A 1950, Citroën Traction Avant 11 Legere, driving down the Grand Avenue, during the 2019 London Classic Car Show
The Citroën Traction Avant was a range of mostly 4-door saloons and executive cars, with four or six-cylinder engines, produced by the French manufacturer Citroën from 1934 to 1957. Approximately 760,000 units were produced. The Traction Avant pioneered mass-production of three revolutionary innovations widely adopted since, and still used today: front-wheel drive, four-wheel independent suspension, and the use of a crash resistant, unitary, monocoque body. Additionally, the car was one of the earliest mass-production adopters of rack and pinion steering. Although the car's name emphasized its front-wheel drive power delivery ("Traction Avant" literally means “front traction”), the car stood out at least as much by its much lower profile and stance – made possible by the absence of a separate chassis under the car's unitary body – sharply distinguishing it visually from its Traction Avant, French for front-wheel drive, was designed by André Lefèbvre and Flaminio Bertoni in late 1933 / early 1934. The Traction Avant pioneered front-wheel drive on the European mass car market, along with DKW's and Adler's 1930s models. Front-wheel drive had just appeared for the first time through luxury vehicle manufacturers Alvis, which built the 1928 Racing FWD in the UK, and Cord, which produced the L29 from 1929 to 1932 in the United States. The Traction Avant's structure was a welded unitary body / chassis. Most other cars of the era were based on a separate frame (chassis) onto which the non-structural body ("coachwork") was built. Unitary construction (also called Unit Body or "Unibody" in the US) results in a lighter vehicle, and is now used for virtually all car construction[3][4] This unitary body saved 70 kg (150 lb) in steel per car. It was mass-produced, using innovative technology purchased from the American firm Budd Company. Weight reduction was a motivation for Citroën that American manufacturers of that time did not have.
Size: 4550px × 2953px
Location: ExCel, London
Photo credit: © John Gaffen / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: -cylinder, 11, 1911cc, 1950, 2019, alloy, aluminium, andré, avant, avenue, bertoni, car, cast, citroë, classic, drive, engine, flaminio, french, front-wheel, grand, layout, lefèbvre, legere, london, longitudinal, show, traction, transaxle
