They were not paid much attention to, like ordinary objects, such as an enameled kettle boiling on a stove before going to school. Or a cake made in a school buffet: delicious, but nothing special. Such vans drove up to shops, laundries, and schools, where the unclean kind of uncle got from them discreet and not very valuable goods. Then these "Muscovites" vans somehow quietly disappeared. They seemed to be forgotten forever. But these ugly hard workers are also part of our history.
SMALL WHOLESALE
They were sometimes called "washers" - for the ribs of the sides of the cargo compartment, resembling a washboard. The van with a very modern design for those times appeared a couple of years later than the sedan. The first trucks were assembled at the very end of 1966. The lower-pressure motor of 50 hp, of course, is far from a giant, especially in comparison with the advanced 412-m, the production of which began in 1967. But then engines in 40-50 hp and in Europe were the norm. And the delivery city van is no longer needed. Is it hard for you to believe that once the “Muscovites” could be compared with foreign classmates?
By today's standards, the van hardly accelerates. The moves of the four-speed gearbox lever located on the steering column are sweeping. Later, in the early 1970s, the lever was moved to the floor, but it didn’t get any better: the gearbox’s remote drive remained moody anyway. However, with certain skills and a quiet rhythm of driving, the box control is acceptable. A lever on the steering wheel to a certain extent even more convenient.
The gearshift lever on the steering wheel is quite convenient. He moved to the floor at the Muscovites at the turn of the 1970s. The gearshift lever on the steering wheel is quite convenient. He moved to the floor at the Muscovites at the turn of the 1970s.
Landing for a driver of medium height is quite tolerable. The high will be crowded, but half a century ago, the standards were different. The driver’s neighbor is worse if there is a spare wheel in a regular place behind the back of the seat. Well, don’t drive a passenger car! Loading and unloading requires agility and flexibility - the roof is low. It was not that the designers did not realize that it was possible to make a “heel” van, but the principle of maximum unification reigned at MZMA, like at other Soviet factories. In this case - with the versatile person "Moskvich-426".
How many works it was worth putting on the conveyor IZH-2715, veterans of the Udmurt plant still remember! The problem of loading and unloading was partly resolved by abandoning a solid wall behind the driver’s back (it was on the first vans): something could be taken out or put out of the cab. However, if the load is laid under the roof, and the braking is sharp, problems could arise. By the way, the brakes are still without an amplifier (it will appear on the powerful 412th and its modifications), but for the van it is quite tolerable.
Well, in general, a sin to complain! For the second half of the 1960s - the beginning of the 1970s (and this van was exactly from 1969) in terms of equipment and handling - a normal passenger car, capable, according to passport data, of transporting 250-400 kg (depending on roads) sometime. But who counted them, these kilograms? However, as a rule, they did not carry much heavy duty on such machines. But you can’t overload them with sausages and sausages for the school cafeteria “Moskvich”.
In early Moscow vans, the cargo compartment door consisted of two reclining parts. In the absence of a solid partition between the cabin and the trunk, there were both pros and cons. In early Moscow vans, the cargo compartment door consisted of two reclining parts. In the absence of a solid partition between the cabin and the trunk, there were both pros and cons.
TWENTY THREE AND THIRTY THREE
In the spring of 1966, a few months before the appearance of the 433rd, the 23rd CPSU Congress was held. Of such trifles as the Moskvich van, in his materials, of course, there was not a word. But the task of doubling the truck production in the eighth five-year period was set. MZMA was obliged to make its contribution, albeit not a great one. By the way, the Moskvich-426 station wagon was mastered later than the van - in March 1967. Well, "doubled" - this, of course, got excited. But growth, by today's standards, is really unthinkable: in 1965, slightly more than 326, 000 trucks were produced in the USSR, and more than 524, 000 in 1970. In this volume, the contribution of the Moscow plant, which received in 1968, a year before the birth of this The Moskvich, the name of the Lenin Komsomol, was very modest. The main products of the enterprise were sedans, which sold very well abroad. But the Moscow plant was, in fact, the only one that mass-produced brisk delivery vans convenient in the city.
Invisible vans ran around cities, did inconspicuous work. Most ingloriously ended their age at the fences of motor depots and dumps. It was there that the pioneers of the Moscow suburbs climbed to collect scrap metal (interestingly, then it was not transported to the same landfill?..). But in visiting this storehouse there was a second goal: it is terribly interesting to touch automotive iron! Let it be rusty and mangled.
Since vans in the USSR were not sold to private owners, there were almost no chances to survive from used cars. So this 433rd recently was on the verge of extinction. Foreign parts and assemblies extended his difficult life, however, and it was coming to an end. But not at all the dude, not famous and not legendary “Moskvich” was surprisingly lucky. Today it is almost the same as it was more than four decades ago: not a dandy, but rather an everyday object from an almost forgotten way of life, like a kettle that was boiling insistently on a gas stove, or a cake from a school buffet …
LITTLE, ALREADY A TRUCK
Production of Moskvich-433 began at the very end of 1966. The machine with a loading capacity of 250-400 kg was equipped with a 1.4-liter Moskvich-408 bottom-engine and a four-speed gearbox. Since the early 1970s, the 433rd was produced in parallel with the more powerful Moskvich-434 van, equipped with the 75-horsepower Moskvich-412 motor and a hydraulic brake booster. In 1976, Model 433 was replaced by Moskvich-2733, and 434 was replaced by Moskvich-2734, created on the basis of models 2138 and 2140.
