Wednesday, March 5, 2008

CITROEN 2CV, NOT JUST A CAR BUT A LIFESTYLE

Author : Youkonton Ratarasarn


German had Volkswagen. French also had a Citroen 2CV as a national heritage.
In 1936, Jean Boulanger and Pierre Michelin, the executives of Citroen had requested a team of engineers to design an economy car that was small comfortable and easy to drive. The system of the understructure must be soft as if someone place a basketful of eggs in the car running across the field, the eggs must not break.
After three years of Citroen engineers congregation, they discovered the original style of a unfamiliar appearance. It was designed by one of the teamwork whose name was Deux Chvaux. The body of the car was aluminium. The system of the understructure was made of metal magnesium for a light weight. It had only on front light and a wiper that must be used by hand to operate. It had two pistons engines, using water to cool the heath and cycling the starter by hand.


But it missed the chance to show to public due to the second World War in 1939. The motor show in that year was cancelled. During the occupation by Germany, Boulanger continued working on 2CV with his team. At all events, many kinds of the raw materials were scant, relating to the war.
After the World War II was ended, the oil was hard to find. This Citroen began to receive intention from the producer, due to many aspects of the appearance. 2CV associated with a living status of French and after situation in a period of war.
The engine of the 2CV used air-cooled engine instead of water-cooled. The understructure was changed into steel. The front light and wiper was added into two and the engine room was changed to a new gear.
Finally, after the more than ten year of design and alteration, 2CV appeared to public for the first time in Paris Motor Show 35 in 1948. Thereby, on October 7, Boulanger, chairman of the Citroen and Vincent Auriol, the French president had exhibited Citroen 2CV which was strange looking and was made fun by many people in that period. On the other hand, it was impressive to French people very much. Owing to its clever design an the price that cost only 185,000 Franc. It was the lowest price in the market at that time.




2CV began the trade in 1948 naming the Model A using the 375 CC engine.
In 1954 it was renamed to AZ and the engine was changed to 425 CC.
In 1956 it released a special model with aluminum body named Model 2ZL. Therefore, it had been altered many times on small details such as Model AZLP and Model AZAM. Until July 27, 1990 at 4pm (GMT), the last Citroen 2CV had been assembled in Portugal. The number of the production around the world was 7,301,278 cars in more than 40 years. Citroen 2CV met with success and sold very well. Sometimes, the buyers had to wait fro more than 5 years in order to have the ownership. The cost of 2CV had never fluctuated.


Citroen 2CV became one of the icon of French same as red wine, basket bread and Eiffel Tower.
Citroen 2CV was mentioned a lot about the ability to run in a various conditions, from desert to high hill and even waded water and mud included a long distant. For instance, in 1953-1954 Jaques Comet and Henri Lochon traveled 52,000km from North America to South America, Africa Spain and France.
In 1958, two students, Jean Baudot and Jacques Sequiela traveled by 2CV around the world with a distance of 100,000km. Beside that, there were many big rally , for example, the Raid Paris-Perspolis-Paris in 1970.

In 1971, the Raid Paris-Perspolis-Paris had 1,300 participants who entered the contest for a distance of 13,500km. 467 of that were Citroen. As shown here, this die-cast came from one of the rally participants. This real model was produced in 1952.

This die-cast 2CV is 21cm long. Its scale is 1:8. It is painted in yellow with logos screened on both side as a rally car refer to the car participated in the Raid Paris-Perspolis-Paris. The front hood can be opened to see the engine inside. Both doors can be open. The roof of the car is made of rubber and can be removed. The seats are covered with real fabric. The steering wheel has a system to operate the wheels in order to turn left and right. The understructure of the four wheels is able to move independently like a real car.
This die-cast car was produced by Maisto. It was not mentioned the year of the released but it seems older than 5 years. It was even more impressive since it was originally create in Thailand.

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