Three decades on the assembly line is not a record for our country. And Moskvich-412, by the way, has changed over the years no less than other domestic centenarians.
But in the last century and a half of his life – at the end of the 20th century – Moskvich completely ruined his reputation.
However, in his life there were not only falls, but also lights.
Step-by-step
From the early years of the MZMA’s life, the will of circumstances gave birth to a tradition that was followed for years: an evolutionary development path. New items were gradually introduced in the production model. And by the time the new bodywork was on time, some components and assemblies had been transferred to it from a discontinued car. And again, improved components and parts were introduced in the new body. The evolutionary path had both advantages and disadvantages. And Moskvich-412 is a good example of that.
The body is from Moskvich-408, originally from 1964. In the second half of the 1960s, against the background of foreign analogues, the car looked quite fresh and original. But the engine and other units on the “four hundred and eighth” were from the previous Moskvich-403.
Motor Moskvich-412 stood in the 408th body is very tight and tilted.
And yet Moskvich-412 for the plant was a revolution, and an important one. For the first time since 1947, an engine that had nothing to do with the previous one appeared. Before that, the cylinder block of another Moskvich-400, in its first life, an Opel, formed the heart of all engines.
The chain-driven overhead valve engine Moskvich-412 developed 75 hp. Of. at 1.5 liters working volume. This ratio was considered reasonable even at the end of the twentieth century.
The history of copying the Soviet unit with BMW, which has been particularly popular for a while, of course, has a real basis. Of course, Moscow designers, led by Igor Okunev, studied the Bavarian unit – one of the best in its class at that time. But it was still not a copy of the 412th engine. It has a different geometry, layout, shape of the combustion chamber. And most importantly: an aluminum block with cast iron sleeves! While the BMW engine was made of cast iron.
For the USSR, this was a particularly wise decision. After all, the repair was reduced to the replacement of bushings and pistons of a single one, and not to repair sizes. And the rings could be replaced without removing the motor, just dismantling the head and removing the sleeves. In the 70s – 80s, the Ufa 412 engines ran 150 thousand km without problems for the owners and practically without consuming oil between replacements.
And 75 forces, even against the background of eminent Western competitors of the early 1970s, is a very solid indicator. Let’s say a 1.5-liter Ford Taunus 17M engine developed 60 horsepower. The 1.7-liter Opel Rekord engine produced the same amount. The Audi 80L engine developed 80 horsepower, but with a working volume of 1.7 liters.
AZLK veterans said the 412 engine’s power was not overrated when it went into production, which would make sense in today’s mores, but underestimated. The chief designer of the factory, Alexander Andronov, understood that if a certain high commission was missing from checking a few “horses”, the Moscow and Ufa factories would be in trouble. Serial engines easily developed 80 horsepower and 75 forces – by a margin. The powerful motor Moskvich-412 logically relied on a hydraulic vacuum brake booster, a license for it was purchased from Lucas.
Officially, the production of Moskvich-412 in Moscow began in 1967, commercial vehicles, in fact, went in 1968. Just in the year when MZMA, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Komsomol, was renamed AZLK – the car factory named after Lenin Komsomol . Almost immediately, production was launched in Udmurtia – at a new plant in Izhevsk.
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“RACERS”The film by Igor Maslennikov starring Yevgeny Leonov, Oleg Yankovsky and Moskvich-412 was released in 1972 on the wave of real sports, including international, successes of this model. For many young people of that time, the picture became a cult – and even now it seems easy.
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Express Moscow — Izhevsky
The history of the appearance of the plant in Udmurtia is interesting and even funny in its own way. In Izhevsk, it was said that in the mid-1960s, when the idea arose to build a giant new factory in Stavropol on the Volga, which would soon become Togliatti, the country’s leadership against the issue of foreign currency to western technology. for cars. The influential Dmitry Ustinov, then not yet the defense minister, but the secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, which oversaw the defense industry, thought so too.
Ustinov believed that if we want to increase the production of cars, then our own and already used Muscovites. All reconciled, they say, the Secretary General Leonid Brezhnev. As a result, both factories were built. For the release of Muscovites – in one of the Soviet capitals of the military-industrial complex, where there was experience and personnel for such production. Incidentally, the factory was not subordinate to the Ministry of the Automotive Industry. This is partly why it was claimed in the 1970s that the Muscovites from Izhevsk were better made than those from Moscow. I think it’s still a legend. Technology and components were the same. Includes Ufa motors and useless Omsk boxes.
Izhevsk cars later received all kinds of innovations than those in Moscow: soft finish of the instrument panel, other interior improvements. The vast majority of Udmurtia’s 412s had round headlights instead of the rectangular ones that had been on Moscow Muscovites since 1970. But after 1973, when the IZH‑2125 Combi went into production, a small part of the sedans were also equipped with very fashionable and more efficient headlamps for the time.
The Muscovite I got to see is exactly like that – 1974. You could say it’s rare.