yep! i think they were!

Just veering back off topic again for a moment, I've owned a couple of Renault 4s-an '85 R4 GTL and an '86 R4 F6 van, they were both fantastic cars, so similar to 2CV/Dyane in essence yet too different to compare.

The F6 was particularly good fun to drive, almost had the poke of a sidewinder but had handling to boot*. I remember scaring tyhe shite out of a boy racer in an AX GT at the A5/M42 island in Tamworth going round it almost flat out in 3rd with the inside rear whell about 6 or so inches off the ground!

They both rotted away however


* I dragged the F6 out of a scrapyard and it had been in quite a heavy shunt at some point, not to mention the two cars that'd been on top of it in the tat yard and it had the most amazing negative camber on the front-probably helped the handling somewhat!

New writeup in the deuche special.

viewforum.php?f=26

I'm inclined to think they stuck with the name 2CV because they were stuck with the damn car. Living in France and looking around it's fairly obvious that for a lot of French paysans, there was no great loyalty to the 2CV, when something better came along they bought it. So over here I tend to see more battered Dyanes and derivatives than 2CVs, and a lot more R4s and derivatives than either.

Wasn't the idea of the Dyane that it should replace the 2CV, just like the Metro was supposed to replace the Mini? But that it was largely the export market that kept the 2CV (and the Mini for that matter) alive to outlive their replacements? If that was the case then it makes far more sense to stick with the name 2CV which doesn't have the tax implications outside France than to change it when from the outside it looks pretty much identical.

The other thing to think about is that the 2CV essentially didn't have a name, just a French fiscal horsepower rating, unlike say a Traction Avant which has both adding the hp/2cv on the end. So when the 2CV was available for a time with both 425 (2CV) and 602 (3CV) engines, it would have been strange to refer to almost identical cars by two different names (to give an example imagine BMW lopping the 3,5,7 off the front of their model designations, leaving you with a whole bunch of cars all with different numbers).

In Argentina however (and my history's pretty vague on these) it looks like the change in engine size coincided with several other changes, like the change from suicide doors to front hinged for instance so it'd make sense for them to change the model name to say "look it's new".

Just my theory though, like I say my history of SA built A-series is pretty vague.

Oh, and I can't find it anywhere but I'm sure in France I've seen the 602cc Van referred to in the past as a 3CV.

The 3CV was introduced by Citroën in 1969 with the 602 cc engine, telescopic hydraulic shock absorbers, the soft-top internally operated, Dyane rear headlamps and a normal clutch as main improvements or differeces with the 2CV (425cc). Suicide doors remain till 1970 and the 2CV stops in 1972.

Citroën Argentina stops to produce cars in 1979 by dictatorial Governement pressures. The company becomes in a trader who imported cars from Europe (Dyane, Visa, GS, CX). In 1982 (Malvinas/Falklands war) that importations were stopped.