Moskvitch 400-420

The Moskvitch 400-420 is a car that was introduced in 1947 by the Soviet manufacturer Moskvitch.

Background

In 1940 and 1941 500 units of the KIM-10-50, the first Soviet compact car, were produced. It was inspired by the similar-sized four-door Ford Prefect and, despite its low price, equipped with such features as a mechanical clock and indicators of the level of oil and the temperature of water in the radiator. However, national priorities changed with the German invasion in summer 1941, and production of the car was halted and not resumed after the war.

At war's end, the Soviet Union deemed the plans and tooling for the 1939 Opel Kadett K38 to be part of the war reparations package, since the tooling in the Rüsselsheim factory was largely intact; residents dismantled the Kadett production tooling and loaded fifty-six freight cars bound for Moscow and the newly built "Stalin Factory" (ZIS). However, according to recent Russian sources, the Kadett plans and tooling were in fact not captured from the factory, because they did not survive there (and what survived was appropriate for producing a two-door model).

Development

Development began in 1944, following a prewar plan to produce a domestically built car able to be used and maintained by citizens living outside major cities. The KIM factory was selected to build the car, with the prewar KIM-10-52 (not built due to the Second World War) as a basis, with production approved in May 1945 and prototypes intended to be ready in December. By the end of May, however, these plans had faltered.

It was Joseph Stalin who personally chose in June 1945 a four-door Opel Kadett to become the first mass-produced popular Soviet car, so plans and tooling of a four-door version had to be reconstructed with help of German engineers, who worked upon them in a Soviet occupation zone.