It's time to touch upon such a popular question: as well as who invented it and when. We have already found out who invented the first car in the world, but our craftsmen were only 10 years behind Henry Ford and Gottlieb Daimler.
The very first Russian car created by two inventors, then living in St. Petersburg - Yakovlev Evgeny Alexandrovich, a retired lieutenant of the Russian navy, and Frese Petr Alexandrovich, mining engineer. It was in St. Petersburg that the first self-propelled crew in Russia was created. For public viewing, it was presented at the All-Russian Art and Industrial Exhibition, which took place in June 1896 in Nizhny Novgorod. According to the creators of the first Russian car themselves, they created it a little earlier - in May of the same year.
But following the letter of the law, it is known that everyone saw it in June at an exhibition in 1896. This is confirmed by a message in the St. Petersburg newspaper "Novoye Vremya", which appeared on June 8, 1896. It is also known that the first Russian car was equipped with a body for two passengers, while it weighed 300 kg and could reach speeds of up to 20 km / h.
Yakovlev in 1891 founded in St. Petersburg on Bolshaya Spasskaya street "The first Russian plant of gas and kerosene engines E. A. Yakovlev", now it bears the name "Volcano". And Petr Frese owned the Joint Stock Company, which produced the Frese and Co crews. It was located at St. Petersburg, Ertelev Lane, 10 (now Chekhov Street)
E. Yakovlev made for the first Russian car an engine with one horizontal cylinder and a transmission, which consisted of a differential and a two-stage gearbox. The engine had a capacity of 2 horsepower. Making these inventions Yakovlev used the experience of Karl Benz. It is worth noting that other car creators of those years from France, USA, Germany and many other countries did the same.
Interesting fact: the first car on the streets of St. Petersburg was the Benz, a four-seater Victoria model.
The first Russian car factories.
At the dawn of the growth of the automotive industry in Russia, there were almost no full-cycle car factories. Almost all factories produced only chassis and motor base. In order to get a complete car, you had to buy a chassis and deliver it to the carriage factory, where the car body was created, taking into account your wishes. At that time, the body was called "karosseri".
However, it should be said that Russian karosseri were highly valued even abroad. Bodies manufactured by Russian factories have received top awards many times at prestigious international car exhibitions in the period from 1907 to 1913 in Russia.
For example, at the first of these exhibitions, held in 1907, a large gold medal was awarded to the automobile bodies of the firm “P. D. Yakovlev ". And at the 4th International Automobile Exhibition of 1913 (St. Petersburg), half a dozen Mercedes cars with the bodies of the Breitigam carriage factory in St. Petersburg were presented.
Among the best carriage factories such names as "Victory", "Frese", "P. D. Yakovlev "," Puzyrev "and" Otto ". But among them only the Frese & Co factory tried to organize the production of trucks and cars. At the beginning of the twentieth century, she created several dozen cars with a transmission and a De Dion Bouton engine, as well as the first trolleybus and train with an electric transmission. But all these inventions were never developed to full final designs.
Puzyrev's first Russian automobile plant.
Naturally, the first Russian automobile plant was founded in 1909. It was called the Russian Automobile Plant of IP Puzyrev. Its creator wanted and made a plant that made all parts for cars himself from Russian materials, by the hands of Russian workers under the guidance of domestic engineers. Also, this plant had a goal - to come up with and make a car for Russian roads. And soon it was created: the models were named "28-35" (1911) and "A28-40" (1912). These cars were simple in design. They had a large margin of safety, but they were a little heavy. They had a large cross-country ability, thanks to the high ground clearance - 320mm.
On cars produced by the Puzyrev plant, for the first time in the world, transmissions in transmissions were switched using cam clutches - this is the plant's own invention. All gear levers were housed inside the body. And all the crankcases for the engine, differential and gearbox have been constructed from aluminum. The engine developed power up to 40 hp.
At the IV International Auto Show in St. Petersburg (spring 1913), already mentioned by us, Puzyrev presented 3 cars - a closed five-seater limousine and an open seven-seater car with a torpedo body, as well as the first Russian racing car with an overhead valve engine and a sports chassis.
The history of the modern car began quite recently - just a few hundred years ago, and the pace of development of the automotive industry is accelerating every year. The very first cars, which most often looked like motorized carriages, developed slowly and their owners and inventors were either not taken seriously or were considered very strange people who were engaged in unnecessary and incomprehensible research. However, their work was not in vain, so let's remember today what were the first cars?
What was the very first car in the world
The very first car was a conventional cart, which was equipped with a steam engine, which was capable of delivering the power needed to move the car itself and the driver. This first steam car was created in 1768 and existed in only one copy, which is quite logical, since there was simply no need for such machines.
The very idea of moving from horse-drawn carriages to mechanized carriages is a real breakthrough, which can be compared to the transition from the usual conservation of fire among cavemen to its extraction.
However, steam cars did not develop due to their too bulky design and inconvenience when loading fuel, and the inventors tried to come up with a new version of the engine.
The first car with a gasoline engine
It took almost 40 years to find new engine options, and already in 1806 the first car with an internal combustion engine was created. Its design was also not perfect, but it was more convenient to use, so it was this branch of cars that was developed.
Already 80 years later, in 1885, Karl Benz presented the first car ready for sale and mass production. It was very different from modern ones and the first thing that catches your eye is that it had not 4, but only 3 wheels.
Around the same time, the first motorized bicycle was invented, and a year later, a motorized carriage, but Gottlieb Daimler became its inventor.
However, back to the three-wheeled wonder from Benz. This car was equipped with a 954 cc engine and controlled by a T-bar. Despite the fact that this car made a splash among the world community, this miracle of technology did not receive wide distribution due to the enormous cost of the car.
Separately, a few words must be said about the engine, since it is he who is a real breakthrough in the era of mechanical engineering. Despite the fact that its weight was about 100 kg, the best engine options at that time simply did not exist. It is worth noting that in the patent for the invention of the car, received by Benz, the engine power was indicated as 2/3 horsepower, although the actual power of the car was slightly higher and reached 0.9 horsepower at 400 rpm. This three-wheeled miracle of technology could reach a speed of 16 kilometers per hour, which was a very good result for that time, and already in 1890 the car began to be produced in large quantities. You can see this car in operation in the video:
Four wheels instead of three
A three-wheeled car for a modern person is a curiosity and antiquity, although it was very much quoted among connoisseurs of the beauty of that era for its unusual and elegant design. But despite this, a few years after the first car with an internal combustion engine appeared, even Benz himself came to the conclusion that the three-wheeled car needed to be improved. Although the four-wheeled variant seemed less sleek and more like a carriage or wagon in the eyes of the era, it was the four-wheeled car that was easier to maintain and more durable due to the lower load on the front wheel. And already 3 years later, in 1893, the first four-wheeled car appeared, which in fact was a modified version of Benz's car, and was no different from its first invention.
The modifications did not end there, and in 1885 the Viktoria car appeared. Improvements to the four-wheeled car created by Benz continued until 1890, during which time more than 2,300 such vehicles were produced and sold.
From functionality to appearance
Naturally, Benz was not the only inventor to build automobiles. In parallel with him, Gottlieb Daimler conducted his work, who decided to approach the issue of creating a car in a slightly different way. The first models of his cars were simple horse-drawn carriages, which were driven by a motor.
Such crews appeared back in 1886, but due to the design features and too much load from the single-cylinder engine on the structure, they were extremely inconvenient, which prompted the inventor to continue working on his car.
Gottlieb Daimler himself spoke of himself as a reserved and patient designer who does not rush forward, but thinks more judiciously. Instead of modifying the current model, he first began developing his own internal combustion engine, for which he soon received a patent.
During this time, his employees were also working on a new car, which was put into production in 1895 under the name "Daimler". The new engines were later used to produce completely revolutionary car models.
It is worth saying that by that time the first car had already been produced that could reach a speed of 80 km / h, and this happened in 1985. This car was equipped with a four-cylinder engine with a capacity of 24 horsepower, which was a real breakthrough at that time.
However, this high-speed model of the car was very bulky, very poorly controlled and far from the safest, so the company still had a lot of work to do.
The very first Mercedes
Daimler's company coped with this work in the best possible way, and by the end of 1890 a world-famous car appeared, which was named after the daughter of the company's founder - Mercedes Daimler. According to experts and historians, this car became the prototype of modern cars.
Mercedes, with a capacity of 35 horsepower, is a real achievement and the pinnacle of the skill of engineers of that time. Ignition in this car was carried out using a low voltage magnet, the car had the ability to change gears, and there is nothing to say about the quality of the body - this was the last know-how in the automotive industry of that era. A high-quality stamped frame made the car stronger and made it possible to apply fundamentally new techniques in the manufacture of the car body.
The brakes of the new car have become more sophisticated, and the car itself is more reliable and obedient, which made it so popular among motorists. A little later, models equipped with a 5.3-liter side-valve engine were released, which also became popular and is still considered almost the best example of cars of that era.
The first car in Russia
Although Russia lagged behind foreign car manufacturers, over time, it understood the prospects for the development of this direction of industry. The first car that appeared in Russia was the French handsome Panard-Levassor, a French car brought to Russia in 1891 by Vasily Navrotsky. At that time, he held the position of editor of the newspaper "Odessa leaf". After that, interest in cars in Russia became more lively and by the end of the year several more cars were imported into the country. However, despite this, for the first time cars on the streets of Moscow, the first cars appeared only in 1899.
At this time, the country developed its own models of cars with an internal combustion engine, and the first such serial car was the "Car of Frese and Yakovlev", which was first presented to the public in 1896. However, this car did not arouse much interest among the highest circles and official representatives of the Russian Empire at the fair.
This practically set the tone for the development of the automotive industry in the country, because in Russia, although they began to produce small batches of trucks and cars, they were assembled under the license of foreign companies from spare parts produced abroad. Unfortunately, until 1917, the Russian Empire did not have its own production of spare parts and cars.
The situation changed after the Revolution, when the old system and old views on pre-revolutionary life changed dramatically. Since then, mechanical engineering in Russia and the countries of the former CIS and began its hard way.
From mechanical carriages to modern cars
The history of the automotive industry also has several dead-end branches of development, including electric cars of the 20th century and similar options that did not receive direct development, but can give food for thought to today's engineers, since the ideas of some cars were quite sound and just lacked the technical ability to implement these projects.
Since every day the automotive industry and the number of cars produced only increases, more powerful engines and perfect braking systems are installed, new materials are used for the manufacture of the car body and even computers are installed, it is quite possible that soon another industrial revolution awaits us on modern cars. in the future they will look the same as we now looked at cars of the 19th and 20th Centuries.
The history of the automotive industry in Russia is multifaceted. No wonder it was the Russian man who was one of the first to invent a self-propelled vehicle. In 1791, Ivan Kulibin presented to the public his own - a cart with a flywheel, a brake and even a gearbox.
The first cars with an engine that Russia saw were imported from Europe. At that time, all technical innovations flocked to the capital of the Russian state, Petersburg, from there. In 1891, the car was brought from France by V.V. Navrotsky.
In the 90s of the 19th century, more and more cars and motorcycles began to appear in Russia. In 1898, the first races were even held in St. Petersburg, in which technical innovations of that time participated. However, all cars and spare parts for them were imported. Their deliveries to Russia were controlled by representative offices of foreign firms.
The first Russian car also appeared in St. Petersburg. Its creators were enthusiasts Evgeny Alexandrovich Yakovlev and Peter Alexandrovich Frese. Yakovlev was engaged in the production of kerosene and gasoline engines, and Frese - in the production of crews. Despite their experience, the creation of the car was a real breakthrough for these inventors.
The first Russian car
The invention was successfully tested in May 1896, after which the car was exhibited at an exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod. The car had a two-seater body and developed a speed of up to 20 km / h.
Later, the Frese enterprise was created, which tried to establish the production of cars and trucks. At the beginning of the 20th century, several cars and trucks, as well as a trolleybus and the first electric train, were produced there. However, imported spare parts were still used in production, and it was not possible to establish a serial production of cars.
The first enterprise that set itself the task of producing truly Russian cars with native parts was the Russian Automobile Plant of IP Puzyrev. In 1911, the models "28-34" and "28-40" were produced here. and demanded close attention at that time. Therefore, the car was strong enough, heavy and with high ground clearance. The inventions of the plant also became cam clutches, with the help of which the speeds were switched. All control levers were already inside the body.
Before the revolution, full-fledged car production had not been established in Russia. For example, the Russo-Balt plant assembled about 10 cars, but they were again based on foreign spare parts. The revolution completely changed the course of Russian history, and at the same time began a new era in the production of cars that have already become Soviet.
Exactly 120 years ago, on July 14, 1896, the first serial Russian car was presented at the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod. The first domestically produced car with an internal combustion engine was ready and passed a series of tests in May 1896. In July, at an exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod, he made demonstration trips. It was Frese and Yakovlev's car.
In the wake of the rapid industrial upsurge that was observed in the Russian Empire since the second half of the 19th century, the emergence of the domestic automotive industry looks like a completely organic phenomenon. The pioneers of this industry in our country were the retired lieutenant of the Imperial Navy Yevgeny Alexandrovich Yakovlev and the mining engineer Pyotr Alexandrovich Frese, who designed the car presented to the general public in July 1896. It was they who launched the serial production of cars in Russia. The Frese factory in St. Petersburg became a pioneer in the serial production of cars and trucks. From 1901 to 1904 alone, more than 100 cars were assembled here, including those equipped with an electric drive. Also, a trolleybus and a road train with an electric transmission were tested here.
The creators of the first Russian car
Peter Alexandrovich Frese was born in St. Petersburg in 1844. In his hometown, he graduated from the mining institute, after which he ended up at the famous carriage factory of K. Nellis. He almost immediately managed to prove himself from the best side, quickly gaining the full confidence of the owner of the enterprise. The business of this company in those years went uphill, and Nellis made a talented young engineer his companion. At the same time, in 1873, Peter Frese created his own carriage workshop, which in 1876 merged with the Nellis factory, forming a new company "Nellis and Frese". Five years later, he became the sole owner of the company, which was renamed Frese & Co. Crew Factory.
It should be noted that in those years, the products of Russian carriage factories were highly valued all over the world, which is clearly evidenced by the fact that they received quite a lot of awards at international exhibitions. A special sign of quality can also be the fact that at the beginning of the 20th century, cars of the now legendary German automobile brand "Mercedes" were equipped with Russian bodies.
Evgeny Alexandrovich Yakovlev was born in 1857 in the St. Petersburg province. Until 1867 he studied at the Nikolaev Cavalry School, and from 1867 in the Nikolaev naval cadet classes. In 1875, after completing his studies, he was transferred to the navy as a cadet. The pinnacle of his naval career was the rank of lieutenant, which he received on January 1, 1883. In the same year he was dismissed on an indefinite leave, and a year later he completely retired from the service "for domestic reasons." After leaving the naval service, Yakovlev began to actively develop engines, acquiring patents for their manufacture. The liquid-fueled engine he created even earned approval from the famous Russian scientist Dmitry Mendeleev. Yakovlev's projects turned out to be quite profitable, over time he had regular customers, so in 1891 he opened the First Russian Plant of Gas and Kerosene Engines.
Fate brought these people together with its invisible hand, their love for automotive technology became a unifying element. Their personal acquaintance took place at an exhibition in Chicago, it predetermined the further fate of their joint brainchild. It is worth noting that Yakovlev's engines in those years had a large number of advanced design solutions (removable cylinder head, electric ignition, pressure lubrication, etc.). In 1893, at the World's Fair in Chicago, they were awarded a prize. At the same exhibition, one of the world's first mass-produced cars, the German "Benz" of the "Velo" model, was also presented for the first time. This machine attracted the attention of Yevgeny Yakovlev, as well as Peter Frese. It was then that they decided to create a similar car, but already in Russia.
Car debut
The debut of the first Russian car and its first public display took place in July 1896. The car was demonstrated at the XVI All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition, which was held in the Nizhny Novgorod region of Kunavino. In the pre-revolutionary era, it was the largest exhibition area in the country, which demonstrated the best domestic achievements in the field of industry. The Emperor personally took care of the financing of the exhibition. Among the many wonderful and interesting exhibits at the exhibition, the joint development of Frese and Yakovlev was not lost.
Description of the car Frese-Yakovleva
Outwardly, the car presented at the exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod, like many foreign analogues of that period, looked quite like a light horse-drawn carriage. In its features, it was possible, if desired, to consider a cab. The prototype of the car was the German Benz Velo, which inspired the creators. The weight of the model they developed was approximately 300 kg.
The heart of the car was a single-cylinder, four-stroke engine, which was located at the rear and produced up to 2 hp. Such a small motor allowed the car to reach speeds of up to 20 km / h. Especially for cooling the engine, an evaporative system was implemented on the car, in which water was used, and the role of heat exchangers was played by brass tanks placed along the sides in the rear of the hull. Together, these tanks could hold up to 30 liters of fluid. During the movement, the water periodically boiled, and the steam, heading into the condenser, returned back to a liquid state.
The car used electric ignition, which was made in the form of a battery and an induction coil. The simplest evaporative carburetor was responsible for preparing the fuel mixture. Which was a container filled with gasoline, while the engine was running, gasoline was heated by exhaust gases and evaporated, combining with air. With the help of a special mixer, it was possible to easily change the composition of the mixture. But its quantitative adjustment was not provided.
The car's gearbox was similar to that used on the Benz car, but the leather belts on the Russian car were replaced with more reliable ones, made of multi-layer rubberized fabric. The belt transmission provided two gears: forward and idle. The gear shifting process was controlled using the levers located on the side of the steering wheel. The car had two brakes. The main one was foot and acted directly on the drive shaft of the gearbox. The second brake was manual, it pressed rubber blocks against the solid tires of the rear wheels of the car.
The simple design of the car was supplemented by a double wooden body of the phaeton type, which had a folding leather top. The car body was articulated with a leaf spring suspension, which worked on the principle of frictional vibration damping. The springs consisted of a fairly large number of sheets, which, interacting with each other, extinguished sharp vibrations and shocks while the car was moving. The use of this design did not require the installation of shock absorbers, but it forced the springs to turn in time with the wheels, the rotation of which was provided by special metal bushings. The wheels of the car were quite bulky (the front wheels were smaller than the rear ones) and, like their spokes, were made of wood. The wheels were covered with solid rubber tires. At that time, there was no production of inflated tires in Russia.
It is worth noting that Frese and Yakovlev were quite talented enough to bring to life many of the ideas that were used in the global automotive industry at the end of the 19th century. In this regard, their development was not unique or exclusive. At the same time, the idea of turning the presented copy into a mass commercial production car looked very interesting at that time. There is still no information about what exactly happened with the sample presented at the exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod. Perhaps it was simply destroyed by the inventors themselves. According to the surviving photographs of this car, for its centenary, which was celebrated in 1996, an exact copy of it, a replicar, was created. The car was recreated in the scientific and technical center of the Russian newspaper "Autoreview" with the direct assistance of the editor-in-chief of the publication, MI Podorozhansky.
After the untimely death of Yevgeny Yakovlev in 1898, his companions decided to redesign the plant, abandoning the production of internal combustion engines. This forced Peter Frese to look for ways to produce his own motors. As a result, he was forced to conclude an agreement with the French company "De Dion Bouton", with which he worked closely until 1910. This year he sold his factory to the Russian-Baltic plant, after which he gradually retired. Frese died in 1918 in his native Petersburg.
One year after the first demonstration at an exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod, sales of the presented car started in the Russian Empire, however, how many copies of the Frese-Yakovlev car were produced and sold is unknown. According to some reports, the price tag for Frese-Yakovlev's car started at 1,500 rubles. It was half the price of a Benz car and about 30 times the price of a regular horse.
Characteristics of the car Frese and Yakovlev:
Body type - phaeton (double).
Wheel formula - 4x2 (rear wheel drive).
Overall dimensions: length - 2450 mm, width - 1590 mm, height - 1500 mm (with folded awning).
Back track - 1250 mm.
Front track - 1200 mm.
Weight - 300 kg.
The power plant is a 2 hp single-cylinder gasoline engine.
The maximum speed is up to 20 km / h.
It was the Russo-Balt C-24/30 car, which first drove along the roads of the Russian Empire on June 8 (May 26, old style), 1909, that should be considered the firstborn of the domestic automotive industry. All cars with an internal combustion engine that appeared in our country before that were, in fact, single products of handicraft. And only the first "Russo-Balt" became a truly serial industrial machine.
The Russian-Baltic Carriage Works (RBVZ), which had been operating in Riga since 1869, initially specialized in the production of cars for the railways of the Urals and the Trans-Siberian Railway. At the beginning of the 20th century, after the completion of the construction of the Transsib, which connected the European part of Russia with the Far East, the demand for railway cars decreased. And the plant switched to the manufacture of military carts for the needs of our army.
But with the end of the Russian-Japanese war of 1904-1905, the production capacities of the RBVZ were again not loaded at full capacity. It was necessary to start the production of some new civilian product, and the director of the plant, Ivan Aleksandrovich Fryazinovsky, suggested mastering and starting the production of cars - an absolutely new then “product”.
Fryazinovsky approached the solution of the problem as an experienced businessman - in 1908, the Automobile Department was created at RBVZ, which began to study the possibilities and prospects for the production of cars in Russia. Soon, in 1910, for the Automotive Department of RBVZ they bought an already existing production - "Frese and K Crew Factory", the creators of which, engineers Pyotr Alexandrovich Frese and Yevgeny Alexandrovich Yakovlev, had been working on the design of the first samples of a Russian car with an internal engine since the end of the 19th century. combustion.
In addition to the developments of Yakovlev and Frese, the Automotive Department of RBVZ also used advanced European experience, inviting engineers from the Belgian company Fondu to work in Russia. As a result, by 1909, 10 engineers, 141 workers and 3 test drivers were already working on the creation of the first production car in our country in the Automotive Department of the Russian-Baltic Carriage Works.
A Don Cossack and a talented engineer Dmitry Dmitrievich Bondarev worked on the creation of a domestic engine for the first production car in Russia at the plant. Soon after the start of production of the serial Ruso-Balt, it was he who headed the Automotive Department of RBVZ.
This is how the first Russian serial production car was born - the Russo-Balt C-24/30, which rolled off the assembly line on June 8 (May 26, old style), 1909. The C-24/30 index was deciphered as follows: 24 - the estimated engine power in horsepower, 30 - the maximum power.
Car "Russo-Balt". Photo: cover of the magazine "Za Rulem", 1989
Then it seemed incredible that in Russia, with its off-road conditions, the car would quickly become wildly popular. But the creators of "Russo-Balt" were not mistaken - already the first series was released in the amount of 347 copies, which was a very impressive figure for the technology of the beginning of the 20th century.
The Russo-Balt car was designed taking into account the best European experience, but much more adapted to the Russian circumstances. The first model "Russo-Balta" S-24/35 was also suitable for winter conditions, it could be equipped with skis and rubber tracks with metal ridges for increased cross-country ability.
Also noteworthy is the fact that one of the copies of the Russo-Balt, produced in 1910, covered 80 thousand kilometers in four years without major repairs. The reputation of the cars of the Russian-Baltic Carriage Works was so high that two copies were ordered in 1913 by the garage of the emperor of Russia himself. Moreover, on the eve of the First World War, 64% of all cars of the plant were acquired by the Russian army, where they were used not only as staff and ambulances, but also as a chassis for the construction of armored cars.
The Russian-Baltic Carriage Works began to develop its production in accordance with the specifics of the automobile industry. New foundries and assembly shops appeared, and the number of workers increased. The design department has set a course for the production of passenger cars in three new series: "C", "K" and "E". All models met the most advanced technologies of that time, and participation in automobile exhibitions more than once made Russo-Balt cars gold medalists.
The RBVZ model, produced since 1912 under the C-24 index, has reached particular attention and popularity. It was on its chassis that the most expensive carriages were installed: limousines, open six-seater bodies, as well as racing cars. By the way, racing copies of "Russo-Balt" could reach a record then speed - up to 85 km / h. Andrey Nagel, a famous Russian racer, made several victorious races in Europe, Asia and Africa in 1912-1913 in his light streamlined "Russo-Balt" without any serious breakdowns.
During the First World War, in 1916, when German troops approached Riga, the RBVZ plant was evacuated to the outskirts of Moscow, in Fili, and was named "The Second Automobile Plant Russo-Balt". Until 1921, it was considered the most well-equipped plant in Russia and was re-equipped for the manufacture of armored vehicles. The last five copies of the Russo-Balt car were produced here in 1922.
The following year, 1923, the plant's capacities were redesigned for aircraft production, and in this capacity, the heir to the Russian-Baltic plant exists in our time, being part of the State Space Research and Production Center named after M.V. Khrunichev.
Only two original copies of the legendary Russo-Balt car have survived to this day. The first of them was recreated from fragments of different machines and is located in the Moscow Polytechnic Museum, and the second is exhibited in their historical homeland, in Riga. It is thanks to the Russo-Balt car that June 8th can be considered the real date of birth of the domestic automotive industry.
