictures to share here.
Looking at the three pedals and the shifter I would have though manual theres no quadrant for the auto shifter, this would have been quite a weapon amongst four banger Ladas and the like
Oh boy, I sure picked the wrong unmarked Volga…was I speeding, ofitzer politsei?
Amazing stuff. And some questions: I am unsure if you’re having a laugh with the two brake pedals, and if you’re not, please do explain! It does say on Wikipedia it retained the 4-wheel drums of the normal Volga but included a 28 gallon tank, so anything’s possible (including Wikipaedia having your underbonnet photo!). Also, no oil filter, but why?
Holy crap, two brake pedals! Are the front and read independently actuated, like a motorcycle? Or was this a primitive attempt at a dual circuit brake system?
We get so used to looking at American, European and Japanese engineering. Russian engineering is a whole different thing. This is a really, really foreign car.
The twin brake pedal thing is wild. Front/back? Or left side/right side as on a tractor? Or maybe just redundancy in case of sabotage. Whichever way it works, it is a fascinating concept – when it’s easier to reconfigure the brake system than it is to leave a pedal out of the car.
Judging by the even wear on both pedals, I’d say it is not a redundant system, nor is one pedal a “stealth” pedal without brake lights. Clearly both pedals are used as service brakes in some capacity.
Russian engineering! Imagine that.
Extremely interesting!
Oil centrifuge: Cyclones are common for air filtration, so it makes sense for liquid also… but I’ve never seen one before.
Left brake acts on rear only for ‘handbrake turns’? Or just a pedal with no switch for brake lights, for visual and signal stealth?
EMP protection: I’ve always read about Russian caution on EMP, using vacuum tubes and so on, but the distributor shield doesn’t fit in that context. EMP makes trouble for low-voltage semiconductor systems, and everything in an old-fashioned distributor is already designed to take strong fields by definition. I’d guess this shield is protecting something else from the distributor’s noise.
The diagram on that interference thing shows a Pi-filter, common in shortwave radio.
Maybe the car contained a radio receiver that needed to pick up delicate low-frequency signals. Monitoring the superhet oscillator from receivers in dissident’s homes?
More likely it was just designed for total radio stealth, so the car couldn’t be ‘seen’ by other spy services.
Scania trucks used to use them. They left a rubbery deposit on the sides of the chamber. They were simple, and effective.
I’m thinking of the four-power military “tours” in and around Berlin that were done in the Cold War which sometimes turned into high-speed pursuits or at least attempted ones; the US ones in the East started with regular Ford and Chevy sedans, then Jeep Wagoneers and finally Mercedes G-Wagens, the British favored big Opels towards the end (notably not Vauxhall-badged UK-spec cars) and if the Russians used any V-8 Volgas on them they *did not* share them with the East German Stasi who were left trying to keep a tail on the above Western cars using apparently off-the-shelf Wartburgs.
I think the Simca 1000 also had an oil centrifuge.
FIAT 850 had centrifuge oil filter on crankshaft pulley.
So did our Polish Fiat 126p. I was told by an automotive engineer working at the time for the car maker that adding an actual filter extended the life of the engine by a significant margin.
Somewhat off topic but my ’68 175 and ’73 450 vintage Honda motorcycles have oil centrifuges as filters. They do work, but every 1000 mile oil changes ease my worries.
Don’t worry about crappy pics, my childhood albums all look like this. I blame all those cheap cameras people used.
Anyway thanks for sharing! Those two brake pedals are just wild. I’ve never seen anything like it.
So I wonder – how did these government vehicles end up in the hands of private owners after the collapse of the USSR? (I assume this was an ex-Soviet gov car?) Who acquired them, and who sold them to civilians?
Some seriously cool pics of a machine I have barely heard of. Thanks for sharing! Wonder when Edelbrock is gonna start selling Weber built versions of that carb…
To all those wondering about the pedals, it’s simply one pedal split in two pieces, both of them connect to one cylinder and move simultaneously, not much of a spy technology tbh
Their equal wear just points out how scared were the drivers whenever they needed to stop the machine because the brake system was still a stock Volga, designed for less weight and power
Interesting, thank you for the explanation. It does look weird though.