Renault 16

Renault 16 (1965-1970)

The Renault 16 - R16 short - is a full size car from Renault. From January 1965 to January 1980 approximately 1,850,000 units were built.

Genesis

1961 issued Pierre Dreyfus, then head of Renault, the contract to develop a new, family-friendly vehicle. Gaston Juchet designed then the R16 as a five-door hatchback sedan.

As of December 2, 1964, the pre-production vehicles were manufactured in January 1965, the series began production in a new factory in Sandouville at Le Havre. End of 1965, the R16 was elected Car of the Year 1966.

Other locations for the assembly of the Renault 16 was the French Flins and the Australian Melbourne.

Body, engine and gearbox

The built exclusively as a five-door R16 is considered the first hatchback in the upper middle class, which had previously been placed on the market by Fiat Autobianchi Primula slightly smaller.

The engine of the R16 was the first of Renault, whose block was made of aluminum. He has wet liners made of gray cast iron. The chain-driven camshaft is located next to the cylinders in the crankcase and operates the parallel overhead valves mounted on the cylinder head tappets, pushrods and rocker arms ("high camshaft set "). The engine is placed longitudinally behind the front axle. The transmission, which is operated by a column shift, sitting in the same direction in front of the engine. This arrangement has long been typical of the French automotive industry. At Renault, she found herself out in the R16 also in the models R3, R4, R5, R6 and R7, Citroën from 1934 Citroën Traction Avant and later in the DS and the SM.

The construction with front engine, front-wheel drive hatchback was later in the compact class standard, was from the 1970s but also the entrance to the middle class and the upper middle class ( for example, the VW Passat ).

Motors

Landing gear

R 16 has different wheel bases of the left and the right side of the vehicle. Just as with the models Renault 4, Renault 5 and Renault 6 resulted from this arrangement of the torsion bars, but they are located in other vehicles side by side, with the Renaults in a row. This allowed a longer spring bars are used and you did not need a stable, heavy suspension in the center of the car, but the bearings of the rear wings are slightly offset. The front wheels are suspended from twin A-arms and have longitudinally mounted torsion bars. The suspension is soft, it allows a relatively high speed even with larger track irregularities. The long suspension travel is made possible by the long torsion bars and the very long shock absorbers, the rear shock absorbers reached up to the top of the seatback.

Interior

The design of the rear bench seat allows for a large variability of the trunk. You can expand with a few simple steps and without tools, so up to 1600 liters can be stored. Normally, the cargo volume is 346 liters with built-in rear seat. Overall, there are seven ways you can arrange the rear bank: Among other things, the back of the rear seat can be attached and below the headliner and seat are folded forward.

Exceptional until the end of production, the maintenance of the steering wheel gearshift: The shift lever for both the manual transmission as well as for the automatic transmission sticking out on the right side of the steering column. This and the hand brake in the driver's footwell make room for a spacious compartment and an armrest between the front seats. Some models are also equipped with electric central locking and electric windows in the front doors.

Facelift

In October 1970, the Renault 16 was first revised. All models were larger taillights. From autumn 1973, the R16 was offered in a TX version with 93 HP, the externally differed by double headlights and the standard rear wiper from the other model versions.

Renault 16 TX

In September 1974, the R16 was modified again. Now the aluminum grille was replaced by a black plastic. Just the R16 TX still had chrome bar edges, to distinguish themselves as the top model of the other lines.

Renault 16 TL Automatic

Renault 16 TX

Engine variants

Was used the engine in the Lotus Europe, the Renault Alpine and in the racing versions with a capacity of up to 126 kW ( 172 hp).

Reception

One often to be found to this day in the media and the time taken up by the Renault - advertising event, according to the former British Formula 1 racing driver Sir Stirling Moss commented as follows on the R16:

"There is no doubt did the Renault 16 is the most intelligently engineered automobile I have ever encountered and I think I did each British motorcar manufacturer would do well to purchase one just to see how it is put together. " (Translation: " Undoubtedly, the Renault 16 is the smartest designed automobile that I have ever met, and every British car makers would do well to buy one, just to see how it is constructed. " )

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