Grace's Guide
British Industrial History
Grace's Guide is the leading source of historical information on industry and manufacturing in Britain. This web publication contains 147,389 pages of information and 233,518 images on early companies, their products and the people who designed and built them.
Renault
From Graces Guide
of Billancourt, Seine, France
of 21 Pall Mall, London, SW (1914)
of Western Avenue, Acton, London
General
Producing cars since late 1898, the Renault corporation was founded in 1899 as Société Renault Frères by Louis Renault, his brothers Marcel Renault and Fernand Renault, and his friend Thomas Evert.
Louis was a bright, aspiring young engineer who had already designed and built several models before teaming up with his brothers, who had honed their business skills working for their father's textiles firm. While Louis handled design and production, Marcel and Fernand handled company management.
1898 Company founded.
1904 Private company formed as Renault Freres Ltd in the UK.
1906 Produced 8-9 h.p., 10-14 h.p. (these two smaller models used two-cylinder engines), 10-14 h.p., 14-20 h.p., 20-30 h.p. and 35-45 h.p. (these four larger models had four cylinder engines) models. [1]
1911 Company name changed.
1913-1917 For a list of the models and prices see the 1917 Red Book.
1914 Automobile manufacturers. [2]
1950 Site at Acton is now 12 acres and assembles cars from components made at Billancourt.
1951 Exhibitor at the 1951 Motor Show in the Car Section.
1961 Producers of Dauphine and Floride. Motor car manufacturers. 545 employees.
1962 Acton factory ceased production.
1963 Exhibitor at the 1951 Motor Show. Importer. [3]
1980 Renault produced more than two million vehicles for the first time, and was the only major European or American motor company to raise production.[4]
Early Registrations
- 1900 AR 20
- 1911 LA 5678
Car Models
See Roadway Autocar Co.
- 1920 Renault the French maker developed a massive range of cars, heavy duty trucks, vehicles to cross the Sahara desert, PSVs and rail-cars.
Buses
- Towards the late 1920s, coaches of a normal and forward-control layout were developed. These were built with considerable speed and they were shown in Britain by Sir Henry Segrave.
- 1925 Blue Bird Motors bought a 26 seater bus which had a coal-scuttle bonnet, pneumatic tyres and servo-assisted four wheel brakes.
Tractors
See Also
Sources of Information
- ↑ The Automobile Vol. III. Edited by Paul N. Hasluck and published by Cassell in 1906.
- ↑ 1914 Whitakers Red Book
- ↑ 1963 Motor Show
- ↑ The Engineer 1981/05/28
- [1] Wikipedia
- 1961 Guide to Key British Enterprises: Motor, Motor-Cycle and Commercial Vehicle Manufacturers
- 1961 Dun and Bradstreet KBE
- British Motor Cars 1950/51
- Ian Allan - British Buses Since 1900 - Aldridge and Morris