Žnoprešk Zest/Zenit
HISTORY
The CM10/11 was the logical followup of the development of the succsesful BR10 Zap for the modernization of the whole company lineup. The technologies developed for the Žnoprešk small hatchback, most importantly the front transverse inline engine, were upscaled and used to modernize the conceptually old Z200.
The project started in 1978, once most of the solution for the Zap were freezed for the production, in order to save time and money, rationalizing and reducing the costs while possible (the merging with BMMA started in the same year).
The car unveiled in 1982 in the Geneve, and it was in sale shortly after, in februrary 1983. The car quickly replaced the Z200 in the sales charts and had a restyle in 1987 before has been discontinued in 1991, where it was replaced by the CM20 Zenit and by the anikatian built CM15, sold, almost worldwide, as Zenit Simple.
TEHNIKA
The main difference bewtween the CM10/11 and the Zap lays in the rear suspesion setup. When the Zap had a revolutionary (at least for Žnoprešk) torsion beam, the Zenit/Zest couple had a indipendent semi trailing arms architechture. Aside from that, the CM10/11 technical solutions are mostly Zap upscaled ones.
On the engine department, the multivalve full aluminium construction of the Zap inline 3 (L3.3-12.8L) was adapted for a brand new inline 4 with the same construction philosophy. The undersqare engine was able to go from 1369cc to 1989cc filling the most important displacement range, from B to even E segment without huge problems. As for the Zap, also the inline 4 engine had reliability issue linked to the use aluminuim for head and block. On the bright side, since from 1983 it was available the IMPEL (Iniezione Multipunto Elettronica - MPFI) as standard on the most prestigeous trim (like the TS or LX) and as optional on the whole range of motors displacement.
