MAZ-543: in the footsteps of the legend
MAZ-543
MAZ for military purposes
Many cars brought world fame to the automobile design school of the USSR, but heavy trucks from Minsk occupy a special place among them. First of all, of course, the MAZ-535, which was already discussed at pages "Military Review". The Minsk residents turned out to be both unique and breakthrough for the domestic industry - nothing like this had ever been produced in the USSR before.
MAZ-535 is a representative of the first generation of Minsk heavy trucks
MAZ-535/537, although not without fundamental shortcomings (for example, deformed tank engine with the appropriate resource) turned out to be nice. Just 11 years after the end of the war and without the involvement of foreign specialists, a heavy truck with a unique transmission was developed in Minsk, which included a torque converter, a planetary 3-speed gearbox, a 2-speed transfer case, center and cross-axle self-locking differentials and planetary wheel gearboxes. Looking ahead, let's say that in modern Russia all the competencies for building such equipment have been lost, and the army is completely dependent on the Republic of Belarus. The actual backup of the Minsk Automobile Plant - the Kurgan Wheel Tractor Plant - was strangled with their own hands in 2011.
Boris Lvovich Shaposhnik
Every domestic car has a father-designer or, in other words, an ideological inspirer, without whom the production car would not have happened. Army UAZs owe their birth to Alexey Vinokurov, Niva to Pyotr Prusov, KamAZ was born thanks to three designers at once - Alexander Setranov, Vsevolod Vyazmin and Georgy Fest. MAZ for military purposes, whose father Boris Shaposhnik is rightfully considered, was no exception.
Boris Lvovich Shaposhnik was most accurately expressed in “Stories Moscow Automobile Plant named after I. A. Likhachev":
“...a gifted person, as if born with a counting ruler in his hands. All his decisions were distinguished by thoroughness of justification, novelty and boldness of the plan.”
Boris Lvovich began his design career even before the war at the Moscow Automobile Plant. The engineer's track record includes all-terrain vehicles ZIS-23 and ZIS-24, gas generator ZIS-21, bus ZIS-16 and executive ZIS-101A. It is here that a graduate of the Moscow Higher Technical University named after. N. E. Bauman, who trained as a mechanical engineer for special vehicles, cut his teeth in designing the first all-wheel drive vehicles. Subsequently, this work became the work of his whole life, turning into a whole family of super-heavy Minsk heavy trucks, which still form the backbone of the Russian Army. But before that, Shaposhnik goes to Ulyanovsk, where during the war he began producing the ZIS-5V truck. In the fall of 1945, he was already in Siberia, where he almost launched new NAZ (Novosibirsk Automobile Plant) cars into production. But the enterprise was not destined to take place, and Shaposhnik was urgently sent to Minsk in 1949:
“To transfer from the Novosibirsk Automobile Plant the personnel of the chief designer and experimental workshop, headed by the chief designer comrade. Shaposhnik B.L. at the Minsk Automobile Plant.”
Let's leave the history of the formation of the production of wheeled vehicles in the Belarusian SSR for another review, but for now let's concentrate on the main character - the MAZ-543.
The second generation
After several years of military operation of the giant MAZ-535/537, it became clear that the multi-axle wheel design is best suited for mounting missile launchers and other heavy equipment. Tracked vehicles in the Soviet Union were henceforth closed to the strategic equipment segment. But the 535 series tractors were also poorly suited for the rocket path - primarily due to layout limitations. For example, there was simply nowhere to put the 9M76 operational-tactical missile of the Temp-S complex on the MAZ-535. It did not fit on the chassis along the length, and if it did fit, it stuck high into the sky, noticeably increasing the center of gravity of the complex. It was necessary to lengthen the wheelbase and divide the cabin in the middle so that the main product could lie more comfortably. Thus, in the late 50s and early 60s, the MAZ-543 concept with characteristic two cockpit glazing lights appeared, which forever became the hallmark of the Strategic Missile Forces, air defense, rocket artillery and many other branches of the military. The first generation MAZ-535/537 was eventually transferred to production in Kurgan, freeing up Minsk residents for a new project.
The MAZ-543 cannot be called revolutionary - it was largely based on the units and components of the first generation tractor. But there were also non-trivial solutions. For example, a fiberglass cabin, which had to be invented from scratch - nothing like this had ever been produced anywhere in the USSR before. Engineers from Moscow Higher Technical University came to the rescue. Bauman, and a special production area was organized for the new product in the experimental workshop.
The first six prototype MAZ-543 chassis were built in Minsk in 1962. The vehicles were equipped with a 525-horsepower D12A diesel engine, which traces its origins to the tank V-2 and is produced at Barnaul Transmash. Separately, it is worth dwelling on the more advanced design of the 543rd machine relative to its predecessor. Thus, the MAZ-535 had a curb weight of 19,4 tons and carried only 7000 kilograms on board. MAZ-543 was heavier - 20,35 tons, but the load capacity was an impressive 19,1 tons. High-alloy steel in the structure and a reinforced riveted-welded frame with increased elasticity, made of thin low-alloy steel sheet, made it possible to achieve this ratio. Almost without changes, the new car carried over from the old one an independent torsion bar suspension on all wheels with double-acting telescopic hydraulic shock absorbers.
The car plant started producing the MAZ-543 rhythmically only in 1965, when 81 copies of the all-terrain vehicle were immediately included in the annual plan. At the same time, the production volumes of the previous 537th machine were reduced with a parallel transfer of production to Kurgan. By the way, in the end it was decided to produce fiberglass cabins not in Minsk, but in a non-standard equipment workshop in Osipovichi, Mogilev region.
The MAZ-543 made its debut for the general public on November 7, 1965 at a parade in Moscow, when it appeared as a carrier of the 9K72 Elbrus missile system. This happened just a few months after the start of mass production of the giant.
MAZ-543 is most likely the first car of the MAZ Special Design Bureau, which also received a purely peaceful profession. We are talking about the intensive development of the West Siberian and Caspian oil and gas complexes, which required specific wheeled equipment. It is difficult to imagine how Mingazprom was able to get quotas for military vehicles, but the factory workers not only organized the production of civilian all-terrain vehicles, but developed a special version of the MAZ-543P. The vehicle was distinguished by a platform on a frame intended for mounting special equipment, as well as by the absence of blackout. In total, up to 2 thousand trucks were shipped to the national economy, which later received the respectful nickname “Hurricane”. The production of the MAZ-543P at one point almost collapsed - the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR A.N. Kosygin had to intervene, after which vehicles with the “P” index were necessarily included in the monthly production plans. Every year, Minsk residents produced 200 MAZ-543 chassis for various purposes and about one third went to civilian customers. In the 60s, a combination of an experimental MAZ-544 tractor with MAZ-5246 and MAZ-939 semi-trailers was developed, and the first modernized version of the base vehicle, the MAZ-543A, appeared. In 1966, in the new version of the vehicle, the engine compartment was changed, its installation site was enlarged, on which the combat control equipment of the missile system was placed. The well-deserved all-terrain vehicle received its next major improvement only in 1976, when the MAZ-543M version was put into production.
MAZ-543M
The product is distinguished by the absence of a second cabin and the displacement of the engine compartment forward and to the right. This made it possible to increase the useful area of the chassis to accommodate larger structures. For example, the fighting compartment and 12 guides of the 9K58 Smerch multiple launch rocket system, 130-mm Bereg guns or S-300P missiles. In general, the MAZ-543M became a real workhorse of the air defense forces - the S-300PMU-1, S-300PMU-2 and S-400 Triumph systems were mounted on the tractor base. MAZ with one left cabin found itself as a retinue of mobile missile systems "Temp-2S", "Pioneer", "Topol" and "Topol-M". Mobile command posts, target detection, communications, defense and security vehicles, canteens and power plants, and much more were installed on the MAZ-543M.
The further fate of the MAZ-543 series is connected with the wheeled vehicles of the third generation of the Oplot Oplot, better known as the MAZ-79111. They were born in the early 70s, and this is a slightly different story...
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