|
Author |
Message |
Rick Site Admin
Joined: 27 Apr 2005 Posts: 22446 Location: UK
|
|
Back to top |
|
|
badhuis
Joined: 20 Aug 2008 Posts: 1390 Location: Netherlands
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 12:50 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Great little cars. I remember when most were rotten to the bone. Lovely to drive (trash) around town and in the country, not so great on motorways (of course). _________________ a car stops being fun when it becomes an investment |
|
Back to top |
|
|
ukdave2002
Joined: 23 Nov 2007 Posts: 4104 Location: South Cheshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 3:18 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I used to drive my mates 4 in the early 80's great fun and practical within it. The gear linkage route thorough the engine bay always made me smile
Dave |
|
Back to top |
|
|
Salopian
Joined: 05 Jan 2010 Posts: 354 Location: Newport Shropshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 4:31 pm Post subject: |
|
|
My family got through 5 of these 3 from new. All covered over 100,000 miles but did they rust! Our last one (EJW 999J) broke a rear suspension pivot off at 6 years old and repairs ran the whole length of the car underneath. As it happened in Somerset I drove it up to Shropshire with a piece of fence post cut to length and wired across. Quite an interesting drive with no rear suspension at all.
The UK cars were originally 850cc I recall but France enjoyed(??) a 747cc powered version which this seems to be.
I'm not sure when the grill changed to the one on this car as the earlier one did not encircle the headlamps - I thought it was after 1967 but could be wrong.
Far superior to a 2CV and many more sold.
Edited to add a joke from the period - Why is a Renault 4 like a rotacut mower? Answer was the wheelbase is not the same each side due to the rear suspension torsion bars crossing one behind the other. _________________ Jonathan Butler
Alvis SD 12/50 1928 MG TD 1950 |
|
Back to top |
|
|
alastairq
Joined: 14 Oct 2016 Posts: 1954 Location: East Yorkshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 4:51 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I had an S-reg 4 for a few years..initially bought as an act of revenge on the family, who had previously 'forced' me to give up motorcycling!
I loved it..simple, no frills [I don't 'do' frills...which is one reason why I loathe moderns?].....could do 70 mph....on he M62, going westbound [towards the setting sun!] it would struggle all the way up to the top...but, much to the annoyance of countless lorry drivers, would fly down the other side!
ALways returned 40 mpgs, no matter how hard it was thrashed.....to overtake, meant 'charging the tailgate' of whatever was in front.....hoping to arrive at their backside just as the oncoming gap appeared....quite an art, really.
On single track roads [round hereabouts] could overtake by charging along the grass verge!
The choke was eventually a wire coat hanger.
Seats could be removed easily....loads could be got in the rear.....but the rear shocks always needed changing once a year...for some reason.
Always 'my' car..[the then-wife had her own]...amazing how many times it came to the family's rescue.
Eventually sold to fund the buying of an amazingly cheap VW type 2 caravanetttte. Sold to a local pig farmer, who liked the idea of being able to get a crate of pigs in the back!
The gear change was a sweetie....simply, a rod from the dashboard hole, right across the top of the engine...where it linked up to.....a gear lever, sprouting from the top of the [front] gearbox. Handbrake on the front wheels..it could pass an MoT without any back wheels at all!
These are marvellous machines...having, as they do, a proper chassis...which is why I am a little concerned about the floor rot?
That floor is part of the [punt] chassis.....how far up the length of it does the rot really go? |
|
Back to top |
|
|
Rick Site Admin
Joined: 27 Apr 2005 Posts: 22446 Location: UK
|
|
Back to top |
|
|
alastairq
Joined: 14 Oct 2016 Posts: 1954 Location: East Yorkshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 5:03 pm Post subject: |
|
|
'Twould need the body splitting from the chassis.... |
|
Back to top |
|
|
Rick Site Admin
Joined: 27 Apr 2005 Posts: 22446 Location: UK
|
|
Back to top |
|
|
alastairq
Joined: 14 Oct 2016 Posts: 1954 Location: East Yorkshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 5:15 pm Post subject: |
|
|
http://www.renault4.co.uk/
Piccies show the chassis, and some links to R4 specialists?
Depends on how deep one wants to go? As a 'banger', a simple plating job would suffice? |
|
Back to top |
|
|
Salopian
Joined: 05 Jan 2010 Posts: 354 Location: Newport Shropshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 8:55 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I'm not sure with respect it could be described as a "proper" chassis Alistair I recall welding an inverted very thin perimeter U channel with a thin(ner) floorpan across the bottom boxing it in. A period bodge on a rusty one I heard of from a trader was to buy a new floor pressing from Renault which cost very little and cutting it up/welding it around the suspension etc underneath to give the impression of a sound car. Could be applied to the R6 as well which was much the same underneath.
Anyway a great design and mechanically bombproof with that wet liner engine.
Think it only weighed 12 cwt or so so not much scope for thick panels. _________________ Jonathan Butler
Alvis SD 12/50 1928 MG TD 1950 |
|
Back to top |
|
|
alastairq
Joined: 14 Oct 2016 Posts: 1954 Location: East Yorkshire
|
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 10:48 pm Post subject: |
|
|
A chassis is a chassis, surely? Whether a punt, tubular, girder, or whatever?
VW beetle chassis are much the same.....in effect. |
|
Back to top |
|
|
victor 101
Joined: 03 Apr 2009 Posts: 446 Location: East Yorkshire
|
Posted: Sat Jan 06, 2018 11:12 am Post subject: |
|
|
It's a bit like the VW Beetle chassis in its design. |
|
Back to top |
|
|
Rick Site Admin
Joined: 27 Apr 2005 Posts: 22446 Location: UK
|
|
Back to top |
|
|
PAUL BEAUMONT
Joined: 27 Nov 2007 Posts: 1281 Location: Barnsley S. Yorks
|
Posted: Tue Jan 09, 2018 8:20 pm Post subject: |
|
|
In my student days I worked on a placement in west Wales. The foreman at the company had one of these that was suffering from the Fred Flintstone floor problem, so he rolled it onto its roof on a load of hay bales, visited a local boat building concern and acquired about a mile of fibreglass matting and 2 gallons of resin and fibreglassed the entire floor before undersealing it well. It passed several MOTs like that apparently with the examiners remarking on how sound the floor was! |
|
Back to top |
|
|
|