Packard Forum Index » ZIS, ZIL, and other Packard Cousins!

filming without clapperboard

How about the boys of the Russian intelligence service? Have they used ZIS cars for their job?
Yes they have. Please find attached a pic that shows an arranged antiwar demonstration. Cubans and locals spurred on by gonzo news and filmed by the KGB converged on the American consular office. Their banners read "Hands off Cuba".

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Where is the source for the rumors?

Paucity of information is a necessary condition and, with view to people's weaknesses, the keen interest is a sufficient condition for many of the rumors. But there's more to it than that.

Soviet propaganda!

You ought to consider that communist systems stop at nothing and much less when it comes to dazzle. The following illustration from the juvenile book "The story of automobiles" (Moscow 1950) gives the Soviet constructors the appearance of being the designers of the ZIS. The caption reads as follows: "A robot eye helps the engineers of Stalin Motor Works to design the windshield, hood and driver's seat."
The Packard One Eighty must be a very early copy of the ZIS.

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Chrysler used to do the same thing, copy inventions of GM and Ford years before they were invented.

Al jesting aside, there are copies which are earlier in production than their originals. Sounds almost unbelievable but is true.

Are you ready to take a look in a Soviet design bureau? On the left hand side a Western pattern, right next an own wax model. Business as usual.

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Can't see that car on the right... is it a Lincoln Lehman Patterson Limo? I think Nixon gave several cars to Brezhnev,
I know for sure that he gave him a Caddy Eldorado. Supposedly Leonid was quite the car guy.

The car on the right (pictured above) is a 1:1 wax model. Indeed a model of a Lincoln Lehmann Peterson Limo or better, modeled on it. Bull's eye! The car on the left could be an Opel Diplomat A with 283 cid Chevy small bloc V8 and Powerglide or one of its German or American brothers.

I would like to start the story of that Lincoln with a juxtaposition of the Chaika GAZ-13 and its follower, the Chaika GAZ-14 (please see pic below).

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Roger, it is confirmed that Brezhnev liked cars. This time the American car club of Latvia works as rumour-monger and surrounds the mentioned Lincoln with military secrets (attached). It will never stop.



But what is the truth? I believe it's no different than the Packard pattern to model the ZIS. A Lincoln is an usual article of merchandise and the Soviets bought it. Below you can see it on a road in Moscow.


...to be continued...

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The design of the 114 from the house of ZIL bears a likeness to the Lincoln Limo but is it a copy? No, I don't think so, it shows certain creative liberties. Especially the interior has a number of Mercedes borrowings and influences.

BTW, as long as I talk about creative liberties I mean the car ...

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Great pics, Gerd, as always...!! I never noticed the resemblance between the Gaz 114 and early 60s Lincoln before, but is sure does. They picked a good one to resemble!

A photograph from the collection of the East German government motor pool. It shows the same ZIL-114 as above, an early version, but its ownership has changed. Brezhnev donated it to his German comrades, a common practice.
The car already has ventilated disks (front and rear). Its cast aluminium V8 (carb., ohv.) reached 300 hp to move 3.085 kg empty weight (6.787 lb). Launched in 1967 as seven-seater it also was available as five-seater four years later. I believe that even the aircon compressor housing was made of cast aluminium.

Electromechanical torsion bar suspension? Now that's going too far. But torsion bars at least.

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My sentiments exactly.

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