Let me tell you, this epic battle is gonna make the Cuban Missile Crisis look like a kiddie squabble at the day-care center! Will Soviet-made Fiat technology triumph over 4,500 pounds of very rusty Detroit iron? Let's take a look at the combatants:

Otherwise known as the VAZ-2107, the Fiat 124-based Lada Signet was available in Canada right up through the end of the Cold War, so our own Comrade Teargaskov went up to Canada and brought back a running $200 example. This team isn't messing around; they've got a PA system in the car to crank the Hymn Of The Soviet People on the track, no doubt intimidating the other racers with the indomitable spirit of the revolutionary cadres, in addition to all the requisite red flags, hammer-and-sickle emblems, and the coolest 1921-in-Leningrad-style car numbers we've ever seen. Here's a little video that shows how seriously Total Loss Racing is taking this thing. The Lada is a simple, sturdy rear-wheel-drive machine and might rack up a lot of laps over the course of the weekend. Oh, did I mention that this race is a true 24-straight-hours event, with no overnight break to fix busted cars?

Now, when we heard that a Lada would be racing, we figured that nothing on earth could possibly challenge a Soviet car for the Index Of Effluency. Then Team Police Brutality (whose Lincoln Continental Mark VIII was one of the fastest cars at LeMons South) picked up a terrifyingly wretched '61 Cadillac sedan about two weeks ago… and figured that they had plenty of time to get it ready to race. No, really! Crazy as it sounds, they've got it most of the way there; the roll cage is installed, the engine runs, and the brakes are, uh, awaiting completion. The reason for all the urgency is that Team Police Brutality is racing to raise money to beat up breast cancer, LAPD style, and they're getting backers to pledge a buck per lap completed during the race to Susan G. Komen For The Cure. Want to join those backers? Go here and sign up! The question is, how many laps can a drum-brake-equipped rustmobile that hasn't budged for decades complete? More than the Lada? We'll find out next weekend!

Naturally, we need to make a contest out of this battle, with fabulous prizes from LeMons HQ for the winner. To enter, just put the number of laps you think each car will finish in a comment below. The course is about two miles long and the race will go a full 24 hours, so the faster cars that run the whole time might get 600+ laps. These two cars aren't going to be so fast, and they will almost certainly might fall apart experience some technical difficulties on the track… but you never know! Win the contest and LeMons HQ will send you some shirts that they can't get anyone to buy at the races cool 24 Hours Of LeMons swag!



Total Loss Racing's 1987 Lada Signet


Team Police Brutality - Beating Up Breast Cancer's 1961 Cadillac Series 62

You can't contemplate Soviet machinery without the Red Army Choir performing The Hymn Of The Soviet Union, so crank up the volume! The air-cooled MEMZ 45° V4 was the powerplant used in the beloved Zaporozhets, a true proletariatmobile built from 1958 through 1994. The MEMZ-968 was the largest and most powerful of the Zaporozhets engines, displacing 1.2 liters and generating 42 horsepower, and it was used from 1972 all the way to the end of the vehicle's run in 1994. It was simple and easy to maintain, very well suited to the climatic extremes of the Soviet Union, and definitely qualifies for workhorse status.
[Wikipedia, MEMZ official history]

In addition to the shots of junkyard-loving ladies posing with these relics of the Soviet era, we get an added bonus: what appears to be a Moskvich veteran of the 1970 London To Mexico City World Cup Rally (or some Russian car freak's replica). These shots were on EnglishRussia a few years back, but this sort of thing never goes stale.
[netwind.ru]

JasonTorch, member of the Make:Way 24 Hours Of LeMons Ford Escort team, did a big double-take when he saw this mysterious sedan. It turned out to be a GAZ Volga 24-10, which was built during the final years of the Soviet Union. We can't tell you how its owner managed to get California registration for it, though we suspect the ordeal is Kafkaesque and ongoing. Here's what Jason has to say about his find:

So I was driving in an unfamiliar neighborhood late one night this week, and a glimpse of an unfamiliar taillight in my headlights caught my eye and grabbed it and stopped it like a bag of pudding thrown onto drywall. I'm sure all us car guys have that sense when they catch a glimpse of something that can't be individually ID'd— in this case it was firing the lights for British, Italian, and American all at once, but not falling into any. You know what I mean.

Anyway, I stopped in the middle of the dark street and pointed my headlights at the mystery car to find it was a GAZ! A GAZ Volga 24-10, to be exact, which would put it in the '77-'85 range— I think this one is somewhere on the later side.

It's a handsome, if a bit normal-looking for my tastes, car. It looks sort of like a late 60s Ford body with Fiat lights and detailing. This one even had curtains in the rear window, which for some reason feels very Soviet.

Anyway— sorry the photos are so bad— it was late and on a very dark street, and I just had my phone. I may go out and try to hunt it down in the day; I left a note with my name and number on the car, so if I can get ahold of the guy and get better pics, or, even better, a ride, I'll let you know.

As we know, you must listen to the Red Army Choir performing the Soviet National Anthem while reading about Racing Heroes Of The Union Of Soviet Socialist Republics. That's the law.


If only the Reds had been allowed to enter a few Pobedas and Volgas in early NASCAR events. Imagine the Cold War drama! Thanks to the many of you who sent in this tip!



[English Russia]

Well, you might keep shop manuals on your coffee table, but that would make you the kind of scarily focused gearhead who also keeps a couple of engine blocks in the kitchen. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course, but Haynes also puts out this… this four-pound slab of concentrated essence of car pr0n, and- now that you're aware of its existence- your life without it will seem as grim and flavorless as the sawdust-enhanced sausage ration in Vladivostok, 1949. It sure as hell isn't cheap, so those of you with a birthday coming up are advised to start dropping some very strong gift-idea hints to your loved ones right now. The rest of you will have to cough up the rubles on your own, but it will be worth it.



From the Ford clones of the 1920s and 1930s (starting with a copy of the Model A and continuing with the modified-for-Soviet-conditions Model B-based M1 shown above), the USSR was making cars and trucks from its earliest days. While some were based on foreign designs (the Opel Kadett-based early Moskvich and Fiat-based Lada being a couple of famous examples), many were all-Soviet projects.


Thompson's book covers all the major lines of Soviet cars and light trucks, including the GAZ Pobedas and Volgas, the ZIL limousines, the beloved Zaporozhets, and a bunch of acronymic vehicles we decadent Westerners have never heard of.


Vehicles manufactured according to the demands of a planned economy (in a nation whose rough roads cover 11 time zones and every crazy weather condition imaginable) were designed with different priorities than those found in the capitalist automotive world, and this book does an excellent job describing how those priorities worked during the Soviet period.


Things really got interesting during the Brezhnev era, during which the USSR's need for hard currency, coupled with the rise of inflation in the West, led to large-scale exports of Soviet-made vehicles. In early-70s Britain, car buyers could pick up a brand-new Moskvich 412 sedan for £717, which was £22 cheaper than a Mini and only £3 less than the wretched Hillman Imp. Many did, though some scary crash-test results took a big bite out of UK Moskvich sales. And, as Teargas has proven with his LeMons car, plenty of Ladas made it to Canada a few years later.


Thompson pays attention to Soviet racing achievements, from the early rally days to late-Soviet Lada hoonage. The machines of UAZ, IZH, RAF, etc., are here as well, with the story continuing to the end of the Soviet Union and a little beyond.

This one earns a five-rod rating (five being the highest rating, in honor of the most reliable automobile engine ever made), plus Bonus Balalaika for sheer Hero Of The Soviet Union-grade awesomeness. Murilee says check it out!

[Motorbooks]

Naturally, we can't discuss the glorious automotive industry of the Union Of Soviet Socialist Republics without the sound of the Red Army Choir belting out the Soviet National Anthem, so get this video playing and crank up the volume before you continue:



What we've got here is a Russian-language site focusing on the triumphs of Soviet rally teams of the 1960s through the 1990s. Don't read Russian? Doesn't matter! Just click on random links and check out the Moskviches (plus some Volgas and other assorted Soviet steel) doing their thing.
[Soviet Rally]

Photo credit: Aleksey Petrosian, via English Russia

First, we need to get in the right mood to appreciate this fine automobile. A little music, comrades?

A while back, I was running errands in Toronto's west end. As I approached a stoplight, I swore I saw the distinct profile of a Russian limousine among the crossing traffic. It was long gone by the time I got there.

A week later, I saw it again and collected these shots.

OK, so I only have 5 photos. I was rushing, my camera battery was dying, but damn, just LOOK at this thing. How thoughtful of the owner to include a little background info via window sticker. Glasnost indeed! Photographed on Parkside Drive in Toronto.

Imagine, if you will, the conversations that once took place in the back seat.

Here's a link to where the car is for sale.

Hopefully you find this interesting

What do you think about that $27,500 (Canadian) price tag? Maybe we need a Down On The Crack Pipe Bonus poll!

You'll need to start the video above to get the full effect of Teargas' story.


Natasha has arrived.
Comrade Davin and I have returned from their heroic journey to Toronto, Ontario. On the Great Hero Trailer of the Proletariat, we spirited Natasha from her prison in the only moderately socialist Canada.


Her captors were brutal, but we were able to bribe them with American Dollars.


We were detained by the Americans at the US Border. The American Border Guards trembled in fear at the sight of so much wondrous Soviet engineering. The spirit of the Soviet worker was indeed strong.


When the pigs told Comrade Reckow and I that we would need to prove that the Lada met US DOT and DEQ standards, I made it clear that Natasha would do no such thing! After an hour of negotiating, and declaring our duty-free hooch, we were free.


Comrades Rory & Davin will be awarded the ORDER OF VICTORY FOR TRAILERING

Back when we were gearing up for some toe-to-toe nuclear combat with the Rooskies, a man could walk into his friendly Dodge dealership and order him up a Town Wagon, to haul six or eight passengers reliably (if not comfortably), or he could opt for the military-truck-based four-wheel-drive Power Wagon and flee those mean ol' Tsar Bombas in an off-road run to the mountains (although you'd need to get quite a head start to escape the blast radius of the Tsar Bomba). Or, because this is the greatest nation on earth, he could have had both! Yes, you could buy a Power Wagon Town Wagon, with four-wheel-drive and lots of seats. Fine vehicle, the Power Wagon Town Wagon, but where can you find one today? They've all rusted away or tumbled down ravines, stuff like that. Except, of course, for this '60 (go here if the ad disappears), which Mad_Science has found for us in Reno. As Mad_Science observes: "note the guy in the picture for scale. Either that guy's a midget or this thing is enormous!" Does it run? Is there rust? What's the interior like? We don't know any of that, but we do know that it's only $1,695 and maybe even, as the seller claims, the "rarest 4x4 in america!" Should be an easy project!

You couldn't buy the Lada in the United States, because we didn't do business with gulag-havin' Stalinists, you betcha. However, the Canadians thought the Soviet-made Fiat 124 sedan clone was so good that they were willing to do business with the Evil Empire, if that's what it took to get their mittened hands on that fine Russian interpretation of an ancient Italian design. That means you need to head up north to Lada Land if you want an example of Late Cold War machinery for your own… and SoNaive has pinpointed the location of this fine '87 Lada Signet (go here if the ad disappears) for us. No mention of running condition is given, but is that even necessary? This is a Soviet Fiat, people! Naturally, you'll want to get on the horn to Italy right away and order up every possible hot-rod engine part you'll need to build a seriously hairy Fiat Twin Cam, or maybe you'll perform a not-yet-found-in-nature Japanese-Soviet-Italian swap and put an SR20DET in this sucka! You might have some issues getting it registered in the United States, because the Lada was never certified to meet US emissions, equipment, or safety standards, but we're sure you'll find the folks at your local DMV are eager to smooth your path to fully legal Lada ownership! Whatever you do to this car, you'll be performing the work in the manner of a Glorious Hero Mechanic Of The Proletariat, because this car comes with a set of Soviet wrenches! Oh yeah! Suddenly I must have a Soviet wrench set!

Just a friendly reminder. Nothing rocks your butt off like an ekranoplan. Nothing. – Davey G. Johnson

Related:
Give the People What They Want: Ekranoplans For All! [Internal]

A high-performance turbine that powered the Tupolev Tu-95 Bear, the Tupolev Tu-114 airliner and the Antonov An-22 Anteus cargo lifter, the NK-12 was designed to run contra-rotating propellers and pumped out 14,800 seahorsepower. Now say, if Vladimir Putin were to bestow one of these fast-spinning behemoths upon you, what would you use it for? Would you retrofit your sailplane? Would you use build the world's most gonzoid go-kart? How about going for the land-speed airboat record in the Everglades? Oh, did we also mention that the NK-12 saw service in the Orlyonok ekranoplan? Yes, friends. We need one of these, and so do you. Now get to thinking. – Davey G. Johnson

Kuznetsov NK-12 [Wikipedia]

Related:
Give the People What They Want! Ekranoplans for All! [Internal]

We have to say, when it comes to Soviet military hardware, we've got what most would consider more than a passing familiarity, given our childhood obsession with books on WWII-present planes, boats, tanks and other various and sundry killng machines, not to mention a pubescent summer spent devouring the Tom Clancy oeuvre through Clear and Present Danger. Still, the Caspian Sea Monster took us by surprise. And while we normally let our commenters have the glory on their own, It's entirely worth expending a post to point out that the link that Sebring MGB pointed out needs sharing in a highly-official, Jalop-endorsed manner. Seriously, if you don't spend at least half the clip giggling in sheer amazement at the fabulosity of these machines, we'd recommend an MRI, stat. Meanwhile, we shall not rest until the Port of Los Angeles is crawling with these things. And no, sorry Long Beach, you can't have any. Oakland, help yourself. Sue us. We're feeling selectively parsimonious this afternoon. – Davey G. Johnson

Related:
Gee Willikers, Anatoly! Ekronaplan! [Internal]