After a brief flurry of interest in the late ’50s, Renault Dauphines are mostly known in the US for giving up the ghost not long after purchase. Though to be fair, they were never meant for US driving conditions in the first place. I’ve only seen one Dauphine in my life, near my workplace in SF back in the ’90s. Had I taken photos, its proper CC would be already done (Sigh…).
Talking about ghosts from the past, these 1960 Dauphine French brochure images have some eerie ghostly qualities. Or so they do to my eyes. Not quite reaching trés bizarre degrees, but not looking quite so trés chic as intended.
Let’s not blame it all on that excentricité francaise, as the ’60s was the decade were pop-art and surrealism reached the mainstream. Still, these shots kind of freak me out a bit.
What could have done the little Dauphine to be haunted by these gals’ souls? Whatever it was it must have been fun, for they all look rather merry. Sorry, I meant to say trés heureuse!
My late uncle Donald had a Dauphine when I was a child (early 1960s). I remember it as a very odd little vehicle. It was painted in an anonymous light blue-grey-green color that I might characterize as “whale sputum grey” 😉
Our neighbor bought one of these with an automatic for his 3 teenage teenage daughters to share. I was always fascinated that the car has a pushbutton transmission like a Plymouth or Rambler. The car survived surprisingly well considering the drivers were all teenagers.
I had an R10 with that automatic transmission.
Really enjoyed that car–comfortable seats, 40mpg (around town), easy to park.
The transmission went south and was way past my meager abilities to repair or even troubleshoot. And, of course, no one in the area would work on it.
I rode in Buicks, Oldsmobiles and Lincolns. The R10 I rode in was hands down the most comfortable car I ever rode in. Why big American car companies going for a smooth ride didn’t try to emulate some features is lost to me.
French cars are weird that way ~ they look funny and don’t follow any rules yet they’re always supremely comfy and handle well .
-Nate
That was one of two clutchless options available on the Dauphine at different times. One was a Ferlec electromagnetic clutch activated by touching the shift lever, similar to the VW Autostick. You still had to shift the gears on that setup, though. The pushbutton automatic looked deceptively familiar to 1960’s buyers acquainted with Mopar and other US pushbutton automatics, but what was behind the pushbuttons was anything but a conventional automatic transmission. In fact, it was the same three-speed box as the manual and Ferlec cars, being shifted automatically (hopefully) through some bizarre complex Rube Goldberg assortment of solenoids and whatnot.
The whole range (Dauphine, Ondine, Gordini and Caravelle) were available here in Uruguay over the early the 60s. All brought in from France, they were also built in Brazil and Argentina. They were quite popular. My father in law had an Ondine that he got new in 1962 and kept until 1970, trading it for a used 404. He says there was some unoxidized metal left in the Renault… for our current standards, they were terrible. For their time, they appear to have been run of the mill. Not great either.
My older brother had a GF in 1967-1968 that drove a Dauphine, a hand-me down from her father. It seemed to be reasonably reliable, and I rode in it a couple of times. It was a bit odd getting in the little back seat through a door, given how ubiquitous VWs were at the time.
A neighbor who was in grad school for electrical engineering had a ’58? Dauphine that was maybe 5 yrs old while he was in school, and even he couldn’t keep it running, it was a real steaming pile. He smartly traded it in (junked it?) for a ’62 Lancer GT that was a sweet little car that was also dependable.
My age is showing, as Dauphines seemed quite common in the Bay Area when I was a kid. There’s a well-preserved one in a remote California desert town which I found on a bike ride. Photo from 2016.
Nice bike you have there!
Mr. Baron, was that Dauphine you saw in the 90’s red ? If so, it was probably mine.
I remember it being light colored, though I’m not entirely sure. I do know it was parked around Potrero Hill, and saw it smoking away the few occasions it was started in cold mornings.
Those images are a bit creepy – and the scale is off-kilter too, so the cars themselves almost seem like scale models.
Looks like American Dauphine sales material featured non-transparent people:
What does this ad mean by “conventional American shift”? Three on the tree? Surely not.
Good question… I have no idea what that means.
It means a manual transmission and clutch.
Not a column shift – I think Tatra was the only one who tried that with a rear-engine car – but probably a 3-speed with reverse on the top left, first below/back from it and a dogleg 1-2 shift.
We had a 1957 Renault Dauphine. My Dad bought it new as a second car to commute to work more economically than our ‘57 Merc. I know they have a bad reputation, but he absolutely loved it.
That’s a cute little car.
Early 60s, a babysitter I had drove a black one. Burned oil like nobody’s business–pew!!
She would take us kids to the (then new) mall to kill time until mom was home. Even at that young age, I was embarrassed to be seen in that car. It rode like a buckboard, and didn’t stop very well. What saved me was her moving out of state–and taking that horrible little death trap with her!
There were a lot of these back in the day, But they turned out to be a POS. Enjoy the pix…
A French car with models with French designed clothing seems appropriate for the era. If I’m not mistaken, French fashion was in vogue at the time. I could see these images appearing in a fashion publication. More than likely the images were created by designers in France.
The Dauphine brochure, one year, advertised how far one could drive on a teacup full of gasoline. IIn 1963, one of my classmates in school needed to do her student teaching rounds. The Dauphine was $1,300.00 versus the VW Bug at $1,600.00. She bought the Dauphine knowing that after three years that she would trade it in for something commensurate with her teacher’s salary.
In July 1971 my notes tell me I took a pic of a pretty decent looking Renault 4CV on a campus parking lot. I think that even then I hadn’t seen a Dauphine in several years, not that I had missed them very much at all. I also note that 4CVs show up in French movies set in a certain period with some frequency.
In 1973 or so I briefly owned a Dauphine, it has the Ferlic clutch and never did work right .
I wanted to like that tiny little four door so much .
I remember in the early 1960’s a teacher of mine bought one and loved it .
-Nate
I remember these buzzing around the Pittsburgh area when I was in grade school.
I think the last one I saw was a rusting hulk on the side of US Route 211 west of Sperryville, VA on the way up to Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. It was there when we first moved to VA in 1979 and remained for a few more years afterward.
At high school in the late 1980s I read a great book all about a Dauphine being rescued and repaired by a teenager (I think). It was basically Don Stanford’s excellent The Red Car but about a Dauphine instead. My grandparents and Uncle had owned a Renault R8 and an R10 so I knew about those Renaults, but the book was the first I’d heard of the Dauphine. It was a great read, but I don’t remember what it was called and have never been able to find it darn it…
Proustian rush – was that an illustrated book about a crashed Dauphine being repaired & rallied?
I think I read it at school in the mid-seventies.
Forgot all about it – until you mentioned it!
They had 3 lug wheels.
Lots of brand cars had 3 lug wheels in the past Peugeot, Citroen, Austin, Hillman to name but a few.
Loved the tres chic brochure photos.
I actually rode in a then new Dauphine a number of times. A mom in my neighborhood, c1962-63, bought one. Every now and then her turn would come up to haul a load of kids to a game, etc. The purchase price was rumored to be well below the already “cheaper than a VW” list price. A Wikipedia reference claims that US sales tanked so badly in 1960 that two shiploads of Dauphines were turned around mid-Atlantic. The NY docks were full of unsold models, it claimed.
At about the same time, a favorite cousin of mine was drafted into the Army. He wound up in an ICBM silo for two years. With many trips to Minneapolis college coed parties. While there he managed to buy a used Dauphine for $25. In 1964, after separation, he somehow nursed it home to eastern PA. I believe it was completely smoked. He immediately ordered a new ’64 Impala SS 409 convertible.
Also called a Hino in Japan
In the summer of 1965 my family drove out to California with my grandma to visit a couple of her sisters who lived out there. My mother’s Aunt Cora and Uncle Roy bought a Dauphine for their teenaged sons to drive. I have no idea if they bought it new or if they found it used somewhere. It was quite a contrast to Uncle Roy’s 59 Ford sedan.
I remember getting some rides in the Renault, it was a turquoise car with a sunroof and seemed like great fun. At the time I had no idea they were so fragile, but remember seeing enough of them that I knew what this one was when I saw it, even at age 6.
The first car I ever drove, summer of 1962, I was 12. Dad brought a Dauphine home from work during lunch on day, took me out on our street (which was three blocks long ending in the cul de sac just beyond our driveway), and I drove all the way to the main road, three point turned it around, and back into the driveway without incident. Probably didn’t go above 15mph. I was both scared and exhilarated.
Did that Audrey Hepburn like model in the ads do anything to help sell these cars,? Notorious rustbuckets, the rocker panels developed advanced ‘body cancer’ in less than the years after purchase. They made a good case for walking.