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Renault Dauphine


cooperlola
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Lovely!  I'm vaguely contemplating getting myself a little French classic - just to potter about the lanes at the weekends, and take to concours and local meets etc.  They're in my price bracket but I'm not sure about the rear engine - wrong place as far as I'm concerned but I don't really propose to fling it about a lot!
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Salt on UK roads and poor quality metal did for most of them in the UK. Worked on R10 major and 4Ls and provided you know how to use a torque wrench probably easier to work on and better parts than contempory Minis and 1100s. Parts availability pretty good. Seen quite a few R8 Gordinis ( or look a likes ) but cannot recall a Dauphne on the road in France.   
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Thanks, Anton.  The Gordinis I've seen are about twice the price of the Dauphines, and therefore more than I want to spend on an occasional-use car.  Obviously, I'd have to drive one before I took a big decision.  As I'm no great shakes as a mechanic, I need to be sure my garagiste would not throw his hands up in horror when presented with one to service/fix.  Next step is to ask him of course...
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Better to get the 4CV, mechanically much the same layout, but lighter and less dangerous (and less prone to fall apart) You still see a few in France whereas Dauphines are very rare now. I had two, one from 1954, and then one of the last, a 1961 model that had been imported from Jersey. The best bit was that just about all the mechanical bits from the Dauphine could be bolted on, updating it somewhat. And another 100ccs, which is what the Dauphine engine had, represented quite a power increase on something that weighed just over half a ton. I replaced my second one with a 1966 Mini Cooper, which I wish I still had, and the Cooper seemed quite sedate after the little Renault. The best thing was that they are very easy indeed to work on - dropping the whole engine and transmission was a case of undoing the connections and linkages, removing about 6 bolts, and lifting the car off.

[img]http://www.microcar.org/carspecs/renault4cv.jpg[/img]

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I had a 1957 Dauphine in the '60s.  It was a good car to drive by the standards of the day but awful in the wet.  As already mentioned above they suffered from corrosion and mine was no exception.

A common mechanical problem was that the camshaft was driven by a set of internal bakelite gears.  These would wear down and leave you, suddenly with a mysteriously non-functioning engine.  I always liked the sound of the rear mounted engine when it was running, and driving my Smart, which makes a slightly similar noise, often gives me a tingle of nostalgia.

The gearchange linkage was very prone to developing slackness and play, so that it was quite easy for your hand to touch somewhere quite high up on a female passenger's thigh while "trying to find reverse".  This was a most useful feature at the time.

Eventually I lost it while negotiating a sharp left-hander on a wet day.  I over-corrected, lost it the other way, over-corrected again, etc. until eventually I hit the wall of an unfortunately placed church.  No damage to the church but the Dauphine's rusted-through front end folded up alarmingly.  My suitcase, which was in the front luggage compartment, was compacted to about half its original length.  Lucky it was there.  It was probably the strongest, most crush-resistant component in front of my legs, and may have saved me from injury.

A few years later I had the use of a company Caravelle which had originally been the MD's wife's car.  It was embarrassing to be seen in it, frankly.

Patrick

 

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Do you think modern boots would help, Patrick?  At any rate, I am being severly but off the idea, having read of several hairy prangs on this and another forum - I'll look at something else I think - the 4CV sounds a good option.  I'm still at the dreaming stage at the moment...
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I had one in England after the time when they had been used as minicabs on the streets of London against the black cabs. They were marvellously economical with petrol due to the very thin bodywork, if you had a dent you just pushed it out with your thumb.  I bought one from an ad in the Evening News, from Hackney. I took it and girlfriend to Southend for the day, problem was every time I stopped I had to reach down and pull up the brake pedal that was jammed against the bodywork, the whole body was moving each time I braked, the best bit was I had managed to get there and back and was just turning into home street when the steering column broke in half at the joint. I took the car to the Police who said that it was just legal as the lights and brakes worked but if they had stopped me, I would be trying to convince them that it was roadworthy[:-))]   I think SD must have bought it off me[Www]
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Hi Coops, just a thought     http://tinyurl.com/288gtr

He can keep his number plate which makes the car under a grand then and a new MOT at least gives some idea of condition.

Probably not too hard to convert to LHD, must a club and scrappies in France.

To avoid some of the tedium of re-registering an ex UK car you might even be able to clone it from a genuine French scrappie [;-)] [;-)] 

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Ooh, you naughty boy, Ernie![;-)]

I actually found a nice one for 4,000 euros here, just restored (all bills etc).  But the info' I'm getting is beginning to put me off a bit... (As a matter of academic interest, the Alpine I saw in simlar condition was 50k! - way out of my league.[:(])

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Thanks to my posting this on another forum, I've been offered a Caravelle.  It currently resides in the UK although it was originally imported from France and is LHD.  It is nearing the end of restoration and is currently on a SORN - just awaiting a re-spray.  I'm going to have a look at it when I'm in England next month.  Obviously, it is a million miles from being a done deal.  However, is there a point in having it it MOT'd in the UK, or is it better to trailer it back here with a certificate of permanent export and just go through the French registration process once (if) I bring it over?

Any comments on Caravelles, while your at it?

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