Yes, the Niva was a good design for Russia's road conditions.
Today's Ladas are mainly Renault based, but still some originality.
Autocar's museum slideshow reveals many of the Lada oddities over time.
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I, ve lost touch now but engine in mine was certainly Fiat based... Recognised quite a few bits from a Fiat 124 I, d had years before.
And on another story... Honestly true.
Used to be a member of a ski club in North of England... We had 2 slip ways about 70 yards apart..
Rolled up early one morning, dropped boat in, motored to jetty and on way noticed a Lada Niva roof sticking a couple of feet out of water. Moored up and went to club house to be met by a young chap, early 20s utterly wet through. He asked if I could pull his Niva, with my ski boat, to slip way. Ski boats are powerful things but no way on earth would it shift a Niva sat in 3ft of water and 2ft of silt. Lad had had a bet he could go down one slip, drive along banking and up the other. He lost.
We recovered car following week with a caterpillar tractor and a long chain. Believe it or not, lad drained engine oil, cleaned and WD'd everything. Put new points, coil and battery on,drained petrol tank and put fresh fuel in, turned it over with plugs out for a while and after 30 seconds turning over it fired up... He drove it off site. I couldn't believe it. True, honestly.
Try that with modern car full of electronics. No chance.