January -- Dakar Tatra trucks come in first (#407, driven by Loprais, Stachura, and Cermak) and third (#414, 7:00:34 later, driven by Koreny, Lamac, and Kahanek) places in the Paris-Dakar Rally.
Sept. 8 -- Tatra Museum: The new museum will be opened on october 4th. A planned but never finished building neighbouring the Tatra Hotel and the Culture Palace, meant to have been a theatre and a nuclear shelter, has been reconstructed. It has 4 stories and a cellar. The cellar (what would have been the shelter) will be used as a discotheque and a decision has to be made whether the restauration shop is going to be there as well. The ground and first floor will be used for the museum cars. Outside will be the streamlined train, "the Slowakian Arrow". Entering the museum at the main gate one will be confronted with the earliest automobiles on the left and, contrasting, the newest automobiles on the right. About 2/3 of the present collection will be exhibited in a thematic way, e.g. all the streamliners grouped together in the main hall, all trucks together in an additional hall. The presention of the collection will be much better, thanks to multi-language video presentations, light plans, sceneries, etc. The factory restauration shop is booked for three years to improve the quality of the collection. On the 2nd floor there are museum offices and a cinema, and on the 3rd floor, overlooking Koprivnice, there will be a museum restaurant and automobilia shop. A videosystem will guard the cars. 300,000 visitors a year are needed to keep the museum healthy. The old museum, being a villa and a big glass building, will be joinly used by the Tatra museum and the city of Koprivnice. The villa will become a Koprivnice city museum (famous runner Emil Zatopek was Koprivnice-born) and the glass building will remain as a depot for the museum. My overall impression of the new museum, having a guided tour with the architect, was very good.
PRIBOR: The Pribor plant closes at the latest on december 31 this year. At the
moment the building is used for assembling the Tatra Beta, a 400kg
weight capacity light delivery van, and the T700. About 50 T700s were built
this year. Production hasn't moved to Koprivnice yet. Whether the Tatra Beta
will be continued remains to be seen. It has not been a success.
WIEN-Koprivnice rallye: 160 cars took part, among them very rare and never-seen-before-cars like a 1915 Typ T, a 1920 Typ T, a 1927 Typ 17, a 1938 Typ 49 threewheeler, a 1942 T75K (jeep), a 1934 T70 firetruck, a 1935 T77, six three headlamp T603s, a Tatra mcrobus with T603 engine built in Bratislava in the early sixties, the 1969 prototype two-door T613coupé by Vignale, some recently restored T87s, a handful Tatraplans, 50! T603s, early 613s and a huge variety of prewar "iron-nosed" (as we call them in Europe) T57s, T11s, T12s, etc. Weather condition were good and we were made most welcome. Competion was by quizzes, tricks, etc. All by all one can say it was a demanding rallye. I myself took my 1957 T603 to the rallye and was joined by my family. Gary Cullen, John Long, Kenneth Uffheil were all on the rallye either as a passenger or driver.
KIRCHHEIM: One week later the Tatra Register Deutschland organised a happy birthday Tatra rallye. 60 Tatra's were present. Amomg them a T52 with Sodomka body, a T75 roadster with Bohemia body, a T75 with Linie Tousek body, a T17/31, a T57K chassis, and a T72 six-wheeler light truck which will be converted to a replica of the world-journey truck used by Dr. Baum in the thirties and will be used by the present owner for a trip around the world in 2008. The rallye was well organised and the wheather was nice.
-info. supplied by Kees Smit
Aug. 1997 -- The new Tatra delivery vehicle, called Beta, is being produced at the Pribor factory. It has a plastic body and is powered by Hyundai 1.3-litre engine of 83bhp output. The rest of the mechanicals are either of Skoda Pilsen or Hyundai origin. It looks like the badge is the only Tatra item. The Beta is being sold through Hyundai dealers for 315980 Czech crowns.
As part of reducing costs Skoda Plzen has decided to move production of Tatra cars from Pribor to Koprivnice. Production of trucks will be cooperated with factory LIAZ, now Skoda-LIAZ (LIAZ means Liberecke Automobilove Zavody - Liberec Car Works), LIAZ is a company that, in the previous era (last 30 years) was making camion trucks (versus Tatra, that was mainly used off-road), now these companies are developing new types (or modifications of current types respectively) together to reduce costs. For example a big problem of current development is the construction of a diesel engine which meets requiremets of new EURO III emission rules.
Tatra and LIAZ also announced production of trucks with an aluminum cab.
-info. supplied by Radek Tandler
Museum: The present Tatra museum closes at the end of august, directly after the 100 year jubilee rallye. It will be moved to an unfinished "Culture Palace" building, near the Tatra International Hotel. Construction is on its way to have it ready for october 1997, when it will be opened.
-info. supplied by Kees Smit
Tatra Centennial Celebrations:
22, 23, and 24 of August: 100 years Tatra meeting in Koprivnice. Due to logistics problems, regrettably not open to everybody. Start will be in Vienna, finish in Koprivnice. The organisers hope to invite three cars of every model Tatra has build.
It will be jointly organised by Tatra clubs from Koprivnice, Ostrava, Brno and Salzburg. In rememberance of the first drive of the Nesseldorfer from Vienna to Koprivnice in 1897, a two day jubilee drive is planned from Wien to Zlin to Koprivnice.
On the 22nd of August there will be a 190km trip from Vienna to Zlin.
On the 23rd there will be a 70 km drive from Zlin to Koprivnice, where all the participants will put their cars on show.
The number of participants will be limited to 150 cars. Therefore, the organisation makes a resevation. They will select the applications. Costs will be Dm 390,-- for one car plus two person crew. Every other passenger will be charged DM 200,--. The entrance fee includes Hotels in Wien, Zlin and Koprivnice, breakfasts, dinners, lunches and parties.
Please apply to: Mr.Adolf Vermirovsky, Bezrucova 647, 74221 Koprivnice, Czech Republic.
Mention: name, family name, adress, type of car, year of fabrication, number of crew and if You want to stay in Hotels in Vienna, Zlin and Koprivnice.
29, 30, 31 of August: International Tatra Meeting in Kirchheim
(just south of Kassel in Hessen), Germany. Organisation: Tatra Register
Deutschland. Information: Wolf Dieter Fischer, Sauerbach 8, D - 36275 Kirchheim,
Germany. tel. 06625 1525. Their aim is to have a meeting of 100 Tatra's.
To find lodging please contact the organisation:
Tatra Register Deutschland,
mr Wolf Dieter Fischer,
Sauerbach 8,
BRD 36275 Kirchheim/Hessen,
Germany.
tel. +++ 49 6625 1525
fax. +++ 49 6625 1634
The rallye held in Kirchhhein is the annual meeting of the TRD, this
year dedicated to
Tatra's 100 year's existence.
The organisation hopes to get 100 Tatra's to Kirchheim. On July 29th the
number of cars signed up was about 55.
PROGRAM:
29 aug: 15.00: Get together of the participants.
19.00: Dinner, Instruction of the participants, Meeting, conversations
etc. Free bus ride
to hotel.
30 aug: 8.30: Start of Jubileerallye. Participants are divided in 4 different
categories
depending on size and age of the car.
19.30: Prizegiving, Tatraparty with many surprises,
31 aug: 9.00 - 16.00: Display of cars of participants in Kirchheim. Carbootsale,
Literaturemarket etc. For those who want to drive their car on sunday,
there is a
possibility to take part in the annual Waldhessenrallye with oldtimers
of other marques.
Start at 9.00 a.m. in Kirchheim as well. Rallye takes appr. 3 hours.
-info. supplied by Kees Smit
Only days after winning a lucrative contract to supply trucks to the United Arab Emirates, troubled Czech truck and automaker Tatra in March became the latest acquisition of engineering giant Skoda Plzen. Skoda Plzen, which is not related to VW's Czech automaking unit Skoda Automobilova, bought a 43.5% stake in Tatra from Komercni Banka. The bank had just acquired 50% of Tatra through a forced dept-for-equity swap.
The UAE will initially buy 1,100 trucks for about $180 million. The UAE Army chose the LIWA, a specially designed Tatra T-815 8x8 variant, equipped with a watercooled Deutz engine (BF&M 1015C) and an American (Twin Disc) automatic transmission.
-supplied by Al Knot, from the April1996 issue of Automotive Industries
