super beautifull machine,but here is a big question mark:why french cars could not find too many fans here in USA?they are super popular everywhere but here in states.
Why didn't French cars find a wider audience in the US? So many reasons...
They were just way too different for most Americans to appreciate, not terribly well made or reliable, they were competing for limited "foreign car" market share against stronger competitors, and most of those competitors had some sort of edge (German engineering, Italian character, English class, but French...weirdness?)
i do not care what everyone think or say about french cars but i can tell you from my personal experience:back in 1998 i used to live in arizona&i have found a rust free 1979 peugeot 504 diesel with manual&seafoam green(sedan),long story short,bought the car from first owner with 360k miles on meter(stock motor)&drove it for the next 12 years without any major issues,sold it with over 500k miles to my cousin&he is still driving it.
I remember back in '83, and'84 you had Renault and Peugeot dealers. Then all of the sudden Renault, Peugeot, Alfa Romeo, and Fiat all but disappeared. I think it had something to do with emissions. On the East Coast these Citroens were very rare indeed.
Really digging it, not much wrong for a restore/refresh. It's great when people go back to using their cars after dropping some bucks on it, and resisting to hussy it up with all the wrong shit.
Given the doorhandles and dash it's probably a '70. The color is an approximation of something that was available then too.
Interesting rear-view mirrors. The originals are definitely lacking in usefulness and not-tearing-doors-endness.
Those dogs are at home in there, and that's saying something. The car never stops moving, drove my dog to paranoia and suspicion to the point that he wont get in any of my other cars either.
An interesting feature is the rear license plate is on a hinge, so you can rock the rear hatch open, drop the tailgate, and still show your license plate. That was the idea anyway, don't try it.
Yeah, the mechanics were one thing. In the day people stopped off at gas stations for routine service. A random dude who did V8's all day would be flummoxed setting the timing on these, let alone most everything else.
They were at a price point which by comparison wasn't buying you a lot in accouterments; dealer and parts support were scarce, early on the metric tires were hard to deal with and the hydraulics were scheduled with oil service; NO ONE wanted to have to do a timing chain or clutch, and finally around 1967 DOT started legislating every unique feature about the car into illegality.
By the 1974 model year the DS would have needed another body and the SM would have needed a re-design for just the USA, where they were selling about 3k cars a year, so they said see-ya.
Best of OPC. 
14 comments:
Best of 2012 right here!
Awesome!
citroen in a grocery store parking lot in 2012 -- a rare sight indeed! love the color combo. never noticed the curved tailgate glass before, wowsie.
Man, I love these so much. Great find. I think I've only ever seen one in person at a car museum in SoCal.
+1 Chris
OPC Find Of The Year (FOTY?)
Exceptionally rare stateside, and not exactly common in Europe either.
Love the dogs, too!
super beautifull machine,but here is a big question mark:why french cars could not find too many fans here in USA?they are super popular everywhere but here in states.
Why didn't French cars find a wider audience in the US? So many reasons...
They were just way too different for most Americans to appreciate, not terribly well made or reliable, they were competing for limited "foreign car" market share against stronger competitors, and most of those competitors had some sort of edge (German engineering, Italian character, English class, but French...weirdness?)
i do not care what everyone think or say about french cars but i can tell you from my personal experience:back in 1998 i used to live in arizona&i have found a rust free 1979 peugeot 504 diesel with manual&seafoam green(sedan),long story short,bought the car from first owner with 360k miles on meter(stock motor)&drove it for the next 12 years without any major issues,sold it with over 500k miles to my cousin&he is still driving it.
IMO, I'd say that French cars didn't do well due to lack of experienced mechanics to repair them.
I remember back in '83, and'84 you had Renault and Peugeot dealers. Then all of the sudden Renault, Peugeot, Alfa Romeo, and Fiat all but disappeared. I think it had something to do with emissions. On the East Coast these Citroens were very rare indeed.
Really digging it, not much wrong for a restore/refresh. It's great when people go back to using their cars after dropping some bucks on it, and resisting to hussy it up with all the wrong shit.
Given the doorhandles and dash it's probably a '70. The color is an approximation of something that was available then too.
Interesting rear-view mirrors. The originals are definitely lacking in usefulness and not-tearing-doors-endness.
Those dogs are at home in there, and that's saying something. The car never stops moving, drove my dog to paranoia and suspicion to the point that he wont get in any of my other cars either.
An interesting feature is the rear license plate is on a hinge, so you can rock the rear hatch open, drop the tailgate, and still show your license plate. That was the idea anyway, don't try it.
Yeah, the mechanics were one thing. In the day people stopped off at gas stations for routine service. A random dude who did V8's all day would be flummoxed setting the timing on these, let alone most everything else.
They were at a price point which by comparison wasn't buying you a lot in accouterments; dealer and parts support were scarce, early on the metric tires were hard to deal with and the hydraulics were scheduled with oil service; NO ONE wanted to have to do a timing chain or clutch, and finally around 1967 DOT started legislating every unique feature about the car into illegality.
By the 1974 model year the DS would have needed another body and the SM would have needed a re-design for just the USA, where they were selling about 3k cars a year, so they said see-ya.
Marina is by far the find of 2012. But-this is definitely a best of in the least.
Love the rear shot, brings out the awesome profile.
Post a Comment