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"The Ni-Zn batteries were a heavy load – over 380kg of weight. The engine had 25 kWt (35 hp) which could get the car up to 90 km/h." a car that weighs nearly 1

• jotm 8y ago
  Well, Li-Ion was mass adopted way after the fall of the USSR, so back then Ni-XX is all they had. The Ford Endura Diesel engines provided ~60 HP, but were more than good enough for everyday use. If they kept up with it, electric may have been quite standard by now. Of course, the US had electric cars almost a century before,which were abandoned, as well. And electric batteries are still nowhere near petrol by energy density. It seems like a good experiment for the times.
• stmw 8y ago
  The Tesla battery packs are ~500kg, so what's changed is the power - 320kW or something.
• dpwm 8y ago
  > reminds me of the old joke... Despite the jokes, the 80s ladas weren't so bad. My dad had a second-hand one in the 90s (almost certainly from mid 80s) and it was a pretty solid car. There was a degree of simplicity to the maintenance that was uncharacteristic of other cars at the time. I don't recall it needing any major work doing to it at any point. It also had windscreen wipers on the headlights which I recall a strange fascination with because at night the blades would cast moving shadows across the road. When he sold it, it was snapped up quick for the Russian market. However, the power of the electric lada in the article does sound more worthy of the old jokes. It still seems pretty ambitious for the day and certainly surpasses my expectations on range.
  • EugeneOZ 8y ago
    lol, it was clearly an exception. Soviet cars (all russian cars except Kamaz) are total trash. My father spent 30 years of his life by repairing them.
    • readhn 8y ago
      You have no idea what you are talking about. First lada, for instance, was not a "soviet" car. It was a product of FIAT. Ural Motorcycle was really a BMW creation etc. etc. Henry Ford helped build some of the first Soviet cars (starting in 1929). By 1935, the Soviets had produced 100,000 Ford-designed vehicles. Soviets often "borrowed" western product designs and presented them as miracles of soviet industry.
      • bch 8y ago
        Ural was not a BMW. It was a Russian product based off an (old) BMW design. There’s a difference. Construction and materials don’t naturally follow just because they liscensed a design.
        • readhn 8y ago
          Russians acquired the design and production techniques for BMW motorcycles and sidecars from Germans. Basically german tech reproduced in russia. "According to official accounts, after lengthy discussion, the BMW R71 motorcycle was found to closely match the Red Army's requirements. Five units were covertly purchased through Swedish intermediaries. Soviet engineers in Moscow dismantled the five BMWs, reverse engineered the BMW design in every detail and made molds and dies to produce engines and gearboxes in Moscow."
      • Fins 8y ago
        Fiat that the USSR bought wasnm't exactly a pinnacle of automotive engineering to begin with (as an American joke goes, FIAT stands for "Fix it again, Tony", doesn't it?) Initially, while all the Italian equipment was operating within design tolerances, Italian expendables were used, and designs weren't tweaked, it wasn't terrible for what it was. But that did not last long, and quality went downhill. To add insult to injury, Lada (or strictly speaking Zhiguli, Lada was the export name, and those were built slightly better) was a highest-end car a normal person could buy (after waiting in line for a few years, of course) without being "somebody".
  • philjohn 8y ago
    As others have said, must be an exception! My dad got my mum a Lada in the late 80's as it seemed a good deal ... that thing was horrendous and always breaking down. Another joke from that time "Why do Lada's have heated rear windscreens? To keep your hands warm while you're pushing them"
    • dpwm 8y ago
      I never knew if the jokes were just cold war propaganda or entrenched in some kind of reality. The design of the Lada definitely went back some way. But for his needs it wasn't a bad car. My dad tinkered with cars and did everything himself. Maybe from a consumer point of view the car wasn't great, but then judging by the comprehensiveness of the toolkit that came with the car it perhaps wasn't aimed at the average consumer. I have since heard from other sources that the electrics could vary between perfect and terrible in Ladas, and that the bodies could be prone to rust. But both things were not uncommon with more mainstream cars of the time. I think the main problem my dad had was getting hold of parts in the UK. > Another joke from that time "Why do Lada's have heated rear windscreens? To keep your hands warm while you're pushing them" I remember many of those jokes being interchangeable with Lada and Skoda. Incidentally, my dad's next car was a Skoda Favorit. I'm not sure the jokes were really relevant there. It is quite interesting how Skoda now enjoys one of the better reputations of brands under the VW group.
      • eccbits 8y ago
        Don't know but wouldn't all cars be prone to rust in Russian winter and breakdowns on your awful roads? :) Came w toolkit, sounds like a gamer's overclocking PC!
        • close04 8y ago
          It does sound a bit strange when I hear people comparing the reliability of cars driven in conditions that are literally and figuratively worlds apart. And I'm thinking of climate, quality of roads, availability of professional repair, etc. Since very few Ladas were ever driven in California, and very few Chevys in Russia it's hard to be fair. They are both the products of local conditions.
• Gibbon1 8y ago
  My dad owned a late 60s Ford Cortina, 1600cc push rod engine, which probably made 100hp on a good day. If you look at it's 1959 predecessor it was about 1000cc and made 39hp. That Cortina also was a POS. 'Some' 1950's and 1960's American cars weren't POS. Everything else was. I don't think until the Japanese automakers efforts at world domination in the 1970's did you see high quality reliable ordinary cars.
  • jacobush 8y ago
    Volvo was always damn reliable from 1950-s on through 1991 as long you as you changed oil, or at least topped it up regularly. Can't kill it, there's almost nothing to go wrong with it. Same basic engine design for 40 years. (B18, B21.)
• rdtsc 8y ago
  > > "what do you call a lada on top of a hill?" > "a miracle." Heh. My driving instructor who enjoyed soviet cars told us of a trick to get cars like that up the hill - turn around and go back up the hill using the reverse gear.
  • nradov 8y ago
    Yes reverse has a lower ratio than 1st on many cars.
  • patrickg_zill 8y ago
    The Ford Model T and maybe the A also were driven like this. Personally I think that the Lada Niva is interesting.
    • ollie87 8y ago
      The Fords where due to how the fuel tank worked, not a lack of power.