Production association «Kirov Plant»

The plant's forerunner was a metal foundry founded in 1801. Its first products were cannonballs, and in 1844 it began making railway rails. In 1868 the plant was bought by the Russian engineer and entrepreneur Nikolai Putilov (1820–1880), and from then on it bore his name. Over its long existence the plant's products have included ships, steam locomotives, armoured trains, artillery, L-1 cars, cranes, excavators, gas turbine units and even mine cruisers.

In 1922 the plant was nationalised, and from that year it was called "Krasny Putilovets".

As Russia had until then imported tractors, in 1923 the Soviet government decided to start building them itself in cooperation with the Ford company. The first Fordson-Putilovets tractor was tested in 1924, and series production began the same year. The 25,000th tractor was completed in 1931. In the late 1920s and early 1930s the Universal U1 and Universal U2 general-purpose row-crop tractors were developed. The latter could still be seen on Estonian fields in the 1950s, though by then built by the Vladimir Tractor Plant.

On 17 December 1934 the plant was renamed the Kirov Plant in honour of the Soviet statesman Sergei Kirov (1886–1934), murdered a couple of weeks earlier. By 1941, 125,000 tractors had been built. From 1941 to 1945 the plant supplied the Leningrad front with military equipment; part of the workforce and part of the equipment were evacuated.

In 1947 a trial batch of KT-12 timber skidding tractors was completed.

In 1962 production began of the K-700, a large four-wheel-drive articulated tractor with a 220-horsepower engine (read more about this tractor in the model description!). In 1975 the 100,000th K-700 was completed, and the same year production of the K-700A and K-701 began. The latter had the JaMZ-240B, a 12-cylinder V-type liquid-cooled diesel engine with 300 hp. The K-700A was a transitional model combining the K-700 engine with the K-701 running gear. The industrial K-702 and the K-703 timber skidder were also built on the (so-called agricultural) K-701.

In 1980 the 200,000th tractor was completed. The same year a trial batch of five K-710 tractors with a 500 hp engine was built, but this tractor never reached series production.

In 1985 the 300,000th tractor was completed. In 1988 production of the K-701M began. Its features were the 335 hp turbocharged and intercooled JaMZ-8423 engine, a 4-speed powershift gearbox, a new cab and larger tyres. Compared with the K-700A/-701 family, the machine's appearance was also changed. A few of these tractors also reached Estonia in the last years of the Soviet Union.

In 1990 production of construction and industrial machinery based on "Kirovets" tractors began.

In 1992 the joint-stock company "Kirov Plant" was formed.

In the mid-1990s the K-744 family was developed to replace the K-700A and -701, finally replacing the venerable veterans in 2002.

Today the plant is called the Petersburg Tractor Plant (ZAO "Peterburgskii traktornyi zavod").

See more on the manufacturer's website.