1960 Renault Dauphine

1960 Renault Dauphine in The Wild Angels, Movie, 1966

Class: Cars, Sedan — Model origin: — Made for: USA

Background vehicle

Comments about this vehicle

Author	Message
DynaMike ◊ 2007-10-10 20:34	Made for USA (bumpers, chrome trim around windshield). Export to the US started in 1957 or 58, but this one will be 1960+ (because of the colour, Gris Pompadour).
CougarTim ◊ 2009-06-24 04:27	In the row of three vehicles on the right, what's the blue van in the middle?
albee ◊ 2009-08-22 06:59	It appears to be a late 40s or early 50s International Step Van. I know because I owned a '48 once that looked just like that......was gonna turn it into some sort of custom hippie van, but didn't have the time so I got rid of it. Last one I saw was a few years ago parked in some side yard in Twentynine Palms, CA. Probably still there. You can probably pin down the exact year if they had different grills every year back then, but I don't know anything about those other than the one I had. I had mine in '73. I can say that it was a 4 speed 6 cylinder flathead, 6 volt electrics, not sure if it was positive or negative ground. The headlights were not sealed beams; they had replaceable bulbs. Rear tires were singles. This was apparently for lighter duty use like a bread van or something. Thing seemed to have enough power to cruise with the traffic on the freeway but you had to keep your foot in it. In it's day I would venture to say there were thousands of these in service all across America. You can ocassionaly catch them in old movies or reruns of shows like Highway Patrol etc. BTW, my father had two of those Dauphines. Picked them up for cheap as people gave up on them early in life. Too hard to get parts for in a lot of places and not as reliable as a VW. He had one to drive and the other for parts. When the starter went out on his daily driver and the second one went out too, he just used the crank handle from the jack and there was a hole in the back sheet metal where you could stick the handle in there and turn it over like a Model T. Not hard to do as the engine was so tiny, but he drove to work and back all week on two bucks of gas. Worst thing the Renault engineers (bean counters?) did was to not give it a 4 speed. Just too low on power to take that big RPM drop from 2-3, otherwise it was OK. Dad also had a Peugeot 403 around that time and you could start the engine the same way although it took more effort with the 1500cc. I remember because the first time he did that it conked out at an intersection and the battery was dead. There he was in the middleof the crossing, cranking it by hand and I could have died......I thought nobody did that since the Depression when there were still a few crank staters around.

Author

Message

DynaMike

◊ 2007-10-10 20:34

Made for USA (bumpers, chrome trim around windshield). Export to the US started in 1957 or 58, but this one will be 1960+ (because of the colour, Gris Pompadour).

CougarTim

◊ 2009-06-24 04:27

In the row of three vehicles on the right, what's the blue van in the middle?

albee

◊ 2009-08-22 06:59

It appears to be a late 40s or early 50s International Step Van. I know because I owned a '48 once that looked just like that......was gonna turn it into some sort of custom hippie van, but didn't have the time so I got rid of it. Last one I saw was a few years ago parked in some side yard in Twentynine Palms, CA. Probably still there. You can probably pin down the exact year if they had different grills every year back then, but I don't know anything about those other than the one I had. I had mine in '73. I can say that it was a 4 speed 6 cylinder flathead, 6 volt electrics, not sure if it was positive or negative ground. The headlights were not sealed beams; they had replaceable bulbs. Rear tires were singles. This was apparently for lighter duty use like a bread van or something. Thing seemed to have enough power to cruise with the traffic on the freeway but you had to keep your foot in it. In it's day I would venture to say there were thousands of these in service all across America. You can ocassionaly catch them in old movies or reruns of shows like Highway Patrol etc.

BTW, my father had two of those Dauphines. Picked them up for cheap as people gave up on them early in life. Too hard to get parts for in a lot of places and not as reliable as a VW. He had one to drive and the other for parts. When the starter went out on his daily driver and the second one went out too, he just used the crank handle from the jack and there was a hole in the back sheet metal where you could stick the handle in there and turn it over like a Model T. Not hard to do as the engine was so tiny, but he drove to work and back all week on two bucks of gas. Worst thing the Renault engineers (bean counters?) did was to not give it a 4 speed. Just too low on power to take that big RPM drop from 2-3, otherwise it was OK. Dad also had a Peugeot 403 around that time and you could start the engine the same way although it took more effort with the 1500cc. I remember because the first time he did that it conked out at an intersection and the battery was dead. There he was in the middleof the crossing, cranking it by hand and I could have died......I thought nobody did that since the Depression when there were still a few crank staters around.

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1960 Renault Dauphine