Citroën · 1948–1990

Citroën 2CV fourgonnette

The Citroën 2CV (French: deux chevaux, pronounced [dø ʃ(ə)vo], lit. "two horses", meaning "two taxable horsepower") is an economy car produced by the French company Citroën from 1948 to 1990. Introduced at the 1948 Paris Salon de l'Automobile, it has an air-cooled engine that is mounted in the front and drives the front wheels. Conceived by Citroën Vice-President Pierre Boulanger to help motorise the large number of farmers still using horses and carts in 1930s France, the 2CV has a combination of innovative engineering and straightforward, utilitarian bodywork. The 2CV featured overall low cost of ownership, simplicity of maintenance, an easily serviced air-cooled engine (originally offering 6.6 kW, 9 hp), and minimal fuel consumption. In addition, it was designed to cross a freshly ploughed field with a basket full of eggs on the passenger's seat without breaking them, because of the great lack of paved roads in France at the time, with its long-travel suspension system that connects front and rear wheels, giving a very soft ride. Often called "an umbrella on wheels", the fixed-profile convertible bodywork featured a full-width, canvas, roll-back sunroof, which accommodated oversized loads, and until 1955 even stretched to cover the car's trunk, reaching almost down to the car's rear bumper. Michelin introduced and first commercialised the revolutionary new radial tyre design with the introduction of the 2CV. Between 1948 and 1990, more than 3.8 million 2CVs were produced, making it the world's first front-wheel drive car to become a million seller after Citroën's own earlier model, the more upmarket Traction Avant, which had become the first front-wheel drive car to sell in similar six-figure numbers. The 2CV platform spawned many variants; the 2CV and its variants are collectively known as the A-Series. Notably these include the 2CV-based delivery vans known as fourgonnettes, the Ami, the Dyane, the Acadiane, and the Mehari. In total, Citroën manufactured over 9 million of the 2CVs and its derivative models. A 1953 technical review in Autocar described "the extraordinary ingenuity of this design, which is undoubtedly the most original since the Model T Ford". In 2011, The Globe and Mail called it a "car like no other". The motoring writer L. J. K. Setright described the 2CV as "the most intelligent application of minimalism ever to succeed as a car", and a car of "remorseless rationality". Both the design and the history of the 2CV mirror the Volkswagen Beetle in significant ways. Conceived in the 1930s, to make motorcars affordable to regular people for the first time in their countries, both went into large scale production in the late 1940s, featuring air-cooled boxer engines at the same end as their driven axle, omitting a length-wise drive shaft, riding on exactly the same 2,400 mm (94.5 in) wheelbase, and using a platform chassis to facilitate the production of derivative models. Just like the Beetle, the 2CV became not only a million seller but also one of the few cars in history to continue a single generation in production for over four decades. A prototype was developed in the late 1990s under the name "Citroën 2CV 2000". However, it did not go into production.

Text from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).

Successor: Citroën Acadiane

All Citroën 2CV fourgonnette data: UK builds, safety, recalls, model years →

History

=== Pre-production === In 1934, family-owned Michelin, as the largest creditor, took over the bankrupt Citroën company. The new management commissioned a market survey, conducted by Jacques Duclos. France at that time had a large rural population which could not yet afford cars; Citroën used the survey results to prepare a design brief for a low-priced, rugged "umbrella on four wheels" that would enable four people to transport 50 kg (110 lb) of farm goods to market at 50 km/h (30 mph), if necessary across muddy, unpaved roads. In fuel economy, the car would use no more than 3 L/100 km (95 mpg‑imp; 80 mpg‑US). One design parameter required that customers be able to transport eggs across a freshly ploughed field without breakage. In 1936, Pierre-Jules Boulanger, vice-president of Citroën and chief of engineering and design, sent the brief to his design team at the engineering department. The TPV (Toute Petite Voiture – "Very Small Car") was to be developed in secrecy at Michelin facilities at Clermont-Ferrand and at Citroën in Paris, by the design team who had created the Traction Avant. Boulanger closely monitored all decisions relating to the TPV, proposing strictly reduced target weights. He created a department to weigh and redesign each component, to lighten the TPV without compromising function. Boulanger placed engineer André Lefèbvre in charge of the TPV project. Lefèbvre had designed and raced Grand Prix cars; his speciality was chassis design and he was particularly interested in maintaining contact between tyres and the road surface. The first prototypes were bare chassis with rudimentary controls, seating and roof; test drivers wore leather flying suits, of the type used in contemporary open biplanes. By the end of 1937 20 TPV experimental prototypes had bee

Export markets

The 2CV was originally sold in France and some European markets, and went on to enjoy strong sales in Asia, South America, and Africa. During the post-war years Citroën was very focused on the home market, which had some unusual quirks, like puissance fiscale. The management of Michelin was supportive of Citroën up to a point, and with a suspension designed to use Michelin's new radial tyres the Citroën cars clearly demonstrated their superiority over their competitors' tyres. But they were not prepared to initiate the investment needed for the 2CV (or the Citroën DS for that matter) to truly compete on the global stage. Citroën was always under-capitalised until the 1970s Peugeot takeover. The 2CV sold 9 million vehicles; the Volkswagen Beetle, which was available worldwide, sold 21 million units. Production of the 2CV in Belgium was from 1952 to 1980. Britain. Production at Citroën's plant in Slough, England was from 1953 to 1960. Until then British construction and use regulations made cars with inboard front brakes such as the 2CV illegal. Producing the car in Britain allowed Citroën to circumvent trade barriers and to sell cars in the British Empire and Commonwealth. It achieved some success in these markets, to the extent that all Slough-built 2CVs were fitted with improved air cleaners and other modifications to suit the rough conditions found in Australia and Africa, where the 2CV's durability and good ride quality over rough roads attracted buyers. The 2CV sold poorly in Great Britain in part due to its excessive cost, because of import duties on components. In 1959, the British Royal Navy ordered 65 2CV pick-ups from the Slough plant, following sea tests aboard HMS Bulwark in the West Indies and the Indian Ocean during 1957–58, with the Westland Whirlwind heli

Production numbers

The Citroën factory offered several high volume variant models on the 2CV running gear – the Ami; the Dyane; the Acadiane; and the Méhari. Additionally, the 2CV was built in a wide variety of joint ventures, often with modified designs. The 2CV and all its variants are collectively known as the A-Series.

Construction

The level of technology in the 1948 2CV was remarkable for the era. While colours and detail specifications were modified in the ensuing 42 years, the biggest mechanical change was the addition of front disc brakes (by then already fitted for several years in the mechanically similar Citroën Dyane 6) in October 1981 (for the 1982 model year). The reliability of the car was enhanced by the minimalist simplification of the designers, being air-cooled (with an oil cooler), it had no coolant, radiator, water pump or thermostat. It had no distributor either, just a contact breaker system. Except for the brakes, there were no hydraulic parts on original models; damping was by tuned mass dampers and friction dampers. The 1948 car featured radial tyres, which had just been commercialised; front-wheel drive; rack and pinion steering mounted inside the front suspension cross-tube, away from a frontal impact; rear fender skirts (the suspension design allowed wheel changes without removing the skirts); bolt-on detachable front and rear wings; detachable doors, bonnet (and boot lid after 1960), by "slide out" P-profile sheet metal hinges; flap-up windows, as roll-up windows were considered too heavy and expensive.; and detachable full length fabric sunroof and boot lid, for almost pickup-like load-carrying versatility. Ventilation in addition to the sunroof and front flap windows was provided by an opening flap under the windscreen. The car had load adjustable headlights and a heater (heaters were standardised on British economy cars in the 1960s). Body. The body was constructed of a dual H-frame platform chassis and aircraft-style tube framework, and a very thin steel shell that was bolted to the chassis. Because the original design brief called for a low speed car, little or no at

Engines

The engine was designed by Walter Becchia and Lucien Gerard, with a nod to the classic BMW boxer motorcycle engine. It was an air-cooled, flat-twin, four-stroke, 375 cc engine with pushrod operated overhead valves and a hemispherical combustion chamber. The earliest model developed 9 hp DIN (6.6 kW). A 425 cc engine was introduced in 1955 with initially 12 hp (8.8 kW), later increased to 18 hp (13.2 kW), followed in 1970 by a 602 cc one giving 28 hp (20.6 kW) at 7000 rpm. With the 602 cc engine, the tax classification was bumped into the 3CV category, but the name remained unchanged. A 435 cc engine was introduced at the same time to replace the 425 cc unit; the 435 cc engine car was named 2CV 4 while the 602 cc took the name 2CV 6 (a variant in Argentina took the name 3CV). The 602 cc engine evolved to the M28 with 33 hp (24.3 kW) in 1970; this was the most powerful engine fitted to the 2CV. A new 602 cc giving 29 hp (21.3 kW) at a slower 5,750 rpm was introduced in 1979, being the final version. This engine was less powerful, and more efficient, allowing lower fuel consumption and better top speed, at the price of decreased acceleration. All 2CVs with the M28 engine can run on unleaded petrol. The 2CV used the wasted spark ignition system for simplicity and reliability and had only speed-controlled ignition timing, no vacuum advance taking account of engine load. The inlet and exhaust manifolds were welded together into a single unit, with exhaust pipe and inlet tract abutting each other directly under the carburettor at an enlarged 'heat chamber'. Heat from the exhaust warmed both the metal and the air/fuel mixture inside the chamber, ensuring full vaporization of the fuel for greater combustion efficiency. The chamber also served as a reservoir of fuel/air mixture d

Performance

In relation to the 2CV's performance and acceleration, it was joked that it went "from 0–60 km/h in one day". The original 1948 model that produced 6.6 kW (9 hp) had a 0–40 km/h (0–25 mph) time of 42.4 seconds and a top speed of 64 km/h (40 mph), far below the speeds necessary for North American highways or the German Autobahns of the day. The top speed increased with engine size to 80 km/h (50 mph) in 1955, 84 km/h (52 mph) in 1962, 100 km/h (62 mph) in 1970, and 115 km/h (71 mph) in 1981. The last evolution of the 2CV engine was the Citroën Visa flat-twin, a 652 cc featuring electronic ignition. Citroën never sold this engine in the 2CV, but some enthusiasts have converted their 2CVs to 652 engines, or even transplanted Citroën GS or GSA flat-four engines and gearboxes. In the mid-1980s Car magazine editor Steve Cropley ran and reported on a turbocharged 602 cc 2CV that was developed by engineer Richard Wilsher.

Sections adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0); text is shortened. Read the full article for the complete history and citations.

Specifications

name: Citroën 2CV
Manufacturer: Citroën
Production: 1948–1990
Class: Economy car
Body style: 4-door saloon, 5-door hatchback (3CV), 2-door panel van, 2-door pick-up, 2-door coupé utility
Layout: Front-engine, front-wheel-drive, Dual-engine, four-wheel-drive
Engine: 375 cc air-cooled H2, 425 cc air-cooled H2, 435 cc air-cooled H2, 602 cc air-cooled H2Willson
Transmission: 4-speed manual
Wheelbase: 2400 mm
Length: 3860 mm
Width: 1480 mm
Height: 1600 mm
Kerb weight: 600 kg
Assembly: France: Levallois-Perret, Argentina: Jeppener (1960–1962), Argentina: Buenos Aires (1962–1980), Belgium: Forest/Vorst, Belgium: Liège, Chile: Arica, Portugal: Mangualde (Mangualde Plant: 1988–1990), Spain: Vigo (Vigo Plant), United Kingdom: Slough, England, Uruguay: Montevideo (panel van, pick-up), Yugoslavia: Koper, Slovenia (Cimos)
Related: Citroën Ami, Citroën Dyane, Citroën Acadiane, Citroën FAF, Citroën Méhari, Citroën Bijou
Designer: André Lefèbvre, Flaminio Bertoni, Walter Becchia, Marcel Chinon
Successor: Citroën Dyane, Citroën AX (indirectly), Citroën Acadiane (for van models)

Specification summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Measured facts from Wikidata (CC0). Check the linked sources for citations.

More photos

Sources

Wikidata — https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1080152CC0 1.0 · retrieved 2026-10-01
Wikipedia — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_2CVCC BY-SA 4.0 · Text © Wikipedia contributors; revision 1375831098 · retrieved 2026-10-01
Wikimedia Commons — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:1978.citroen.2cv.750pix.jpgPublic domain · Photo: Adrian Pingstone · retrieved 2026-10-01
Car Model Index — https://models.autoculturesociety.com/Compiled record. Sources that do not permit reuse are not copied; this index is credited instead.