Avtovaz Lada Kalina (diecast 1:43, Hongwell)

This is Lada Kalina in scale 1:43. The model is made by Hongwell. Nothing opens.

During the end of the nineties, the specialists of the Volga
Automobile Plant are working on updating the recently launched
VAZ-2110 to the Priora, while simultaneously working on the project of
restyling the Samara family. Simultaneously with them, the "classics"
remain on the conveyor, leading their history from the distant
sixties. It is gradually becoming clear that updating the existing
models alone will not be enough - the plant needs a new car that would
bring a fresh design and allow it to attract a new audience. This role
was assumed by Kalina - a compact "runabout" with a "juicy"

name and a fundamentally different appearance from the entire model
range of that time.

New with a touch of old

Back in the early 90s, at VAZ, by order of the AVVA concern, a project
of a "people's car" under the index 1116 was carried out, but ... the
money collected from the sale of shares was not enough to launch the
car into mass production. Several years later, it was decided to use
the developments to create a new machine on the same platform on which
Samara and the "ten" were made.



This is understandable: it is the development of the basis of the car
that is the most labor-intensive and expensive for any manufacturer,
and in the difficult nineties already the Russian VAZ simply could not
afford such a luxury. And there was no urgent need for a new
architecture, because thanks to the "genes" of Porsche, the
front-wheel drive cars turned out to be quite successful - in
contrast, for example, from the "stillborn" AZLK-2141 or the
not-too-practical Tavria. Almost immediately, the future car was named
"Kalina", due to which, subsequently, almost no one named the car by
the digital index, as was customary with the "ten".

Why did the new model get an index starting with one? This is exactly
how the USSR industry standard designated cars of a lower class than
the Zhiguli and Samara, whose indices always began with a two. There
is no mistake here: the designers understood that the car on the
Samara platform would no longer resemble the C-class "grown up" by
that time, and decided to create a full-fledged class B car,
designating it accordingly. In addition, this would theoretically
allow VAZ cars to be “diluted” into different segments in the eyes of
buyers.



The new model was immediately conceived as a whole family, and in
addition to the sedan and hatchback we are used to, Kalina was
supposed to become ... a minivan that could be an alternative to
Nadezhda! Alas, for technological reasons, the designers had to
abandon such an idea in favor of an ordinary station wagon, which
subsequently entered the conveyor under the index 1117.

It is interesting that the first designers created the 1119 hatchback,
and not the 1118 sedan, the release of which began earlier than the
rest of the modifications. Apparently, this is why the short five-door
looks the most harmonious and integral. But keeping in mind the
puncture with the VAZ-2108, VAZ marketers were the first to enter
serial production later on, the four-door sedan most demanded by the
consumers.

The success of the designers

Kalina's appearance fully corresponded to modern trends and trends of
the nineties - soft lines, rounded surfaces. Indeed, at that time,
biodesign dominated everywhere, and in Togliatti they could not ignore
the fashion trend also because the car in the future was to be
supplied for export. It sounds surprising, but Kalina of the first
generation was bought even in Germany, oversaturated with cars!



Despite the still Soviet basis, Kalina has not only a new appearance.
The designers decided to abandon the previous developments on the
interior, since the details of Samara and "dozens" did not correspond
to the rounded appearance of Kalina. Initially, VAZ employees paid a
lot of attention to the elaboration of the vehicle's layout. By the
way, Kalina was the first VAZ model, the interior of which was
designed in mathematical models using the latest equipment. This
provided the compact car with surprisingly good ergonomics - in terms
of spaciousness and ease of landing, this car cannot be compared with
the previous front-wheel drives, although the base, in fact, remained
the same! But the approach was different - more modern.

Despite the difficulties associated with the situation in the country
(one default in 1998 is worth it!), They did not save on solutions in
the interior, which had a beneficial effect not only on the interior
design, but also on its technical performance.

One example is seat rails and recliners (backrest tilt mechanisms).
They are noticeably different from the ones on VAZ - 2108, since they
were made not by the traditional VAZ supplier, but by the German
company Keiper (Recaro Group), which is developing such units. In
addition, other foreign companies participated in the design of the
Kalinov seats.

Of course, Kalina was a more progressive and modern car precisely in
comparison with previous models, since the car did not objectively
reach its classmates from Europe and Asia at the time of the start of
serial production. Nevertheless, it was during the development of
Kalina that the VAZ workers implemented at the level of the serial
model such modern solutions as LED illumination of the instrument
cluster and keys, an electric lock for switching on the reverse gear,
a rotating "foreign-made" light switch, perfectly illuminating the
road with headlights with an electric corrector and polycarbonate
glass without a diffuser, a heating and ventilation system with
recirculation, a trip computer built into the instrument cluster,
luxury equipment with a factory air conditioner that could
automatically regulate the temperature in the cabin ... Kalina stood
out, as they say, to everyone against the background of other VAZ
models of the late nineties.

The electric power steering was appreciated by women who quickly liked
the "light steering". And in principle, the technical solution itself
(electrics instead of hydraulics) should be recognized as quite
reasonable for a car of this class. After all, a hydraulic booster is
a complex high-pressure mechanism, tubes, an actuator ... In addition,
all this takes away power from the motor, and it is much easier to
adjust the EUR by setting the required steering information content.

Proven solutions

So, by 2001, Kalina had acquired its final appearance, at the same
time leaving the image of a "laughing dolphin", that is, it began to
look quite modern and unambiguous. Alas, it became a truly serial car
only in 2004. Nevertheless, the car immediately found its buyer, who
liked the okay sedan with a comfortable interior and quite presentable
appearance, which made it surprisingly similar to the Opel Corsa for
the Latin American market.

As a result, VAZ employees got a car of the same class as the Fiat
Palio or Renault Symbol, but much more affordable and at the same time
much more “urban” and compact than the previous models. In other
words, the main advantage of Kalina was that it was initially
"sharpened" to the B-class standards, and this was done by quite
modern means.



The only thing that severely limited the “top” constructors was the
platform architecture. It is difficult to provide such a car with
balanced driving performance when the steering rack is located high
and fixed on a pliable engine shield, and not on a powerful subframe,
as is done on most analogues (and later on VAZs themselves). The VAZ
team managed to get rid of the notorious "jelly" of the VAZ-2110 in
corners by playing with the parameters of the suspensions, but the
usual Kalina, of course, did not become a "driver-car" from this.
However, the consumer for the most part did not need this, because
unlike Priora, Kalina was bought by more sedate motorists for normal
operation.



The high-torque 1.6-liter eight-valve engine 21114, which was a
further development of the usual "poltorashka" from Lada Samara, was
also matched to the concept of "minimum of global technical
innovations".

Unfading

Of course, for the Russian manufacturer in terms of reliability not
only of the power steering, but also of quite traditional parts, it
was not so much a Lada as an ordinary VAZ, but many Logans and Nexia
lost their potential owners precisely because of the Volga "berry".
And this means that the desire of the factory workers to make a new
generation car at a qualitatively different level was realized even on
the platform of not the very first freshness. It is no coincidence
that Kalina of the first generation lasted almost ten years on the
conveyor - until 2013, and most of the technical solutions are alive
and well today in Kalina-2, which has remained a "berry again" to this
day.