Renault 30

The Renault 30, or R30, was an upper-middle-class car that Renault built from February 1975 to January 1984. It was presented at the Geneva Motor Show in March 1975, together with the Peugeot 604 that used the same engine, and was the first independent Renault six-cylinder model after the Second World War. It differed from the otherwise identical Renault 20 by stronger engines and richer equipment, and Renault pitched it at managers and entrepreneurs who drive a lot. Development began as project P127 in the late 1960s, first with a V8, but the oil crisis of 1973 and 1974 led instead to the PRV V6 of 2,664 cubic centimetres built with Peugeot and Volvo. Designed by Gaston Juchet, it was a hatchback rather than a three-box saloon, which the market received sceptically. About 145,000 were built at the Sandouville plant near Le Havre, around 18,000 of them for Germany, and in 1981 a 2.1-litre turbodiesel joined the range. Francois Mitterrand used one as an official car from 1981 to 1983. The Renault 25 replaced it.