The ZIS-101 was a
limousine
A limousine ( or ), or limo () for short, is a large, chauffeur-driven luxury vehicle with a partition between the driver compartment and the passenger compartment.
A very long wheelbase luxury sedan (with more than four doors) driven by a prof ...
produced by the
Soviet
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
car manufacturer ''
Zavod Imeni Stalina''. It was introduced in 1936. Its
chassis
A chassis (, ; plural ''chassis'' from French châssis ) is the load-bearing framework of an artificial object, which structurally supports the object in its construction and function. An example of a chassis is a vehicle frame, the underpart ...
was
reverse-engineered
Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompli ...
from a
Buick 33-90, except for the front suspension, engine, exhaust and battery carried over from 1933 experimental limousine L-1, itself an unlicensed Buick 32-90 copy, but the body was designed by
Budd Company
The Budd Company was a 20th-century metal fabricator, a major supplier of body components to the automobile industry, and a manufacturer of stainless steel passenger rail cars, airframes, missile and space vehicles, and various defense products ...
for whopping $1,500,000 while the stamps were made by Hamilton Foundry & Machine Company for another $500,000. It was equipped with an straight-eight OHV
engine
An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy.
Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power gen ...
(a
metric
Metric or metrical may refer to:
* Metric system, an internationally adopted decimal system of measurement
* An adjective indicating relation to measurement in general, or a noun describing a specific type of measurement
Mathematics
In mathema ...
copy of
Buick 345) producing up to and giving a top speed of .
The car was fitted with a 3-speed manual
gearbox
Propulsion transmission is the mode of transmitting and controlling propulsion power of a machine. The term ''transmission'' properly refers to the whole drivetrain, including clutch, gearbox, prop shaft (for rear-wheel drive vehicles), differe ...
.
[
It was followed by the ZIS-101A that had improved the engine giving ][ The engine was the same as in the 101-A, but boosted to and a top speed of (although a '']Pravda
''Pravda'' ( rus, Правда, p=ˈpravdə, a=Ru-правда.ogg, "Truth") is a Russian broadsheet newspaper, and was the official newspaper of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, when it was one of the most influential papers in the co ...
'' article claimed 170–180 km/h). It was, however, not made in more than one or two copies.
Variants
* ZIS-101: Initial production version. Produced 1936–1939.
* ZIS-101A: ZIS-101 with improved engine. Produced 1939–1941.
* ZIS-101B: Improved ZIS-101, prototype.
* ZIS-101C: Ambulance version.
* ZIS-101 Sport: Two-seat version. Produced in 1939.
* ZIS-102: Convertible version. Produced 1938–1940.
References
Cars of Russia
Cars introduced in 1936
1940s cars
ZiL vehicles
Luxury vehicles
Sports cars
Soviet automobiles
Flagship vehicles
First car made by manufacturer
{{Classicpow-auto-stub