ZAZ Tavria

[Andrew353w]

I've driven it! Julian Nowill was kind enough to offer it to me for sale in the summer of 2003. My daughter & I took the train to Exeter St. Davids, where Julian met us & we took it for a spin. It was fully speced for the U.K., with a MPH speedo & dials in English. He also offered me a Lada Riva, which I DID buy as my family would have to use it while I was working abroad & I couldn't quite see them nipping off to Halfrauds for Travia parts...( asking for Lada bits produced quite a grin, anyway!)

 

It drove very well & felt a bit like a Skoda Favorit; light and nippy. The gear ratios seemed somewhat odd, though, as the gaps didn't seem to be well spaced. That said, as only 3 vehicles were imported to the UK and 2 of them have subsequently been crushed, the remaining one must be THE rarest car in the U.K. Worth owning for that reason only! I've since seen the car at a number of Eastern European car get togethers and can confirm that I know who owns it... and he's not parting with it!

[RichardK]

*SPELLCASTING*

T H R E A D N E C R O M A N C E

BY THE FIVE POINTS OF THE STAR OF SOVIET RUSSIA...

With MASSIVE thanks to Sam for delivering this fine automobile to frankly uncivilised places, where it will be issued with permanent leave to remain then given a job.

Oh, and yes, it looks good from this angle too.

[Zelandeth]

Now that's something else! 

More photos please...Interior because I've never seen one...

What engine did these run?

[RichardK]

More photos at the weekend - I had a day off today, but will have to work very hard tomorrow and not be distracted by this sexy beast.

The engine is a MeMZ... something. Inline four OHC transverse FWD; nothing I've read suggests that it's related to anything as such, but Sam says a fair number of bits are Polo-esque.

[RichardK]

заз-1102 in 1979-1982 prototype shape

Looks quite Chevette to me.

Where it started in 1970...

And what could have been...

 

[Crackers]

Jesus christ. The rate we're reviving these 8-year dead threads at the moment, this time next week they'll be announcing Thatcher's come back from the grave. 

[mk2_craig]

Love it!! Best colour too.

[RichardK]

 

[RichardK]

Not a plan, btw, just WTF? A Tavria ragtop!

[wuvvum]

48 minutes ago, Crackers said:

Jesus christ. The rate we're reviving these 8-year dead threads at the moment, this time next week they'll be announcing Thatcher's come back from the grave. 

This one not revived by 2cvspecial though, unusually...

[wuvvum]

Excellent purchase Sir.  I was half tempted by this myself.  Does it have the daft gearchange pattern?

[Aston Martin]

 

 

[RichardK]

12 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

Excellent purchase Sir.  I was half tempted by this myself.  Does it have the daft gearchange pattern?

It’s not so much a rule, as a guideline. The gate suggests reverse is around there somewhere,  but it appears to be quantum ratio that only exists when observed at a particular state.

It is a fine and solid car -‘what held you back? I am confident registering won’t be too much drama

[wuvvum]

17 minutes ago, RichardK said:

It is a fine and solid car -‘what held you back?

A combination of factors, primarily timing and the realisation that I should be spending my limited resources on sorting the obscure LHD hatchback I already own rather than buying another.

[Ghosty]

38 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

This one not revived by 2cvspecial though, unusually...

Yes, and this is the hero-tier content worthy of a resurrection. 

[RichardK]

Some morning filth. Have popped it on the battery conditioner, removed a jammed boot strut, sussed out getting the bonnet past the wiper arm and tried my number plate on - maybe I’ll register it on that number.

I’m very curious if Ed’s RHD one has different headlights and if so where the hell one would find them, but I doubt these are going to bother anyone no matter which way the beam goes.

[Bitzer]

This must have been one of the worst cars EVAH. Note the creative use of an old tire, which served as a heat shield. Sheer necessity, because the engine had inherent tendencies for overheating, thus endangering the cleverly* placed spare wheel tire.

 

[Sham]

So much winning going on here.

 

[RichardK]

29 minutes ago, Bitzer said:

This must have been one of the worst cars EVAH. Note the creative use of an old tire, which served as a heat shield. Sheer necessity, because the engine had inherent tendencies for overheating, thus endangering the cleverly* placed spare wheel tire.

 

Ah! That's where the toolkit lives! I wondered what those hoops were for.

I've found a manual but don't want to spend money on fripperies until the car is rustproofed and legal. I have even resisted the 1:43 toy ones so far... but payday will change that.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

3 hours ago, Bitzer said:

This must have been one of the worst cars EVAH.... 

Kind of symbolic of the state of Ukraine, where it was built. The Russian legacy is hard to eradicate, and you're never quite sure what other parts of your territory will be annexed....

[Bitzer]

Actually, when dealing with "Sappelfrosch" (nickname assigned to ZAZ in former DDR), some basic Ukrainian phraseology may come handy:

"Suka!" (pronounced "sookah") - "Bitch!"

"Blyad!" (pronounced with soft "d", like in "during") - "Fuck!"

[somewhatfoolish]

The glorious workers republic has triumphed again; tractor production is up 200% comrade!

[mk2_craig]

That's some impressive PCD dimensions on the wheel bolt holes there.

[Zelandeth]

Intriguing.  Definitely some parts in there which are very similar to those used on the Samara (side indicator repeaters too).  The instrument panel is like some bizarre cross between Yugo and early 80s BMC.

Interior is better trimmed than I expected - though I'm guessing the quality of those materials leaves something to be desired in some areas.

Engine is a new one on me, definitely not aware of having seen that before.

[LightBulbFun]

15 hours ago, RichardK said:

*SPELLCASTING*

T H R E A D N E C R O M A N C E

BY THE FIVE POINTS OF THE STAR OF SOVIET RUSSIA...

With MASSIVE thanks to Sam for delivering this fine automobile to frankly uncivilised places, where it will be issued with permanent leave to remain then given a job.

Oh, and yes, it looks good from this angle too.

wow thats some weapons grade shite right there, fucking amazing  

had absolutely no clue this existed! 

and its all the more amazing that it seems to mostly be an entirely home grown effort? 

and not just a Western car they made for about 300 years

very much looking forward to seeing more on it

(also amazing to hear they made RHD ones too...)

[wuvvum]

50 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Engine is a new one on me, definitely not aware of having seen that before.

I always thought these had the same engine as the 1.1 Samara?  That may be bollocks though.

(Thinking about it, I'm not sure we ever got the 1.1 Samara here.)

[Zelandeth]

40 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

I always thought these had the same engine as the 1.1 Samara?  That may be bollocks though.

(Thinking about it, I'm not sure we ever got the 1.1 Samara here.)

I don't *think* so...Admittedly mine was the 1.3, but they look to be quite different, head design at the very least.  Equally the 1.1 engine from the Samara could be vastly different to the 1.3 for all I know!

[RichardK]

I could be all like "I sound like an expert" on this but I know as much as you do and probably less than others, however I've read a lot about the Tavria over the years - though obviously secondhand stuff, really, like Wiki.

So here's everything I know about Tavrias from various sources:

The design was underway in 1970 - and it was in competition at some points with Lada's design as well, but because I'm not an expert, I don't know what that really means - if the ministry would only award one contract for a small FWD car, or if what LEVEL of car (and investment/resources) each firm would get was the goal.

Anyway, it got to the stage of something that resembled a Lada Niva humping a Suzuki Whizzkid and there were three-box models too that I don't care about from the Tavria point of view, then the weird-ass round-light thing that looks a bit like a VW Polo breadvan (before the breadvan appeared) designed for a sci-fi show.

Edit: some more reading suggests that there were prototypes that had a 968's aircooled V4 in the back, and the experimental liquid-cooled four-pot in the front - which probably accounts for some of the 4x4 prototype comments in articles.

That, I think, was shown to the ministry who compared it to what would have been a brand-new design Mk 1 Fiesta, and it must have been terrible because they were told to go back to the drawing board, which is where the FWD Chevette HS looking idea pops up.

Edit 2:  Reading between the lines - the VAZ-1101 and ZAZ-1102 were essentially ordered/requested/gently-suggested-with-a-stern-look to converge and collaborate, and that collaborative effort (which again, seems to spawn Tavria/Oka/Samara in different ways - the Lada 1101 and ZAZ prototypes do have a shared aesthetic but they are also clearly quite different) might be the round-light breadvan-looking thing.

That collaborative effort was shown off, and said it wasn't good enough, and the ministry lobbed a Fiesta at them.

The Chevette-HS looking car MAY (again, hard to tell) actually be adapted from that Fiesta. If it's not a copy, once you see the roofline and window shape it cannot be unseen, but as you can see in the prototype the tailgate is different etc. so if it was adapted from the Fiesta they adapted a lot. Like the Aleko, it seems that the designers were more than capable of doing their own thing but because the ministry wanted something specific derived from a western car they sort of went for the path of least effort/resistance. Probably with a resigned sigh and a lot of swearing. 

(Alekos aren't a direct copy of a Simca - the engine/gearbox arrangement is more like an Audi, in-line, etc).

The engine is MeMZ designed, 1.1-litre, I will have technical drawings once I can afford some bits from Latvia.

Given MeMZ designed what Sam described as a truly amazing bit of engineering in the V4 from the ZAZ-968 series, I think it's very 'western' thinking to assume that some Soviet engineers couldn't design their own four-pot transverse engine and five speed gear box and get it all 100% right...

SHUT UP ABOUT THE GEARBOX,

Anyway. The ZAZ-1102 is signed off, as such, before the Lada 2108 Samara, but because Russia - the 1102 is held back. Maybe because no demand, maybe because it needed more work, I can't really tell - one thing I've read suggests that launching too many cars too soon wasn't a very communist thing to do so they waited a few years, but that would mean Oka and Tavria landed at the same time and arguably Oka was chasing the same low end of the market just in a different way.

All this means the lovely pretty would have looked AWESOME in 1982 Tavria shows up in 1988 just before the Mk 3 Fiesta and very upgraded Polos appear - but also just before some sort of capitalist bollocks and restructuring shows up too. If ever a car needed the shelter of an iron curtain to stop too much light being thrown on it, this is probably the one.

Apparently the communist-era ones from 1988 through 1991 are quite well assembled, and the ones from 1991 through 1996ish  - which is when Daewoo got involved and improved it - are the absolute worst. Glad I've got a *checks notes*

Oh. 1995. It'll be fine.

The engine was steadily upgraded and reading between the lines is actually a fairly good design. Sam told me that things like the steering rack are very VW Polo-ish, but I wonder if Ed's red one being Polo-ish might be down to RHD conversion using 'bits that kinda fit'. The brakes (albeit just moving around the drive) feel very Mk 2 Golf ish. If the Mk 2 Golf had three of those linkages instead of one.

Tavria Novas (Daewoo ones) are seemingly much better but lose a lot of the communist-era charm. By which I mean plastic that's like your school vacuum-forming experiments but flimsier. The Nova's dashboard is much nicer looking, the wheels on some seem to be normal drums and discs with regular hubs, I expect the fit and finish is much improved.

Body seems well engineered and mostly very nicely finished. Trim is interesting, like a Waitrose bag for life for the seats for example and I'm not sure which way around the boot carpet goes because either side looks like underlay. Perhaps it needs a rubber liner. Key says Lada on it.

I'm mocking it here but don't get me wrong, even without driving it (perhaps that's the best way) it's absolutely beautiful to me. I love the shape, the big windows, the single wiper - the white eBay electric one years ago sparked the curiosity as I'd really only known the Oka as a 'weirdly modern Russian car we never got' and the shape of the Tavria looked so cool. I will make the most of whatever it presents, and I think enough of them survive to feel like upgrading bits of it isn't a heresy, so I may improve the mirror mountings, vents and things over time. We'll have to see, you know how random my moods and cars can be but I do feel like this one is worth long-term fuss. I didn't want to part with my Twingo, and this is replacing that in my head.

(Thought - how bad would it be to fit a full-length webasto roof to this? Suicide? Heresy? A huge waste of money?).

My main concerns are around MOTing it and really just "those rear lights look like Samara. I wonder if they are and if the headlights are because RHD Samara lights would solve MANY problems". And they're not really concerns, just thoughts - it will be MOTd and it will be used and photographed and enjoyed.

[RichardK]

4 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Intriguing.  Definitely some parts in there which are very similar to those used on the Samara (side indicator repeaters too).  The instrument panel is like some bizarre cross between Yugo and early 80s BMC.

Interior is better trimmed than I expected - though I'm guessing the quality of those materials leaves something to be desired in some areas.

Engine is a new one on me, definitely not aware of having seen that before.

I've had ready meal boxes that feel longer-lasting and less biodegradable.

That's part of the charm though.

[RichardK]

5 hours ago, Bitzer said:

Actually, when dealing with "Sappelfrosch" (nickname assigned to ZAZ in former DDR), some basic Ukrainian phraseology may come handy:

"Suka!" (pronounced "sookah") - "Bitch!"

"Blyad!" (pronounced with soft "d", like in "during") - "Fuck!"

I get the feeling I will be consulting your knowledge of Tavrias in the wild and how to swear at them frequently...

Also. PICKLE FROG?!

This one is called Masha. Not pickle frog.