m-72 to Ural?

[dneprlover]

hotflash44 here are some pics of IRAQ - URALS taken over and used by US - Marines

Note the lack of military fittings. Civvy vehicles are easily commandeered

[GregAus]

dneprlover, your very knowledgeable on Ural history i can tell by your comments, im just starting to try to understand this interesting and complex story. Seems that some of the web historians are of two camps on certain information , im just trying to get to the truth as it may be. Glad the Cossack site helped you and me with additional info. thanks again for your input, and lets see where this thread leads. Im a firm believer that you need to know where your from, in order to know where your going.(old saying)!

You won't get the truth about Soviet motorcycles unless you read Russian. Even then it's a difficult journey. So much crap has been written in English and German and repeated endlessly that the truth is hard to find. IMZ was founded in October 1941, except it wasn't. MMZ arrived in Irbit and the intention was that it would return to Moscow. In 1945 it was decided to leave MMZ where it was and it became IMZ. See the problem?

Pre-war there were MMZ, LMZ and XMZ (KhMZ) badged bikes. During the war they were M-72s without badges. Post -war there were IMZ and GMZ badged bikes. In 1951 KMZ started producing bikes with the supply of 500 engines and gearboxes (and perhaps final drives) from IMZ. Confused yet?

In 1956/7 new models were introduced and the IMZ M-72 was given to, or sold to the PRC. Sometime in the mid to late '50s IMZ bikes were sold with an Irbit MZ logo on the tank. This continued until the M-62 which was designated the Ural 1. The M-63 was the Ural 2 and the M-66 the Ural 3. The M-67 had the same 32 hp engine as the M-66 but a new frame. It became the M-67-36 with the new engine. Subsequent bikes were just called Ural. Around 1969 bikes were exported with the Cossack brandname. In the early 1990s bikes were sold with the Uralmoto logo. Even more confused yet?

[hotflash44]

thanks Greg,the Russians are running out of letters, would assume the Ural label will hang around for ever,thank goodness.think when i get a UDF i will make up my own semi fake/true history, of course unless you show up! your research/knowledge is wonderful.

[dneprlover]

thanks Greg,the Russians are running out of letters, would assume the Ural label will hang around for ever,thank goodness.think when i get a UDF i will make up my own semi fake/true history, of course unless you show up! your research/knowledge is wonderful.

If you really want to confusticate people? Get a set of those red roundel EMW p*ss take badges from Oldtimer garage. They actually say ' dies ist keine BMW' . Really plays with BMW owners brains

I have a set on my MT11/R80 mongrel

[hotflash44]

i like that i like to mess with people too! Its fun to listen to people at shows tell their friends what they think a Ural is, they are almost as confused as i am! the most common question is what a great restoration of a ww2 German motorcycle, then i say its Russian and a 2016 brand new, you should see the look on their faces!

[KevinCraig]

You know i have read everything i can find on the Ural history and it can be a bit confusing. When trying to be accurate when answering questions people have about the bike. What year did IMZ start labeling/calling the bike Ural. from what i read it was M-72 in its military days during ww2. As i am sometimes ripped for saying my 2016 Ural is a descendant of the military bike the M-72. Strangely Saddam Husein once ordered 2000 Urals as fast response military vehicles.

Yuri told me the Russian wheel he sold me was from a warehouse in Iraq. His stockroom looks like it was thrown into a shipping container and shipped across the world. More evidence that Yuri is an honest guy.

[hotflash44]

And the beat goes on, actually i find all this obscure information interesting, keep it flowing!

[windmill]

Actually the M-72 is a basic copy of the BMW R71 - civilian bike. It was never a purpose built military bike but rather an adapted civilian bike.

The Soviet M-72 was built for the military, was it, or was it not?
The ?MZ factory was founded to produce the M-72, was it, or was it not?

I understand that nothing in today's Ural line up has been used by any military in any meaningful form, but I don't understand the reasoning to deny where it traces its lineage to.

[windmill]

thanks Greg,the Russians are running out of letters, would assume the Ural label will hang around for ever,thank goodness.think when i get a UDF i will make up my own semi fake/true history, of course unless you show up! your research/knowledge is wonderful.

When someone asks if my rig is an old army bike, I tell them it's Like a Jeep, a civilian version that evolved from a WW2 military rig.
IMO, it's a honest, accurate, explanation that makes sense to the average person who isn't interested in esoteric details.

[GregAus]

thanks Greg,the Russians are running out of letters, would assume the Ural label will hang around for ever,thank goodness.think when i get a UDF i will make up my own semi fake/true history, of course unless you show up! your research/knowledge is wonderful.

31 of the 33 letters in the Russian Cyrillic alphabet can be used so there's heaps of letters left. And of course they can double up, there were two TMZ factories and two IMZ factories. Izh was once the Izhevsk Mototsikletniy Zavod.

[GregAus]

Actually the M-72 is a basic copy of the BMW R71 - civilian bike. It was never a purpose built military bike but rather an adapted civilian bike.

The Soviet M-72 was built for the military, was it, or was it not?
The ?MZ factory was founded to produce the M-72, was it, or was it not?

I understand that nothing in today's Ural line up has been used by any military in any meaningful form, but I don't understand the reasoning to deny where it traces its lineage to.

The WLA/WLC were produced for the military, were they not? The 741 was produced for the military was it not? H-D and Indian converted almost all their production to the military did they not? By your logic, why do you deny H-D and Indian's military lineage? You do know that the WLA and 741 outnumbered the M-72 in the Soviet army over 4:1? Modern H-D and Indians have as much if not more military lineage than Urals especially since KMZ took over all military production in the '50s. Want to pretend you have a military or military derived bike - go for it. The OHV Ural derives from post-war CIVILIAN BMWs. Tell whatever stories you want, but they're not true.

[windmill]

Actually the M-72 is a basic copy of the BMW R71 - civilian bike. It was never a purpose built military bike but rather an adapted civilian bike.

The Soviet M-72 was built for the military, was it, or was it not?
The ?MZ factory was founded to produce the M-72, was it, or was it not?

I understand that nothing in today's Ural line up has been used by any military in any meaningful form, but I don't understand the reasoning to deny where it traces its lineage to.

The WLA/WLC were produced for the military, were they not? The 741 was produced for the military was it not? H-D and Indian converted almost all their production to the military did they not? By your logic, why do you deny H-D and Indian's military lineage? You do know that the WLA and 741 outnumbered the M-72 in the Soviet army over 4:1? Modern H-D and Indians have as much if not more military lineage than Urals especially since KMZ took over all military production in the '50s. Want to pretend you have a military or military derived bike - go for it. The OHV Ural derives from post-war CIVILIAN BMWs. Tell whatever stories you want, but they're not true.

I understand what you're saying and I'm not denying anything, it just seems you don't understand what I'm saying.

Basically, the WLA ect. ect. were incidental military branches on the family tree of their respective civilian manufacturers, and todays Urals are a branch of the tree whos founding roots were a military vehicle manufacturer.

I don't think its a "story", but rather a concise, accurate explanation of its origin.... A civilian utility vehicle that evolved from a WW2 military vehicle. Nothing more, nothing less.

[hotflash44]

windmill ,tend to agree, your argument is simple and seems to nutshell the whole issue. M-72 born a military bike, and Harley and the such born a civilian bike. so that in my twisted thinking makes the modern Ural a very distant relative of the M-72 and the WLA etc. a distant relative of the civilian Harley bike.

[windmill]

windmill ,tend to agree, your argument is simple and seems to nutshell the whole issue. M-72 born a military bike, and Harley and the such born a civilian bike. so that in my twisted thinking makes the modern Ural a very distant relative of the M-72 and the WLA etc. a distant relative of the civilian Harley bike.

IMO, it's a silly thing to argue about as it's a matter of perspective. Ural wouldn't even exist if it weren't for the M-72, and HD would still exist if it weren't for the WLA. That's my perspective.

[tx2sturgis]

And in the very early 1900s boxer engines were used in small lightweight airplanes, as well as early motorcycles.

Ten to fifteen years later, BMW started making motorcycles in the 1920's.

So you COULD say that Urals ultimately descended from airplanes!

Does 'flying the chair' prove that the boxer motor still wants to get airborne?

I leave it to the reader to decide.