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20 years after Perestroika and 20 years after they built the last ZIL car, the factory gets an order for 3 custom built parade cars for the May Day parade. Visit the ZIL factory, see them being made and meet the people who built the last ZIL cars and trucks.

aljazeera.com/programmes/witness/2014/05 ... -limousine-2014528113543724920.html

So nobody has any comments or maybe nobody bothered to watch?

I just finished watching it. It was haunting and yet kept my interest all the way to the end. Very sad, somewhat similar to what happened to Packard.

Perhaps the most grievous blow to the soul is futility. Most anything else can be born if there is purpose.

I particularly liked the last group photo, and pondered the amount of skill represented there.

Interesting, bizarre, and ultimately, depressing.

It was depressing. I've never seen a factory situation but I can think even in the good days for that factory the lowliest worker here could watch it and maybe be glad they were not in reversed situations. Wonder what happened to the cars and if they ever made it to a parade.

One of the comments early in the clip regarding the Soviet rule or practice of no spare parts being made brings a question maybe Gusha could comment on. With the few ZILs that have hit the collector market since the breakup what are the hopeful restorers of those cars managing to do. Its not like there is an abundance of parts ZILs around. Being so much was hand made even a parts car might not help and I would imagine the skilled labor that built the cars from scratch is not that plentiful either. Of course, I guess it could be no different than restoring a rare Packard where none are left but at least on a Packard there are a few things shared.

Rusty, thanks for sharing and sorry to let you wait. Like you I was waiting for reactions.

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It is regular like the sunrise. If it's bad, then it follows a rule, if it's good, then it is mysterious and accidental. Thanks Howard, to bring it into question.
As all of you know, the "communistic economy" (a self-contradiction) has been a central steered and controlled command economy. CCCP, a giant with feet of clay, was to weak to behave economical. Sustainability and provisions for the future like systematic spare part supply were out of reach.

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They do it (like me when reparing a modern car) by help of their credit card. ZIL collectors are rich men. Please take into consideration, that

- A missing spare parts system almost inevitably leads to panic buying. Every single car owner was collector and storekeeper of his own stock and stored whatever he could get.

- Moreover an original spare part was too valuable to use it. Even and especially in case of a breakdown, people started to evaluate their spare parts as too precious to consume them. The one or another has spared his parts (hence spare parts) for worse situations.

- Metal worker and motor mechanics mutated to artists. One of my former colleagues knew, how to solder spiral-wound filaments of burnet-through glowplugs by help of a 3,500 Kelvin hot gas welder - hot enough to burn the complete filament within a split of a second.

- As much as other people, PackardInfo members are suckers for red fairy tales. Tell them that Czech craftsmen are masterful auto body men to commit sacrileg. The following comment warns of large hammers. Try to mention Russian spare parts. A day later one starts to talk about REAL US quality.