Topic: Puzzle #551- Solved! Laura & Kaliakra

[Otto Puzzell]

Know what these are?

Please, respond below and let us know the make and model designation of the cars posted here.

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[Otto Puzzell]

An early holiday gift for the Experts...

[@re]

To quote from a nice web page I found: The cars in this picture were built in 1983-85 and never entered production. The company responsible was a research institute in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg. The front-wheel drive coupé was called the Laura Kaliakra, equipped with a Lada 2105 engine and a ZAZ 968 transmission. The coachwork was in fiberglass on a tubular skeleton.

[faksta]

A minor update. The cars were not intended to be produced. Authors, Dmitriy Parfenov and Gennadiy Hainov, have built these two cars for themselves, and they have had different names - Laura (Parfenov's car, on the left) and Kaliakra (in some sources called Koleakri) - Hainov's one, on the right. Interesting fact: on the exhibition in Prague (don't know what year it was) Laura was seen by Nuccio Bertone, which was very satisfied with its design and had a conversation with both Parfenov and Hainov. That's what the magazines wrote.

[vdp]

It seems that the same company that is building the Kombat T-98 in St. Petersburg (now called Combat Armoring Group,back then it was OOO Avtokad) was the institute in Leningrad that built these cars. Their website states:

"The our company was created in 1985 by Mikhail Gorbachev lake a independent car design center in the new spirit 'perestroika' time.
Now company have a engineering, designer group and produce some type of the original vehicles and prototypes.
The first prototypes was 2 sport cars 'Laura' with 'Lada' engine and hand made independent suspension ,stirring and front wheel drive transmission."

This information seems to be in conflict whith faksta's post about the two cars had different names, and only one of them beeing called Laura.
These cars are also beeing reffered to as Avtokad Laura or Kombat Laura.

Can anybody help me in sorting out this confusion with names? Faksta maybe?

[faksta]

The story behind Laura cars and other Parfenov's vehicles is quite complicated and different sources report different information.

[Arunas]

The facts that faksta provided in his earlier reply are quite correct. My advice would be to change the topic's title as Laura & Koleakra(i)

I add tech specs of Laura:

Number of seats: 5
Number of doors: 2
Curb weight: 1100 kg
Fuel tank capacity: 70 l
Consumption at a speed of 120 km/h: 7.8 l / 100 km
Top speed: 165 km/h
Length: 4200 mm
Width: 1800 mm
Height: 1590 mm
Clearance: 160 mm
Engine: VAZ 2105
Transmission: ZAZ 968 and VAZ 2121 components
Bodywork: fiberglass

[Arunas]

Another beautiful contemporary color photograph...