Renault 14

The Renault 14 is a small family car that Renault produced from 1976 to 1983. It was first shown in January 1976, with production starting in June of that year at the new Douai plant, and it was developed to compete in the small hatchback class that the Volkswagen Golf had popularised in 1974. It has front-wheel drive and a transverse four-cylinder engine tilted back by 72 degrees, with the spare wheel carried above the engine under the bonnet. The engines came from the X-type unit developed jointly with Peugeot, and the 14 was the only Renault to use it. Sales were hampered by an advertising campaign that likened the car to a pear, and it later gained a reputation for body corrosion, which led the French press to call it the rotten pear. Production ended in 1983 after 993,193 cars, and the Renault 9 and 11 replaced it.