1966 Volga GAZ-21 - Jay Leno's Garage

Commies went broke in 1991, this car surely is NOT the reason for their demise.

LOL I had one..In black..

Gaz 21 volga...fantastic!....this Is the third version "whale"...the second was " Shark" and the First a name "star"!!!!!!

America would regard this as a middle class car, while in Russia, elite people drove this..... crazy.

The succesor of the equally estatically pleasing GAZ M20 Probeda

Butt ugly???? This puts many Volvos of that era to shame!

czarna wołga?

Mr Leno. I have acquired one of these fine autos and was wondering if you had a resource for any manuals or paperwork, preferably in English. Thank you

It a gorgeous car. I would love to own one

Why was the steering wheel on the right side in that picture he holds up?

As far as I know, the KGB actually used the GAZ 23, which is the same car but with a 5.5 Liter V8 under the hood, producing about 160hp. I know that isnt much, but when all the other cars on the road can pull a maximum of about 130km/h, that aint too shabby.

Watch the movie, "Black Lightning ". It's in Russian with English subtitles. Good movie, a 1966 Volga is the star.

Simple to maintain... I should say so!

There's another channel on YT where some guy in Estonia gets ancient barn-finds to start and run.

He got the successor model (different body, same mechanicals) to this out of a forest, and got it to start... By setting the valve clearances with a hammer!

That car is gorgeous, I’m actually looking into getting one

Have you shown the Trabants yet? There's a Trabant assembly film out hete that is really fun.

The "Gaz" is a reference to the plant -Gorki avto Zavod - or, "The auto plant in Gorki". Gorki is now Nizhny Novgorod, and GAZ still exists. The deer is kind of a city mascot - it's on the city flag"

The tuning buttons on the radio selected which KGB office could monitor your conversation.
Due to chronic shortages, you had to remove the windshield wipers when parked otherwise they'd be stolen. Imagine waiting 4 - 7 years to have that piece of crap.

Funny to see this junk in US. Actually my grandpa had almost same GAZ-21 (a bit different version with solid steel deer figure on the hood, a bit more chrome and emerald colour paint). Pretty good condition. Well that was before ruskies came and grandparent's village become a battlefield. As you can guess, Volga, as same as the garage, didn't survived artillery barrages.

Oh deer, what all the nice cars that you have even you need a punishment car to drive once in a while!

That thing is cool.

My tire is marked: made in West-Germany.

I don’t understand some of the videos about these cars that make fun of them-I think they’re fascinating vehicles and were made to handle the conditions they were expected to work in. Were American cars “better”? In some ways, but I bet they’d be completely destroyed in a couple years in that climate. (Look at how fast cars rusted away in my area-the upper Midwest)

Jay is coming off like a snob , I don't think it was trying to compete with Cadillac and Mercedes that was for you rich guys Jay, I like the Simplicity and the clean lines it's Built like a tank and easy to work on also, I'll bet you could always slide a 350 Chevy in it if you wanted to

That is a MOSZKVICS,,,,They were reliable cars...
All Russian build cars were reliable except the air cooled Zaporozhets ( it stalled on you at sudden from stop acceleration)...

The KGB volga was black and it came with a 5.5L V8

I remember I almost got killed by one of those when I was a kid while a was rolling down a hill in an improvised go cart, it was so tall I got under and the driver fortunately stopped before something bad happened.

Im not Russian but I find this racist .😂😂

I'm in Uzbekistan and got to ride in a 1967 Volga yesterday from the date this posted. It was fun. The thing drove like a tank, no power anything.

Такую песню люди в СССР никогда не пели. Можно было бы поинтересоваться, какие песни были популярны в СССР в 50-60-годы.

Probably you'll never see this comment Mr. Leno but I'll post it anyway. I went to high school in Kabul, Afghanistan, 1962 - 1966. Almost every cab was either a Mosckvich or a Volga--usually beat up as hell, smoking atrociously, gears grinding constantly and sounding as if every bearing in the cars had been worn into a crumbly mess. Yeah, but they always worked and did their job. We used them frequently to get from one side of town to the other side of town, Afghan drivers with turbans flapping about in open windows, and cigarette puffing with the radio turned up as loud as it would go. Volgas were the luxury taxi. The Mosckvich was the economy taxi.

You need to do an LS Swap on that thing. A corvette powertrain would spice things up a bit

Horn in aftermarket, OEM one plays Soviet anthem. In all seriousness these things were bulletproof and made to last, the anti corrosion is far better than western cars of the period. You only worried if a black one pulled up. Yuri Gagarin actually got a Citroen DS.

The KGB preferred black 😂 I live in Kyiv and still impressed by the amount of Gaz Volga Lada still being driven now and in good condition, but considering that an old sad Lada needing work can cost $1000 and min wage is about $1.50 they take care of their cars 🎉
Customised they are worth a lot in any ex Soviet country and they were popular in all the Soviet Union countries not just Russia

I had a '66 Volvo 122S (sedan, we had a wagon as well). It had about 95HP and a 4-speed manual. This Volga looks like Russia attempted to copy the Volvo.

That’s a gazelle not a deer.That’s why it’s a Gaz

I don,t know why are you so scared from Russia, why you think it is the only and the best modification, and if it's ugly then am going to kill myself ( i don't speak english, if something wrong sorry)

As COLUMBO would say, Oh it’s nothing special. It’s just transportation.

Lol as a person who lives in a 3rd world corrupt capitalist country, this is stylish and elegant.

Ford throughout the world:
Canada 1904
France 1908
England 1909
Australia 1909
Argentina 1913
Brazil 1919
Ireland 1917
Spain 1919
Italy 1922
Chile 1924
Germany 1925
USSR 1929
Hungary 1935

GAZ=Ford

My favorite Soviet car!

Your an idiot.. you have no knowledge on Europe 🖕🏼

اتذكرها في عام 1970 في السعوديه كانت كثيره وغالبا سيارة أجره Taxi كانت جميله وقويه وتتحمل الحراره والبروده

As the spies used to say (maybe they still do): ‘Moscow rules; watch your back’. So where are the wing mirrors?

funny stuff. but i like that car.

Моя первая машина на которой меня учил мой отец управлять ей.😊

Jay, you didn’t show the BEST PART of this car! The front seat folds back making an entire bed! It’s awesome!

I disagree, it was a very well designed car, so much that it has become a sought after classic. And manual transmission on an efficient 4 cylinder ohc motor, manual windows and no A/C was downright standard all over the world back then, except in the US. Oblivious decadent luxury was standard in the US. And I'm not even a communist!