RE: Renault 4 GTL: Spotted

[M4cruiser]

I hate to admit it, but I had a Renault 6 once (just a bigger version of the 4).

Couldn't enjoy driving it at all, whatever possessed me to buy it? I kept it a month, and swapped it in for a good old BL - a proper car.

[griffdude]

Between my Dad, my brother & I we’ve had quite a few of these great little cars. I learnt a lot about using momentum driving one of these & although the body roll is hilarious they do seem to hang on.
They do rot though..,

[rtz62]

Was it just a ‘thing’ local to my teen years in Nottinghamshire, but they were universally called ‘Noddys’ around there, and I’ve never found out why.
Is it a PH car per se? No
It it’s a great antidote to today’s roads and driving conditions, although if I had one I’d probably have to do the motoring equivalent of wearing a hair shirt and drive it from the Midlands, through the Chunnel and down into southern France, picking up plenty of wine, cheese and the like on the way...

[2xChevrons]

LuS1fer said:

guy_spyder550 said:

I remember reading that because of the way they built the rear suspension, it has a different wheelbase on each side of the car
,

True of quite a few French cars, don't know about the 4.

The R4 was one of the first. The Renault torsion bar suspension system had transverse bars for the rear trailing arms. The longer the bar the softer ride could be, but each bar was nearly the width of the chassis. So the bars were laid one behind each other, left-hand bar a couple of inches ahead of the right-hand one, so the static wheelbases differ. The same design was scaled up for the R16 and used on the R5, R7 and R14 as well.

[Buffalo Girls]

Lovely thing. As has been said earlier, a 2CV seems to be worth more for what is a worse car. The value of R4s are only going to go one way.

[croyde]

My first car was a Renault 6. Bought for £300 back in 1980.

I drove it everywhere on L plates for 2 years then had a lesson with my mates dad in his Escort the day before my test.

I couldn't get on with the H gate gear shift and he said I would fail. We did another lesson in my Renault and he told me to take it to the test centre on the day as I was driving in it really well.

The examiner looked a bit uncomfortable but I passed first time thanks to my ability with the push pull gear lever

2 days later I started work for a van courier company in a Honda Acty van after 2 years of being a motorcycle dispatch rider.

I'd love a 4 or 6 again but not at those prices.

[73RS]

If you want to see lots of R4s go to Madagascar, where it is still the taxi vehicle of choice

[V8 FOU]

Blackpuddin said:

Lovely cars. Would make some sort of sense at £3.5k, not so much at £5k just yet.

When you find one as good as this for less money, do let me know!

[Johnnybee]

This was in the car park at Cadwell last weekend.

[DoddsyFrs]

I swear i caught a glimpse of one on a plusnet ad just now.

[Riley Blue]

The only time I ever drove one was on holiday in northern Portugal. A friend had rented it for us and I was horrified when I saw it but after a few miles I fell for it big time, it was the perfect car for the very rough roads in the mountains where we were staying and was so much fun I looked for one to buy when we returned to the UK. I never did buy one but doubt I'd have regretted it if I had.

[Vaud]

Riley Blue said:

The only time I ever drove one was on holiday in northern Portugal. A friend had rented it for us and I was horrified when I saw it but after a few miles I fell for it big time, it was the perfect car for the very rough roads in the mountains where we were staying and was so much fun I looked for one to buy when we returned to the UK. I never did buy one but doubt I'd have regretted it if I had.

Like a narrow tyred, FWD mid-low power car in the alps in the winter, they suit the conditions...

[gdaybruce]

I once had to change the head gasket on my mother-in-law's Renault 4. It required the purchase of a special Renault socket with a kind of built in extension to reach a particular head bolt. It did its job and has lived at the bottom of my tool box ever since, I guess on the basis of 'you never know when you might need it again'. Can't imagine it's going to be any time soon!

[griffdude]

Johnnybee said:

This was in the car park at Cadwell last weekend.

Very Cool

[Fetchez la vache]

Used on of these on the farm back in the day. The only memories I have of it were using the strange gear lever on the dash, and the fact that it was really rather tremendous at crossing fields.
The memories are entirely positive, and they're too cool for school, but not positive enough to warrant spending £5k on one.
The last place I saw one was in London near Maida Vale at New Year, so amongst all the show off metal there on every corner (well, London in general..) it made a very refreshing change and is the only car I can actually remember seeing.

[oilit]

i've had a hankering for one of these for a while - a mate of mine had one as a hand me down from his mother - it was mad !

Looked at a few but all been rough - but were 25% of the price of this - and they didn't have fiberglass bodging on the front inner arch to wing tops like this one does - slash the price by 70% and Ill take it !

[rallycross]

I had one of these funny old things many years ago and it was brilliant in the snow, we took up into the hill in heavy snow it would just keep going where others cars would get stuck (but thats the only positive I can remember about it).
This was Renault's modern rival/version of the 2CV.

[GTEYE]

Motorrad said:

MJK 24 said:

Still in use as everyday transport in The Algarve. I saw three or four each day when I visited.

Having owned a couple of 2CVS and driven thousands of mostly rural miles in 4s I think you'd need to be on drugs to pay near 5K for one.

Sure they have lots of character, I love their simplicity and they are surprisingly good fun to drive but 5 grand? fking insane, I guess that's the price of nostalgia, perhaps I should go and dig out the example we've left rotting in our chicken shed

edit to add: the Algarve is where my car is located, we used to use them as hacks to get around our land and pick up waste food for the pigs. Our neighbours still use one for similar purposes.

Edited by Motorrad on Saturday 14th April 10:40

But given the fact you could spend £20,000 or more on a 2CV, I'd say £5,000 doesn't seem so bad.

[paulyv]

Would love to take something like this over for the drive to Le Mans one day.

[Balmoral]

MJK 24 said:

2xChevrons said:

But try and find anyone still using a 2CV as a functional piece of daily transport.

Balmoral Green where are you?!

Six years now as my daily driver, been all over Europe in it too. Still a very original car.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNmpipU2hmo