s sanitized
CIA Wo.:
Mr. Theodore L. Thau Executive Secretary Advisory Committee on
Export Policy Department of Commerce
In response to your request, we ore forwardingopies of aentitled, "Tho Soviet Motor Vehicle Industry's Noed for Gleason Cear Cutting Machine Tools "
Director Economic Research,D
Attachment: s stated
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The Sovietustrv's NeedGear Cutting
Background
1. The persistence of the Soviet efforts to buy Gleason gear cutting machines for bevel and differential goar seta for axlos for trucks and passenger cars of thoAZ, and UAZ plants is easily understandable in the light of the history of the Soviet automotive industry. The industry grew vory slowly and improved very little technologically when it had to depend on indigenous resources. It progressed most rapidly when it received large injections of Free World managerial skill, equipment and technology. Rapid progress was achievedn thas, when Ford built the Gor'kiy Motor Vehicle Plant and equipped it withooling,ost recently in bringing the Volga Motor Vehicle Plant at Tol'yatti into production with the assistance of Fiat engineers, Italian money, and Pree World equipment.
the years since the end of world war II
tho truck industry, although it has grown steadily, has prog much more slowly than desired by the planners and has stagnated technologically. Now models, under development for years havo typically come into production four and five yoars after dates originally announced for them. The existing product mix has become increasingly inadequate with tho continued industrialization of the country. More than eighty percent of production consists of trucks with cargo capacitiesons. Very few trucks are produced for light (pickup) duty or for heavy long distance hauling.
is the last yearive year planwas supposed to show notajor increasesize trucks, especially those withwas intended toargo increase in thethe relatively neglected models in tho very lightheavy classes. None of these goals have been met.
The goal for output of all trucks0 was originally
setcomparedroduced
. 0 goal was subsequently raised.
As the following tabulation shows, the rates of expansion of truck production have continued to be disappointingly low during the period and output will not reach the lower end of the range originally planned
Rate of
(Percent)
7.4
7.1
380
408
4. All Soviet truck plants have expansion or modernization programs under way. Some programs, like that at GAZ, were in process long before the present five year plan period. The inability of the USSR to keep these expansion programs moving as scheduled probably stems from two factors. The first is the generalof the resources of the construction industry which presently retards the completion of many large Soviet investment projects. The second is the limitations of the Soviet machine building sector which is not oriented toward the production of the special purpose, highly efficient tools and equipment such as us machine builders have traditionally tailored for the needs of the USindustry. Even the assignment of high priorities to the automotive industry in the current five year plan was not able to produce the desired results, because the necessary specialized resources are too scarce to meet requirementsa lack of experience iu design andof modern vehiclesack of experience in machine tool design for the automotive industry. The showcase passenger car plant under construction at id yattl, the largest and most expensive manofacturino
* Planned rate of growthublished in vestnik Mashinostroyeniya,. 5.
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facility ever built in the L'SSR, has been made possible only because of the purchase of thousands of man-years of Fiat automotive experience and the importing of morealf billion dollars worth of specializedmachinery from the Free World on long term credit.
3. The purchase of the Gloason tools is crucial to modernization and expansion programs now under way at the two largest Soviet truck plants, GAZ and ZIL, and at the sole plant for producing light trucks and jeeps, UAZ. Many of the guar cutters at ZIL and GAZ are Glcason machines and overears old, having beenby the USSR during and immediately after World War II, before the end of Lend-Lease. Most of the others are Soviet-made copies, of whose performance bitter complaints can bo read in the Soviet Press.
It is possible that UAZ light truck plant has no gear cutting machines and has its gears cut on the same machines that cut gears for the Volga passenger cars at GAZ. No foreigners have been allowed in the UAZ plant, not even the Gleason people who had the unusual opportunity to see GAZ. UAZ got its start as an assembly plant for GAZ vehicles, and it is not known how much of the production process has been transferred to UAZ.
If present US policy for not exporting truck technology to the USSR is maintained, the technology to be embodied in the projectod heavy truck plant ot Naberozhneyye Chelny (Kama Motor Vehicle Plant) will suffer. Not only will tho USSR need US equipment for this plant
if it is to be up to date technically, but the plant most probably cannot be built in the tine period desired by the USSR planners without US managerial and engineering assistance. Unable to close the automotive technology gap from native resources, the USSR already has sought technical and material assistance for the Kama plant from every highly industrialized Free World country. To dote, no country has been both able and willing to provide the formidable amount of management and engineering talent, and financing that this billion dollar pluswill require.
jjck use 8.
. t 8" Qtal Soviet motor vehicle park rrmf-^n*
The Soviet military
ve
s
lossercent of tho park, the state and collect! farms aboutercent, common carrier services aboutercent and the rest aro held by individual enterprise
9. The Soviet economy does not provide enough
trucks for either the military forces or agriculture to
satisfy peak requirements. During periods of mobilization
such as occurred when Soviet forces invaded Czechoslovakia
ome trucks of civilian motor transport firms
are diverted to military uses. Agriculture,ark
ofillion trucks, must be assisted during tho
summer harvest with trucks from military transport
battalions as well as from the other civilian sectors.
Secretary Brezhnev reported to the8 Plenum
thatrucks must bo diverted from other uses
to assist agriculture for three or four months at harvest time.
10. Because of the general shortage of all-wheel-drive trucks, the motor pools of tho Soviet military forces contain many conventional drive vehicles. Moreover, many all-wheel-drive vehicles are employed in the civilian economy in rural areas, oil fields and other areas with primitive roads. Because general purpose motor vehicles of both conventional and all-whoel-drive design are extensively used by the military forces and because ail-whcel-drive vehicles are widely used in the civilian economy, it is not possiblo uo distinguish by modelSoviet military and civilian trucks.
11. eneral increase in the output of all types of trucks (possibly combined with the hard surfacing of tho rural highway net) would allow the Soviet armed forces to be better equipped with tho all-wheel-drivc vehicles that are best suited to tactical operations. An increase in production of all-wheel-drive models is included in tho plans of each of the existing plants desirinq Cleason goar cutters. Moreover, an all-whcol-drive model is proposed for the perspective Kama plant.
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ANNEX
otor Vehicle Plants Por Which Gleasor. MacnTnes Have Been Requested
Tho Gor'kiy Motor vehicle Plant (GAZ)
GAZ is the USSR's largest motor vehicle plant. It was established during the first Five Year Plan period with the technical assistance of the Ford Motor Company and equipped with the obsoleteord production equipment, it started production oford trucks and sedans 9 GAZrucks of two to four ton capacity,0 "Volga" assenger cars, and an unknown number of combat vehicles.
According to the annual plan, GAZ is supposed to increase outputercent Moreover, specific montion ishe plan of increasing the production
of the all-wheel-drive trucksndnd of introducing into production, in the second halfew version of the Volga passenger car designated
produces throe general categories ofemploy the same basic major componentstransmissions, transfer cases, etc. The curcent production are listed by category as
Drive
ons cargo,
6 cylinder engineons cargo,
8 cylinder ongine Chassis of both of these models are used
by other plants for mounting bus, dump,
and other bodies.
ons cargo,
6 cylinder engine, same but with winch
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x4 tons cargo,
6 cylinder engine Chassis of both basic models are
produced for mounting special bodies
in other plants
Combat (armored) Vehicles
BRDM-2 (also designatedB2)
^ iS is ancar that incorporates tne following standard GAZ components; engine, transmission, axles, hand brake, brake master cylinder, shock absorbers, parts of transfer case.
B
heeled armored carighly specialized chassis but incorporates the following standard GAZ components: Enoine, transmission, universal joints. it also uses modifiedransfer cases. Drive to the wheels is accomplished in each of the four axles through spiral bevel andgears which could be made on the Gleason machinery.
Tho Llkhachev Motor Vehicle Plant (Zip. Moscow
. If* s the second largest truck enterprise in cne USSR and the oldest, having been established4 it contains large numbers of US automotive machine tools and Soviet copies of them. However, no US equipment has been exported to zit, since passage of the Export Control Act As at GAZ, the production processes and proouct design are based on us practice. jl producedrucks ofon capacity, and engines iind components for larger prime movers, including those used for missiles. ZIL also
*s produced in special military versions that incorporate shielded ignition and control of tire pressure from the cab. Tn the Free World also, only strictly military vehicles employ these features.)
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uxury limousine in very small numbers,loss thaner year.
16. Aboutercent of tha trucks produced at ZIL areodels, the rest beingfour wheel truck3. In addition to producing complete trucks, ZIL produces engines for tacticalvehicles produced by tho Ural Motor Vehicle Plant in Miass. ZIL also produces some of the parts, including anginas, for therime moversssembled at the Bryansk Motor Vehicle Plant.
na1 Dr ive
onsylinder ongino
,onsylinder ongino
onsylinder engine
Engines and other components for tho
0 ton cargo, prime mover and missile transporter, and engines foron truck, an all-wheel-drive truck of military importance.
The Ul'yanovsk Motor Vehicle Plant (UAZ)
17. UAZ was builtart of the early post WW II program for reestablishing and expanding the prewarindustry. Its first complete product was theeop now calledhe production of which it took over from GAZ Initially, UAZ was very dependent on GAZ for components, but has become less so
Theariant of this conventional drive vehicleater tight, electrically shielded ignition and electrical system. This feature is usually installed only on tactical (all-wheel-drivc) vehicles.
s new and eventually will replace then production. One reasonrolonged dolay incompletely to production ofurrent inability to produce enough axles.
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recent years. 9 UAZ produced0 vehicles, of0 were light trucksnd0 were jeepsnd Jeeps are used for command andin the Soviet Array, and also have civilian application.
18. Plans for the future development of UAZ call for the eventual productionight trucks per year. Plans also called for the outputrucks per yearut this isompletely unrealistic figure. UAZ ia the only plant in the USSR that currently produces jeeps and light trucks, similar to US "pickup" and panel trucks. Current production consists of the following models:
*- Conventional Drive
IH,on cargo,
4 cylinders, panelM, on cargo,
4 cylinders, pickup
b. All-Wheel-Drive
ons cargo,
4 cylinder engine panel body,ons cargo,
4 cylinder engine pickup body,ersons,
4 cylinder engine ambulance body,1 persons
4 cylinder engine, micro-bus bodyersonson cargo,
4 cylinderoor jeep,ersonsbs,
4 cylinderoor Jeep
All these vehicles use tho same roar5 ratio) and share many other parts. The USSR has no plans to produce passenger cars at UAZ. Some confusion might arise from the fact that in the USSR jeeps are called passenger cars. Many of UAZ's jeeps are used by the armed forces and have been shipped to less developed countries under Soviet military assistance programs.
CIA/OER
Original document.
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