RS's Adventures in Small Renaults

[CLINT]

Never driven a 4 but I've had an early 5 and a few 16s. I assume they are somewhere in the muff to drive?

[Junkman]

The early 5 drives very differently because it's so compact. The 4 drives like a scale model of an R16, because that's what it essentially is. What catches most people off guard is that they are so much better to drive than they have any right to if you look at the figures on paper. They are also surprisingly capable off road.

[CLINT]

Never driven a 4 but I've had an early 5 and a few 16s. I assume they are somewhere in the muff to drive?

Muff?? What??? Fucking tablet changing my words. I meant middle, obviously.

[Junkman]

In context it was very obvious what you meant.

Also, the 1.1 GTLs like Renault Sierra's example are indeed the best of the bunch.
That's why I much prefer the 850cc 3 speed 6 Volt ones.

[NergleFuttocks]

I asked this before on another forum but forgot the answer. So what was the Renault 3? Was this just an even more mingebaggeried Renault 4?

[Renault Sierra]

Never driven a 4 but I've had an early 5 and a few 16s. I assume they are somewhere in the muff to drive?

Muff?? What??? Fucking tablet changing my words. I meant middle, obviously.

You're always in the muff when you have a Renault 4.

[Renault Sierra]

I asked this before on another forum but forgot the answer. So what was the Renault 3? Was this just an even more mingebaggeried Renault 4?

Effectively just a base model 4 with a 603cc engine rather than the 4's mighty 747cc. It fitted into the 3CV tax bracket, which is the reason for the name change.

Very few people bought them, nor did they buy 4s very much either, the real big seller being the 4L which had 845cc and luxuries like a heater and rear quarter windows.

[Junkman]

I asked this before on another forum but forgot the answer. So what was the Renault 3? Was this just an even more mingebaggeried Renault 4?

Yes.

[Renault Sierra]

The early 5 drives very differently because it's so compact. The 4 drives like a scale model of an R16, because that's what it essentially is. What catches most people off guard is that they are so much better to drive than they have any right to if you look at the figures on paper. They are also surprisingly capable off road.

Pretty much this, just imagine a smaller, very much less refined R16 with heavier steering and you're about right. Although having said that the early models apparently drive quite differently.

Sadly I've never had the chance to get behind the wheel of an R5, something I'd like to change one day.

[Forddeliveryboy]

Two grand little cars, there. I've driven many thousands of relaxing miles in early Clios, SuperCinqs, the original 5 and 4s, only once (a Budapest-Strasbourg ton up dash in tandem with an ID19) in a 16.

The original R5 drives very differently from what followed because it's so different under the skin. The original was fundamentally a 4 but with a streamlined and monocoque shell and was sublime, for me. Like the 16 it handled bloody well, a little like a prewar Citroën but with much more heel. It (the 5) was perhaps the final nail in the coffin for Citroen's small cars, with an unsurpassed urban chic.

A crosswise engine and strut springing lifted from the 9 felt slightly less fun and a little lacking in character compared with what had come before when the Super 5 was launched, crucially it didn't have the sexy novelty of the 205. Yet these relatively short-lived machines were still utterly French with long gears and wheelbase, sufficient airiness inside not to discourage a hat and tobacco smoking, relaxed torquey engines and an ability to scud over poor surfaces at speed with an impunity which 205s lacked.

It always felt like Le Clio improved on many of the SuperCinq's abilities and added Germanic solidity without losing that wonderful insouciance - which has been replaced with that awful die Schärfen forcmost Eurozone cars.