Funny holidays - Jeeper Day

On September 12, Russia celebrates Jeeper Day This holiday, which is well known in motorist circles, is dedicated to the first domestically produced SUV The prototype was created back in 1941 at NATI The project was led by design engineer Alexander Fedorovich Andronov The fate of his brainchild turned out to be sad - although it was superior to its main competitor GAZ-64 in its main characteristics, mass production of the AR-NATI was never launched, but we’ll tell you about everything in order Shortly before the first shots were fired, which marked the beginning of the Second World War, several 4x4 vehicles were in service in different countries This list includes the German “Horch-91”, the Japanese “Kurorange”, “Marmon-Herrington” from American designers and the Soviet GAZ-61, created on the basis of the “Emka” Each of these models was produced in small series The cars were, in essence, light command vehicles Thanks to their increased cross-country ability, they could overcome most of the obstacles in their path and quickly deliver the leadership to the desired point However, these cars were significantly inferior to modern SUVs The first all-wheel drive SUV with dependent suspension, which went into mass production, was created in the USA The army launched a tender, which was won by three large companies - Ford, American Bantam and Willys-Overland Their designers were engaged in independent projects The cars that were subsequently produced by Ford were called GPVs The first two letters of this abbreviation were read as “JP” It is believed that it was this abbreviation that gave rise to the name of a whole class of cars - jeeps There is another version, according to which the cars got their name because of American army slang, where the word means “hard worker” The development of off-road vehicles was carried out in many countries The USSR was no exception In our country, two factories were involved in the development of SUVs for the Red Army - NATI and GAZ Their employees were hard at work creating prototypes Two contestants subsequently had to undergo tests The winner was planned to be put into mass production The NATI plant presented a reconnaissance vehicle called AR-NATI, and its direct competitor is the GAZ-64 At that time, Soviet designers did not yet know about the developments of American companies commissioned by the military, so we can say that domestic SUVs were truly the first in our country They were created independently, and not based on other people's models Soviet designers did a great job, as work on both projects was completed in less than two months - this was a record time for such large-scale developments The samples were brought to the Kremlin, where they were examined personally by Stalin along with Shaposhnikov, Budyonny and Voroshilov During the tests, AR-NATI became the undisputed winner This SUV has proven itself to be faster and more reliable The winner was recommended for serial production, but, alas, this was not destined to happen The Great Patriotic War began, and it turned out that AR-NATI required original parts, and it was almost impossible to organize their production in such difficult conditions In the meantime, GAZ specialists were finalizing their model, which went into mass production as a more practical option Meanwhile, AR-NATI, which was superior to its competitor in many ways, would soon face complete oblivion One sample of the car was destroyed by the Germans during the bombing of the plant, and the second served honestly at the front, used up all its resources and was written off before the end of the war Unfortunately, AR-NATI became a “ghost” SUV, which today still lives only in black and white photographs of war chronicles Not a single drawing of this car has survived If not for the pictures, the SUV could be considered an urban legend But the GAZ-64 was mass-produced almost until the 70s