Tuning GAZ 66 to improve a real SUV

The all-wheel drive SUV GAZ 66 was specially designed for use in off-road conditions, and therefore it has high cross-country ability. There are legends about the Shishiga’s ability to overcome almost impassable places.

Tuning the all-terrain vehicle Gas 66

However, the car has quite a lot of factory defects, and the level of comfort of the all-terrain vehicle is not at the highest level. For this reason, GAZ 66 is regularly tuned by car owners.

Tuning the GAZ-66 body

First, they sand the outer metal parts with their own hands and remove the rust. Rotten elements are replaced or sealed. If necessary, the holes are repaired and the car is painted.

The car is often used for fishing and hiking, so the body is painted in camouflage or army khaki. Finally, treatment is carried out with an anti-corrosion compound.

Install stylish deafening horns on the roof or at the side mirrors. A body kit for the GAZ 66 all-terrain vehicle is not needed, and it is not installed very often. Only arcs and “kanguryatnik” are used from it. In this case, a spacious trunk is mounted on the roof.

GAZ-66 does not need body protection, so bumper amplifiers are not installed. Thresholds are also inappropriate. When homemade fans do strengthen the front bumper, they mount a hydraulic winch on it - an integral part of a military vehicle. In combination with welded safety bars and guardrails, the design looks quite impressive. Winches, as in the photo, are connected to the power steering system, which is borrowed from Japanese cars.

Body tuning is complemented by a ladder to the roof. They can’t do without external optics:

• fog lights under the radiator grille;
• spotlights on the roof.

They use LED lights and headlights - the standard ones are dim and do not illuminate the road well. Advantages of LEDs:

• Do not overload the electrical circuit.
• They serve for a long time.
• They have a durable construction.

Additional optics are installed at the rear and front of the SUV. With additional rear lighting, it is convenient to make a U-turn at night.

Fog lights are adjusted so that they turn on separately from others.

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Original parameters

Before we begin tuning, let's consider the most significant technical components of the GAZ 66.

• The car is equipped with an eight-cylinder ZMZ-66-06 engine with a volume of about 4.3 liters and a power of 120 hp. Average fuel consumption is about 20 liters per 100 km. The gearbox is a 4-speed transfer case with a reduction gear and has the ability to drive both axles or only the rear axle. For harsh operating conditions, an important point is the presence of engine heating before starting.
• The car is capable of regulating tire pressure thanks to the special design of the rims. Inflating the tires themselves is quite easy thanks to the presence of a compressor driven by the engine of the car itself.
• The hydraulic brake system has a booster.
• The behavior of the car in conditions accompanied by rolls and distortions has been thought out, i.e. the center of gravity is located exactly in the center between the axles.
• The car has two axles with the ability to independently lock the differential, which makes it easy to overcome any unstable ground surface.
• In addition, the truck has a fairly high ground clearance - over 300 mm, and according to its technical characteristics, it allows fording up to 800 mm.

Despite these seemingly good technical parameters for a car of its time, today the GAZ-66 does not meet the requirements of modern car enthusiasts and car tuning is inevitable in any case.

History of appearance

This Russian passenger car was produced from 1992 to 1997. The base model is considered to be 2410, and the car's body parts came from version 3102. In the early 90s of the last century, the new Volga was purchased for government needs and was also offered to private owners. The prestige of the car led to good demand among the population.

The development of the GAZ 31029 car began back in the 80s of the twentieth century. This was the second point of the program to improve the GAZ 24. The first part of this program was designed to modernize the mechanical component. And we took up the appearance a little later. At the same time, the government did not consider it appropriate to make the body similar to the 3102. Thus, the 29 differs in some details. There is a different hood, fenders, radiator grille, original bumpers. The GAZ 31029 car was launched into production in 1992. This was the first car produced after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The exterior was perceived differently, and demand increased. Since 1996, the car began to be equipped with modern engines from ZMZ, an injector, new rear axles, and disc brakes. Many owners of the GAZ 31029 car did the tuning themselves, as a result they were able to significantly improve the comfort of the car and its appearance.

Engine work

The most important thing that, as a rule, begins with tuning any vintage car is replacing the engine.

The original GAZ-66 engine is quite powerful and quite good. However, there were cases when a MTZ engine or a diesel engine such as the D-245 of the Minsk Motor Plant was installed instead. True, it is not always clear what motivates the supporters of such modernizations, since along with them the native ZMZ-66-06 is quite good.

In terms of achieving efficiency for this car, the most optimal option would be to use an engine from ISUZU with a volume of up to 4.5 liters. With such an engine, you can reduce fuel consumption without losing the main advantages of the car as a whole.

External tuning

Not all Soviet SUV bodies have retained their original appearance, so many cars already require welding and painting work. Not all owners of 66s are interested in painting them in their “native” color, and many owners try to make the car bright and different from others. It has now become fashionable to repaint off-road vehicles in camouflage colors. But still, the army color “khaki” also looks good - more solid and strict.

After the body has been brought into proper shape, it is additionally worth doing anti-corrosion treatment.

Modification of the Gas 66 truck for off-road travel

A body kit on a cargo all-terrain vehicle is not so relevant, and is not installed often. The main body kits used are roll bars and kangaroos, and on a car with a kung car, a durable and large trunk is mounted on the roof of the body.

There is no point in installing any reinforced bumpers or additional thresholds - the GAZ 66 does not need additional body protection.

His original front bumper is already powerful enough, but a winch on the bumper wouldn’t hurt at all. It is worth thinking about tuning external lighting. Standard headlights will dimly illuminate the road at night in the forest or on a country road, so it makes sense to install additional optics. Nowadays, LED lights and headlights are often used as additional light. This optics has its advantages:

• LED lights are very economical and do not overload the vehicle's electrical circuit;

• The LEDs themselves are very reliable and have a long service life;
• These headlights have a fairly robust design.

Additional light is installed on the SUV front and rear. With additional rear lighting it is convenient to turn around somewhere on a bad road in a dark forest. At the front, headlights are mounted at different heights; generally, headlights are mounted on the bumper or on the roof of the car.

Making a bumper with your own hands (FORD ORION)

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There are beautiful aerodynamic body kits, newfangled LED optics, a variety of suspensions and much, much more.

If you are happy with the result, then you can assemble the dashboard of your Mondeo.

There are also those, perhaps even lucky ones, who believe that their car already has everything from the latest technology. Everyone has their own perfect car... since the concept of perfection is seen from a different angle and prism.

Ru - understanding all these nuances, knowing all such subtleties and desires, competently approaches the question: The popularity of tuning is growing every day, every hour! There are more and more cars, and more and more people want to stand out from the gray mass, and not a few.

Nowadays, a car has become so affordable that some families have not one, but two or even three. And they all follow a pattern, one after another... And manufacturing plants, tuning studios, shops and private craftsmen understand this very well.

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Therefore, if today there is a desire to somehow stand out and highlight your car, then this will not be any problem. Then use a drill to drill holes into which the lamps will be installed. The latter must “sit” securely in the holes and not dangle in them.

The next step in improving the interior lighting will be connecting the wires from all installed diode lamps. To prevent the wiring from dangling, it must be fastened by soldering. A quite useful element when tuning the backlight is a variable resistor.

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It must be included in the scheme if you want to be able to change the color and brightness of the lighting. Once you have installed the diodes, they need to be connected to the dashboard switch. In this case, you must strictly observe the polarity, otherwise the new backlight will not work.

Before you begin assembling the instrument panel, you need to check the brightness of the scale illumination in different lighting conditions. If you are happy with the result, then you can assemble the dashboard of your Mondeo.

To give the Mondeo the appearance of a “charged” car, you can go in two ways. The first is to install additional parts that will help make the car body more voluminous.

The second method is to replace the rims and install an air intake on the hood of the station wagon.

Many car enthusiasts have the opportunity not to choose between these styling methods, but do them all. At the same time, tens of thousands of rubles are spent on tuning, even if all the work is done independently. In order not to spend huge sums, you can choose the optimal styling method.

Some are sure that this manipulation is almost not dangerous, since they believe that the engine life increases, because with an increase in torque, gears can be switched at lower speeds.

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Others argue that as a result of such tuning, the load on the piston group, as well as other mechanisms, greatly increases, which is why all parts wear out faster. But it is worth noting that tuning does not affect engine life.

First of all, the engine life depends on the nature of the control. For example, a measured driver has a very long engine life, since it will never load the car.

Functional changes

But the racer’s engine life, even with tuning or without tuning, will be short. But if economical tuning is done, then both sides agree in this case.

In this case, by reducing the amount of fuel injected into the cylinders, it is possible to ensure that the engine life begins to decrease due to a decrease in power and torque. As a result of such reductions, the engine has to spin up a lot in order to engage a high gear, which increases the load on the engine.

Unusual transformations

Let's tell you one example when craftsmen realized that the remarkable advantages of the cargo GAZ-66 can be turned into an SUV for completely non-truck purposes.

They took the GAZ 66 chassis in a shortened version, retained the original engine, gearbox and transfer case, used the same suspension, but made the body again. Looking at the Gas 66 tuning photo, you can see something reminiscent of a Hummer, right?

Quite a lot can be said about what came out of this. On the one hand, it turned out to be a fairly inexpensive, extremely powerful and passable SUV, on the other hand, it’s worth forgetting about comfort and convenience, i.e. It is not possible to adapt a truck to a smaller vehicle without consequences for convenience.

The transmission steals a lot of space inside the cabin. The original gearbox requires skill in handling. The steering has extremely low sensitivity, and accordingly affects maneuverability and mobility. The suspension, designed for a loaded truck, is very harsh on the occupant. And no sound insulation will help, since it is very difficult to muffle the sound of such an engine in a body that is not designed for such operating conditions. Such a car also cannot boast much about its dynamics, but its cross-country ability and load-carrying capacity are still excellent.

You, of course, can also try to make something similar from your GAZ-66, but first think about whether you can drive such a car? Having such a monster at your disposal, subject to the application of skillful hands and imagination, as well as a certain amount of funds, you can always get a high-quality car that will become a faithful companion and a comfortable place to stay on a tourist trip, and for this it is not necessary to change the entire body, trying get something like a Hamer.

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Salon

When modifying the cabin interior, special attention is paid to eliminating noise and preventing dust from entering. To do this, you need to stock up on various rubber seals, as well as modern insulating materials such as

• vibroplast Silver,
• vizomat PB-2,
• SFP herband.

Changing the interior of the cabin will allow you to reupholster the seats, replace the door trim, floor and ceiling. Installing a good sound system will create coziness and comfort for the driver and passengers.

Easy tuning of the standard version of the SUV

GAZ 66 is popularly called “shishiga”, the appearance of this car deserves attention; to make a beautiful tuning you need to do the following things:

First, you need to bring the cabin and body of the car to normal condition - remove rust, fill various holes with putty, and you can also apply paint to the updated body. You can choose absolutely any paint color, if you wish, you can even paint your car pink, though it won’t look serious, but it will look glamorous.

Best of all, military colors, especially camouflage, are suitable for this car. The main thing is to think in advance so that the new tuning elements are combined with the paint.

Next, you can proceed to installing new light optics, because the standard ones do not glow very well, so you can install new main optics, and you can also install additional lights, for example, fog lights, and place them under the glass.

This SUV looks ideal when it has 6 of these headlights. You can also install headlights on the roof of the cab. The fog lights must be configured so that they turn on separately from the main headlights.

Next, you can make the car look like a super rally car that conquers the Dakar, for this you need to install arches. They can be made in the form of a frame for the cabin. The small arcs on the side mirrors also look great; the guard will also look very original. It is very important to install a winch, which is considered an important element of every military vehicle, it should be installed at the rear of the SUV.

In order to make the car more elegant, you need to install modern horns; they will look very stylish on the roof or near the side mirrors.

Refinement of the instrument panel

To make the instrument panel look modern and stylish, you can install LEDs in it, which will illuminate it. The dashboard will look especially bright; if you install diodes with white light, to make the interior look unusual, you can install diodes with colored light. In any of the options, the instrument panel will be better readable.

The standard interior has ordinary light bulbs, but when tuning the GAZ 66, these light bulbs must be changed to LED ones. If you wish, you can install an LED strip with other electrical appliances, for this you need to be an expert in electrics, or find a specialist, but if everything is done correctly, the lighting in the cabin will be simply magnificent, passengers will be delighted if you have to drive at night. In general, when tuning a GAZ 66, you need to understand that you cannot do without a creative approach. There are many different options to improve your car.

Everyone’s tastes are different, so tuning a car can also be different, for example, many prefer the car to look modern, but classic, and some motorists like to make their car original and unique. When tuning a GAZ 66, the most important thing is that the car ends up being such that the owner likes it and brings him joy and benefit.

Next video with tuning GAZ 66:

Replacing the power unit

No matter what remarkable characteristics the GAZ 66 has, by modern standards the car only meets the requirements for cross-country ability. The engine produced by ZMZ is no longer considered powerful enough, much less economical.

Usually the factory engine is replaced with a D-245 diesel engine (manufactured by Minsk Motor Plant) or with a 4.5 liter ISUZU engine.

Many enterprises install diesel engines from the Minsk Motor Plant. Companies often offer replacement of the standard 66 engine with a turnkey MMZ D-245. That is, the owner of a GAZ 66 only needs to take his SUV to the company’s service center, and after a certain period of time receive a car with a new engine. Of course, the motor itself and the work performed are guaranteed.

The process of installing a diesel engine on a GAZ 66

But everything depends on the solvency of the car owner, and not everyone can pay this amount. And many craftsmen try to make the replacement themselves.

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1. Surely many are interested in the question of how to paint a GAZ 66 with your own hands beautifully and efficiently? It’s hard to imagine, but there is nothing complicated in this procedure. First, you will need to obtain permission from the traffic police, and then you can proceed directly to the process. For convenience, it is better to use a warm garage in the winter or, if it’s warm outside, you can just do it in the fresh air. You need to purchase several spray cans of the selected color from the auto store. The following combinations of three colors are popular: green (as the main one) - 5-6 pieces, black and dirty yellow - four pieces. You will need 0 sandpaper and three cans of primer. Let's get to work: we clean off the “suspicious” and rusty areas with sandpaper, you can start with a larger one than zero, then you should apply a zero. Next you need to use “soil”. Next, all this should be dried, degreased with acetone and allowed to dry. Then we start painting. First you need to use green paint completely, in several layers. Next black and yellow. You choose the drawing at your discretion. It all depends on your imagination (of course, you won’t be able to create 3D tuning the first time, but patience and determination help you achieve a lot).
2. As an option for upgrading a GAZ 66 car, you can use an interesting contraption - a speedometer knob. With this device you can independently increase the mileage of your car. It must be connected via the vehicle's diagnostic connector via the CAN bus. This is the most modern device for increasing mileage.

Advantages of this device:

• speed readings are recorded in all service units - an increase in mileage cannot be determined during maintenance;
• quick connection using a standard connector for vehicle diagnostics;
• winding speed is up to 5000 km/h. You can also quickly increase your mileage;
• the connection process does not require intervention in the electrical wiring;
• The connection is made inside the car.

Modernization of the engine and chassis

Of all the characteristics of the GAZ-66, its legendary cross-country ability is striking. Unfortunately, the engine lacks power and efficiency. There is only one way out - replacement. The factory power unit and engine are replaced with Minsk diesel D-245. With a turnkey guarantee, this is done by specialized service stations.

There are no noticeable indicators in traction, so they choose another option - the Japanese one, from the all-wheel drive ISUZU. Fuel consumption is significantly reduced. Together with the engine, all systems of the car are changed: fuel, cooling. At the same time, new hydraulics are required.

GAZ-66 has unique factory wheels - the pressure in them is capable of self-regulation. This is the design of the disks. Tuners, however, install even larger wheels and increase ground clearance. The car easily moves over fallen trees and does not get stuck in the snow.

There is no limit to what tuners can discover. This is proven by the updated appearance of the legend of the Soviet automobile construction, the famous “sixty-sixth”.

Gearbox improvement

If you change the engine, then you need to change the gearbox. There are some nuances here:

• Instead of the standard box that was originally installed on the GAZ 66, you can install a box from the ZIL-130, which has 5 speeds and a reverse one. This gearbox is compatible with modern engines, so the Shishiga will feel more playful on the track.
• You will also have to change the transfer case, for example, the option from KRAZ or Ural will be perfect.
• And in order to significantly improve the vehicle’s cross-country ability, it is necessary to install wider wheels, for example, from KRAZ or BTR.

After such metamorphoses, the car will look very menacing and will have no equal on the roads.

Reasons for high vehicle cross-country ability

The vehicle's high cross-country ability is primarily associated with the following features of the GAZ 66 Kung:

• Large sizes of installed wheels, which have a rather unusual design.
• The famous self-locking differential also determines that the car has increased cross-country ability.

However, it has a lot of shortcomings. Among them are an unreliable engine, the power of which is not quite enough for such a large car, the lack of proper comfort and special devices that will increase cross-country ability. This is why many people decide to modify the car in question.

The car was produced from the factory with an eight-cylinder 3M3 6606 engine, the displacement of which is 4.5 liters, the maximum power of which is 120 horsepower. Paired with the original engine, a 4-speed gearbox is installed; the transfer part can redistribute torque to the front or both axles. An important point is that the car left the factory with powerful pre-heating of the engine - this moment allows you to start the engine even in the most severe conditions.

Replacing wheels

GAZ 66 has cross-country ability, which is sometimes the stuff of legends.

An example of a Gas 66 all-terrain vehicle on wide wheels

But this does not mean that there is nowhere to improve this indicator further. As you know, there is no limit to improvement, and the installation of non-standard wheels on an all-terrain vehicle is proof of this. Installing wheels of larger diameter allows you to increase the ground clearance of the GAZ 66, due to this the all-wheel drive vehicle will be able to overcome various obstacles even better: drive over fallen trees, avoid getting stuck on virgin snow or on a water hazard.

Arched tires also help you overcome obstacles better. They differ from regular tires in their wide profile while maintaining the normal wheel radius. With reduced pressure inside the tires, the load on the ground is reduced, and due to the width of the wheel, reliable traction with the road surface is obtained, regardless of whether it is loose sand or swamp slurry.

There are two more ways to increase cross-country ability using wheels. One of the methods is to peel off the wheel rubber; in the second case, special low-pressure tires are installed. Tire stripping is not provided for by the factory, and tuning is carried out by the owners of the “sixty-sixths” using a makeshift method. Part of the outer cord is removed from the rubber. The tire becomes softer and the grip on the ground becomes better. At the same time, the pressure in the cylinders is reduced, and the vehicle’s maneuverability increases.