(first posted 5/18/2013) My phone vibrated. It was a text from my brother, with this photo attached. “I’m in Columbus, Ohio, and look what I found!”
“What is it?” I texted back.
“I don’t know; I hoped you’d know!”
He’s not a car nut, but he knows I am. And he knew I’d go digging for answers.
In the mid-1950s Renault wanted to increase its market share in the United States. After talking with its U.S. dealers, Renault came to believe that it would need cars more tailored to American tastes. Moreover, although Volkswagen’s Karmann-Ghia wasn’t selling strongly in the United States, it was getting people into VW showrooms, which boosted Beetle sales–and made a worried Renault wonder if that’s what was keeping buyers out of their U.S. showrooms.
Renault, which issued their rear-engined Dauphine in 1956, saw that they could do just what Volkswagen did–deliver a sporty car based on their everyday sedan. Like Volkswagen, Renault turned to Ghia to design the body.
At the same time the project was getting off the ground, Ghia was building a relationship with Chrysler through that company’s chief designer, Virgil Exner. Ghia asked Exner to help with the design, presumably to be sure it would strike the right notes with American buyers. Since Ex was all wrapped up with Chrysler, he introduced Ghia to his son, Virgil Exner, Jr., who designed the car based on Ghia’s design parameters.
Having also designed the Volkswagen with which this Renault would compete, Ghia was walking a tight line. Not wanting to sour its relationship with Volkswagen, Ghia turned to designer Pietro Frua and his company to pick up the ball. The waters get muddy at this point – it’s not entirely clear whether Ghia or Frua built this car’s prototypes. In any case, when Frua tried to talk with Renault about the prototypes, Renault wouldn’t respond because of their contract with Ghia, and Ghia wouldn’t respond to Renault because of its relationship with Volkswagen. So Frua took a prototype, which he badged Dauphine GT, to the 1958 Geneva Auto Show, hoping to sell the design to another manufacturer. He got everyone’s attention; by the opening of that year’s Paris auto show, things had been sorted out and the car stood alongside the other Renaults.
From the start, this car would wear two names: “Caravelle” in English-speaking markets, and “Floride” everywhere else. In 1959, it went on sale in two body styles: a coupe, and a ragtop with or without a removable hardtop.
The Floride/Caravelle continued through 1962, when the Dauphine platform was discontinued. Of course, the Dauphine continued to be sold in many markets, but Renault was moving on domestically. The new Renault 8 would provide the underpinnings for the car, which would henceforth be badged “Caravelle” worldwide. The body got some design tweaks, most notably a new hardtop roof line that allowed more headroom for rear-seat passengers. Renault turned to Frua to do the work, but when Frua claimed full credit for the updated design, Ghia got hot about it, things got nasty, lawyers became involved and billable hours ensued.
But enough about the drama surrounding this car. The Floride/Caravelle saw many mechanical improvements during its lifetime that probably made it more satisfying to drive. While the 1959 base engine delivered but 30 horsepower, by the time production ended in 1968 you could get a 58-hp Caravelle. Disc brakes all around became standard in 1962, and Renault even improved the interior a couple of times to make it more comfortable.
The last U.S. Caravelles were sold in 1967. After selling only 117,000 of them worldwide, Renault decided that their Karmann-Ghia fighter just wasn’t competitive anymore. Although the K-G went on to become a cult classic, the Caravelle remains pretty much forgotten. But someone in Columbus, Ohio certainly loves this one.
The Caravelle name would of course reappear on a Plymouth some years later (as you well know, having written the piece!):
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/curbside-classic-1987-plymouth-caravelle-se-this-ship-still-sails/
It’s amazing that any of these have survived in North America. They were not that common when new. Still quite attractive.
My dad bought a white/red 1960 Dauphine as a second car (same as second pic, above) when my older sisters were at university, and my older brother was learning to drive. My brother managed to re-arrange the front end of the Dauphine on a couple of occasions. I remember when he arrived home with the front wheels pointing in very different directions after hitting a curb around the corner from our place.
The Dauphine endured unspeakable abuse during its time with us, even being used to carry large rocks for a retaining wall at our cottage, after removing the back seat cushion. It was surprisingly reliable, even managing to start on the coldest winter mornings.
I vividly remember how incredibly slow this car was, so it’s quite funny to think it could be turned into a sports car. I just checked, and even the Gordini version had all of 40bhp when it was first released. My brother tested the Dauphine’s top speed, and never quite managed to reach 70mph (110kph).
Just remembered a couple of features, probably common to the Caravelle and Dauphine:
– Spare tire was stored in a compartment behind the front license plate. This accounts for the shape of the bumper on both cars, providing clearance to pull out the spare, after pulling down the hinged door behind the license plate.
– There was a hole in the middle of the rear bumper. Yes, you could crank start the rear-engined Dauphine, using the jack handle.
– Two-tone horn, `city` and `country` modes. Both made clown-car sounds compared to American cars of the period.
My family’s Dauphine experience is a story that needs to be told…
The city/country horn became a family joke.
Right!…My Dad had a ’68 R10 which also had the spare tire stored in a special compartment underneath the front trunk..It had the “reverse pouty-lip” front bumper that Renault did a lot in the ’60s (before bumper standards). First car he had with Radials (I think they were Michelin).
His R10 was right after this model, I’m guessing that in ’67 when the new emissions and safety .laws took effect, many models needed to transition or were no longer imported to the US…maybe this is what happened to the Caravelle (and ultimately to the R10 when it was no longer sold here)…guess that made room for the “Le Car” model of the 70’s.
The Aunt of a friend had an aqua colored Dauphine in the mid sixties. I remember riding in the back seat of it once. It seemed to be slow and noisy, but was certainly different.
Her next car was about as opposite as you could get – a dark blue original Pontiac GTO with lighter blue vinyl interior. I think the GTO had red wall Uniroyal tires. It was very good looking.
Very rare cars here Renault and durable do not belong in the same sentence, rust ate these cars quite quickly and so a rare sighting good find.
Awesome! I don’t recall seeing any of those before. Poor Renault — they had some good cars in their day.
I do feel obliged to point out a redundancy: “… and billable hours ensued.” If lawyers were involved, that’s a given. 🙂
Congratulations on this find. My only ride in a Caravelle was about 15 years ago, and it had been converted to an EV. The Dauphine and Caravelle were one of the most popular cars to convert to battery power in the EV wave of the seventies. They were light, had adequate room for batteries (some in the trunk, and some more behind the front seats), and were easy to come by back then. It was a short ride…
The Dauphine was the first car I ever drove, as dad brought one home at lunchtime on summers day in 1964, We took it a couple of laps up and down the driveway, then down the street to the next intersection and back.
The three things I really remember about the car is that: a. The steering felt like it was being run thru a chain drive from the steering column to the wheels, b. The push button drive automatic, and c. The two-tone horn.
The horn was a staple for the Dauphine’s radio ads. And I remember seeing more than a few Caravelle’s around Johnstown in my youth, due to a reasonably successful Renault dealer in the area. Back before 1968, your foreign car choices in the “not in the big city” areas were Volkswagen and Renault. Period.
Some people who never heard the radio ads and didn’t know French called them “Ren_ alt Daw_feens”.
Actually, as seen (heard, I suppose) in this 1958 ad, “Ren-ALT” was the pronunciation used in the US at the time. I think it switched to “Ren-OH” during the Fuego and LeCar era. Kind of like the change from the “Su-BAR-oo” 360 to “Su-ba-ROO” for the later models.
Thanks – interesting commercial and info about the pronunciation change.
I kiddingly used to call the Fuego a No Go Fuego.
The Dauphine in the second picture has raised white letter tires – no doubt in keeping with it’s
“performance” image. 🙂
And here in Britain, the majority of people did, and still do, pronounce Renault as “REN-oh,” with the stress on the first syllable.
I not only remember the ads for Renault Dauphines that always featured balloons coming up through the sunroof, but the Mad magazine parody in which the lady is dumping the guy and giving him back his Dauphine “…and here are ze keys and ze balloons!”
Mad also did a parody VW ad in the style of the Renault ones:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mytravelphotos/1818612109/in/faves-12458821@N08/
Nice writeup on a car I’ve never known about. Must confuse everybody at the shows it attends, being a vintage renault. The overall styling is OK, but either it needs some of that front overhang to be chopped off, or the wheelbase needs to be lengthened (in the front). What a great find, though! Wonder how hard it must be to find parts…
I see one of these (in really nice shape, like the feature car) parked in front of a mechanic’s garage near our office several times a week. Always wondered whether the mechanic drives it to work, or it just needs repairs that often…
It wouldn’t have hurt this car’s desirability, when new, that there was a Caravelle jetliner in service in the same time. This one’s even christened ‘Dauphine’…
Great find Jim–I mean, Jim’s brother 🙂 I never realized that these were Renault’s Karmann-Ghia. Looks like they had a long run, even if sales weren’t so hot.
For some reason, I used to think the Floride was the convertible and the Caravelle was the coupe. Thanks for correcting my error.
And I just noticed the CC is a convertible with the hardtop, not a coupe!
This CC is stealthy that way!
there was a convertible version street parked in tribeca a few years back. i remember thinking it was very cool and looking up the history on wikipedia as soon as i got home. sadly, i saw it with a fresh dent not long afterwards. disappeared after that. i wonder what became of it?
When I was in the sixth grade a classmate of mine mentioned that his parents were out of town (Mexico City) and he had access to the keys for both-a 1961 Chevy Biscayne six with a three on the tree, and a coeval Renault Dauphine with four on the floor. The Chevy was easy to drive since the top two gears had synchros, but the Renault was a pure crash box. As I had no idea what double-clutching was, nor had I had any idea how to perform such a feat, the Dauphine was a real drag to drive. The only way I had to go up the steep hills in the neighborhood was to bring the car to a complete halt, select first, and go up through the gears. That got old so I went back to driving the Chevy. Plus the Chevy, in spite of the Blue Flame Six, could actually leave copious amounts of rubber, an important consideration for a sixth-grader.
CC has been hitting close to a lot of my family’s cars lately, between the Mazda pickup (I had a Courier) and the Saab wagon (parents had a 2 stroke version). This one is also close but not dead on: my mother’s first car was a Dauphine. Apparently they shared the snap oversteer trait with other rear engine swing axle cars. The story is that she took a gravel corner too fast and rolled it. Luckily(?) her brother was in insurance so he got it totalled. The next day her future father-in-law made her go out and drive his car so she wouldn’t become afraid to drive. My impression is that that bought my father a lot of points in the relationship!
@Kevin – driving in 6th grade? Nitrous, beer, etc? Sounds like you were the kid my mother warned me about… But as Paul pointed out over the weekend, glad we can all get along here, so I can live vicariously through your stories.
Hi,
great find which would be quite a find in Europe now, too.
However, I still cannot make think anyone has ever made a car that was better because it was rear engined, and I include the 911 in that.
“Little” Ex, jaunty beret and all, was featured in a 1947 magazine* article about winners of the Fisher Body Craftsman’s Guild.
*Popular Mechanics?
Yes, amazing that this Caravelle survived in the US! My grandfather took me to the first Dauphine that arrived in Cape Town. Here the Caravelle was name Floride till the roofline changed and then called Caravelle, if I remember correctly…it is some time ago! Was fairly popular here.
Hello, It’s Rich in Columbus. Thanks for featuring my 66 Caravelle on your website. Here’s the story….
My wife and I were visiting Paris in August of 2012, and we noticed a lot of cool vintage French cars driving around. I wondered if you could still buy one. So, after sightseeing each day, we’d retire to our rented apartment, where I’d surf ebay, while my wife watched French TV, though she barely understood a word of it. No matter, the wine was quite tasty and affordable.
I searched Peugeot…no listings. The Citroens were too expensive. Then I came across this lonely Caravelle located in central West Virginia. Here’s that story…Herb, now 91, had bought the car in 1989 (at age 68), and had done some decent restoration work on the car. But, the one thing he could not make right was the brakes. Trust me, the one thing you need in central West Virginia is good brakes! Mind you, this was before the internet, and I suspect that there was not a big market for French auto parts in those parts. Plus, Renault had pulled out of the US market in 87, so it’s no wonder Herb had trouble getting those quirky French brakes to work. Thus, with re-built engine, new paint job and new tires, the car went in to Herb’s garage, where it remained un-driven for the next 23 years. Finally in 2012, his grandson listed it on ebay, and I was the lone bidder. I paid $2000. (There was no land-line for internet at the grandson’s place…there was a tower on the next mountain over, and if the weather was good, the transponder on his rooftop could transmit a signal, thus allowing him to access the internet. Worse than dial-up, I’d imagine).
Next I drove truck and trailer 5 hours into the heart of God’s country, down roads with no names, past homes barely discernible from salvage yards, with the sound of banjo music echoing through the hollers. At the top of the highest knob overlooking the valley sat my $2000. The ramps on the trailer were almost too wide for the tiny car, but with the help of some cousins from the next holler, we got it trailered, and down the mountain I went in 1st gear. I drove a harrowing 45 minutes (10 miles covered) to the next tiny hamlet, where I discovered that one of the wheel straps had come off completely, and the other one was loose…the car had walked back about 2 feet on the trailer. Needless to say I made sure all straps were quite secure, and checked them often on the return trip. The return trip took 7 hours to cover 200 miles.
Once home, I sorted through the whole car, and with the help of Jacques’ Rear Engine Renault Parts in El Cajon (and my MasterCard), I finally got the thing running reliably (after 2nd caliper re-build) and on the road in Nov. 2012, about the time your CC photo was taken. Now my wife and I are enjoying the ride in our little French roadster, and I am hoping nothing else needs fixed….You know what they say….”Once you own a French car, nothing worse can happen to you.”.
Au Revoir,
Ricard
Thanks so much for the background story on your car. Not only is the car fascinating, but your story makes it even more so. You should consider submitting a “My Curbside Classic” piece on your car, as I am sure that it would be a great read.
here’s my caravelle no 1
I haven’t seen a Caravelle here in the US for decades. And I think this is the last Dauphine I saw, about three years ago, though I suspect it may have been even more decades since it moved under its own power.
Ever notice how much the Tesla Model 3 front end looks like a Caravelle?
Yes!
I’m glad I’m not the only one with that thought.
Pierre Dreyfus, the then Regie Renault CEO travelled the US and was impressed by the wealth and the voloptuous American cars. There and then he decided to have this car developed aiming at the US market, it is even said the Floride name is inspired on the name of the State Florida.
When the R8 succeeded the Dauphine, the underpinnings of the R8 were much more modern as the text says disc brakes all around, Renault choose to name the car Caravelle.
The Floride has side vents in the rear wings to let cooling air in, the Caravelle has them in the bonnet, that is the most distinctive difference between the two.
A young and hot Brigitte Bardot had one.
Each time I see a Renault Caravelle, I’m reminded of the movie “Day of the Jackal (1973).
The protagonist commanders a Caravelle from the baroness.
It’s too bad they never tried importing the Alpine aka Interlagos, based on the R8. Beautiful and fast. Some of them were built in Brazil by Willys, which was tied to Renault at the time.
There is a green one around here sitting in an import repair shop.
One of these crossed the block at Mecum Denver yesterday. Based on the photos here, it was missing the front bumper. Funny looking oddball, but someone bought it.
Here is my 67 Caravelle 1100s
I found her in a barn in New Hampshire in 2011
I enjoy driving her and getting the beautiful suspension feeling
And comfortable seats!
Here is Brigitte Bardot sitting on her Caravelle!
Princess Grace of Monaco was presented with a new Floride by the Renault factory
The car was green and can be seen in the collection of Prince Albert in Monaco.
The Caravelle’s detachable hardtop.