Can a car be a "faithful friend"?

* The author is part of the community of readers of La Vanguardia.

Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
11 December 2023 Monday 22:06
7 Reads
Can a car be a "faithful friend"?

* The author is part of the community of readers of La Vanguardia

Walking among the Christmas decorations through the streets of Balsareny, in the Bages region, I was able to find a gem, the mythical Renault 4 or for some, the "four cans".

This car, in its day, meant a paradigm shift in the Renault brand and today we could say that it is a collector's item. Without a doubt, a beautiful encounter for motor nostalgics, which we can relive with these photographs in La Vanguardia Readers' Photos.

This vehicle became so popular that it received various nicknames depending on the location, not just "four cans." One of the ones that attracts the most attention is "faithful friend." And, judging by how old the car in the images must be, it seems that he does it justice.

And the R4 was produced by the French manufacturer Renault between 1961 and 1993. It was originally conceived to compete with the Citroën 2CV.

It was a strong bet, since it was a vehicle with a philosophy totally opposite to that until then followed by the French firm Renault. It was a car equipped with pioneering mechanics, with front-wheel drive, suspension based on torsion bars and cooling by a closed-circuit system with an expansion vessel. All of this involved a very different structural design.