st. The Russian company Sherp LLC, which produces all-terrain vehicles of the same name at a plant in St. Petersburg, will change its trademark from Sherp to Arkhant. This was reported to socialbites.ca by the Sherp company itself.
“We are launching a new Arkhant brand with which we will produce unique off-road vehicles. So, St. All-terrain vehicles based on a prototype invented in St. Petersburg by Alexei Garagashyan (Russian engineer, creator of the first cult car Sherp – socialbites.ca) receive a new life, a new breath, a new name, ”The official representative of the company .Ru he told .
According to him, a whole family of snow and swamp vehicles will be created under the Arkhant brand, which will include both familiar vehicles and new models that have never been produced before.
In particular, in August, a new base model with an open body will be shown on the Army 2022 forum, its name will not be revealed until the official premiere.
The snow and swamp vehicle, which is under renovation for rescue teams, is planned to be exhibited at the stand of the Ministry of Emergencies. In addition, the current model range includes the four-wheel Sherp N all-terrain vehicle and the two-section ten-wheel Sherp 10.
Disconnected from Ukraine office
Historically, the world-famous Sherp snow and swamp vehicles were produced at two businesses: St. Petersburg – for the Russian market – and in Ukraine near Kyiv – for export to other markets. At the beginning of this March, socialbites.ca Wrote With the outbreak of military events in Ukraine, the founder of Sherp, Ukrainian businessman Vladimir Shkolnik, announced that all patents for brand and technical developments from the Russian “daughter” were canceled.
In the Russian Sherp office, they announced that they will continue to produce all-terrain vehicles of the same name, despite the hindrance of the former Ukrainian partner. However, the company admitted that the rupture of relations has caused some difficulties in the procurement of some components. Now this problem is solved – for the production of Arkhant, the Russian company had to find alternative suppliers for a number of parts, including ultra-low pressure wheels, which were previously supplied from Ukraine.
“Today we can say that the problem with the production of wheels has been resolved. st. They will already have the logo of our Arkhant trademark, with which we will sell all-terrain vehicles manufactured at a factory in St.
Also, the Arkhant all-terrain vehicle will receive a different power plant from the Ukrainian version.
Instead of the Japanese Kubota diesel engine and manual transmission, the car will be equipped with an 85-horsepower 1.0-liter gasoline engine combined with a variator. The brand and country of origin of the new engine in the Sherpa (the name of the legal entity has not yet changed) have not been named. The carrying capacity of the new model is 1 ton, and the weight of the machine in the basic configuration is 1600 kg.
The new version of the Arkhant all-terrain vehicle (pictured) will be lighter than its predecessor and will not be as comfortable as before.
The Russian Sherpa explains that this is a simplified first version, which, if desired, can be strengthened with the necessary options. But in the most budget version, the cost of this car with rollover protection instead of a hard roof is estimated at only 5 million rubles, against 10 million rubles for existing Sherpas equipped with a kung superstructure. The body for the new off-road vehicle will be made of plastic rather than aluminum.
At the same time, Sherp LLC claims that despite the public statement by Ukrainian businessman Vladimir Shkolnik about the ban on the production of Sherp all-terrain vehicles in Russia, licenses and other bans that significantly affect the work of the enterprise were not revoked. manufactures land vehicles.
socialbites.ca contacted Sherp’s Ukrainian office with a request to comment on the company’s stance on the attempts of the divided Russian production and possible steps against it, at the time of publication the editors did not receive a response.
According to information from the SPARK-Interfax database, Ukrainian businessmen Vladimir Shkolnik and Sergey Samokhvalov owned Russian Sherp LLC in equal shares until July 2021. Then the Russian citizen Ekaterina Gavrina became the only owner of this company, who had no other business. According to current data from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities,
Its CEO since March 18, 2022, Eduard Pavlov is the sole founder of the company.
Autoreview columnist Konstantin Sorokin says that at Arkhant replacing the diesel engine with a gasoline engine with a CVT seems like a necessary measure under sanction conditions, the CVT in such a car may be less durable.
“If a company releases a lighter and cheaper version, it will likely promote it for tourism use. Most likely without the winter operation, ”Sorokin argues in an interview with socialbites.ca.
The expert adds that such an all-terrain vehicle is not well adapted for use in government structures, due to its extremely low payload and capacity. Sergei Burgazliev, an independent automotive industry consultant, believes that the base price of 5 million rubles for a snow and swamp vehicle of this class looks quite attractive.
“Such machines are needed, but production volumes are small – we cannot speak more than a few dozen per year.
Arkhant’s position is quite good, considering that there is very little competition in this segment, Burgazliev told socialbites.ca.
From a technological point of view, the production of special tires for Sherpa seems like an insignificant task: only manufacturers of rubber for special equipment, non-standard size, as well as a Burgazliev, emphasizes that he conducts rubber compound and tests for them.