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Concept
Renault 5
Summary
The Renault 5 is a five-passenger, three or five-door, front-engine, front-wheel drive hatchback supermini manufactured and marketed by the French automaker Renault over two generations: 1972–1985 (also called R5) and 1984–1996 (also called Super 5 or Supercinq). The R5 was marketed in the US and Canada as Le Car, from 1976 until 1983. Renault marketed a four-door sedan variant, the Renault 7, manufactured from 1974 until 1984 in Spain by Renault's subsidiary FASA-Renault and exported to select markets.
The Renault 5 became the best-selling car in France from 1972 until 1986, with a total production exceeding 5.5 million over a 14-year period, making it France's most popular car.
The first images and details of the Renault 5 were published on 10 December 1971, and the car's formal launch followed on 28 January 1972.
The Renault 5 was styled by Michel Boué, who designed the car in his spare time, outside of his normal duties. When Renault executives learned of Boué's work, they were so impressed by his concept that they immediately authorized a formal development program. The R5 featured a steeply sloping rear hatchback. Boué had wanted the tail-lights to go all the way up from the bumper into the C-pillar, in the fashion of the much later Fiat Punto and Volvo 850 estate/wagon, but the lights remained at a more conventional level.
It was launched onto the right-hand drive UK market in the autumn of 1972, where alongside the recently launched Fiat 127 it competed as an imported but more modern alternative to British Leyland's Mini and Chrysler Europe's Hillman Imp — and without competitors from Ford or Vauxhall.
The 5 narrowly missed out on the 1973 European Car of the Year award, which was instead given to the Audi 80.
Boué died of cancer at the end of 1972, just a few months after the car he designed was launched.
The R5 borrowed mechanicals from the successful Renault 4, using a longitudinally-mounted engine driving the front wheels with torsion bar suspension. OHV engines were the same as the Renault 4 and larger Renault 8.
Official source
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