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Allow me to introduce, the Citroen C15
- koterpillar 9mo agoCan't imagine producing and selling this under the current regulations (and not just the crash-worthiness). I with they and C15 move towards each other...
- evilmonkey19 9mo agoBest car ever! I have seen then running in Spain forever and still work as the first day. Easiest car to repair ever and never breaks!
- onion2k 9mo agoEasiest car to repair ever and never breaks! If it never breaks how do people know it's easy to repair?
- jacquesm 9mo agoWell, it never breaks as in: it will always get you to where you need to go because the engine just keeps running. Broken driveshaft? Stick a vice grip on it and keep rolling... And they're easy to repair because there isn't a lot in them to begin with, so you have a lot of room to work. Running gear wears and needs fixing but the core is nigh on indestructible. Same with the VW diesels from that era, the 1.9 mechanical.
- jacquesm 9mo agoThat's hilarious. The German version (VW Caddy) is similar. Citroen at some point had a van version of the 2CV and the Diane, this is the continuation of that tradition.
- jen20 9mo agoLiterally: the C15 was based on the Visa (clearly, when you look at it!), and was the first platform-shared vehicle between Citroen and Peugeot where it was basically a Peugeot warmed over with some additional eccentricity. Not bad, overall though.
- jacquesm 9mo agoExactly. And the Visa was an interesting little car all by itself.
- cpa 9mo agoAbsolutely true. It's even the subject of many memes! search for "c15 memes".
- lelanthran 9mo ago[flagged]
- blell 9mo agoHe forgets the part where because of emissions requirements the C15 can't be driven in that scourge the people the author defends call "low emissions zones".
- pasc1878 9mo agoGood so the car won't be killing people due to high noxious emissions.
- ErroneousBosh 9mo agoStick a petrol version of the engine in (Peugeot XU instead of XUD) and convert it to run on propane. There you go, now the exhaust is just water and carbon dioxide, and you don't die from breathing it in. No CO, no HC, and not really any more NOx that was in the air it sucked in. This is why forklifts run on gas, instead of petrol or diesel. We could have had incredibly clean air in our cities 25 years ago, if the government hadn't decided that pushing "scrappage schemes" to get people to buy "cleaner greener diesels" was cheaper.
- ceejayoz 9mo agohttps://eupolicy.social/@jmaris/115860595509967609 https://eupolicy.social/@jmaris/115860595509967609
- blell 9mo agoThat does not matter. It only complies with Euro 3 emissions requirements.
- omnicognate 9mo agoWhich will get you into London's Low Emission Zone (LEZ). Not the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ), though. Besides, I think the point is really that we should be making and buying vehicles more like this (in the positive aspects) rather than that we should all drive 40 year old Citroens.
- epolanski 9mo agoWon't impress friends/chicks as an F150 or a Land Rover Discovery /s On a more serious note real (which is a minority) owners of bigger trucks need some serious torque for hauling.
- geremiiah 9mo agoEveryone is always hauling. Lol.
- brnt 9mo agoAll non-Americans know Americans sleep 8 hrs a day, work 8 hrs a day, and haul 8 hrs a day.
- Earw0rm 9mo agoI must have missed a memo, because every situation in which I've ever wanted to "impress a chick" has taken place indoors, or at least far from roads. And yet lots of guys seem to spend an extra $30k or more on their vehicle for no additional utility beyond that. Literally who is impressed? Then again, these are probably dudes who get their dating advice from the Tate brothers. /shrug
- wiseowise 9mo agoCloseted gays trying to impress other dudes, idk? It’s like those huge bodybuilders: you’re picturing being surrounded by chicks, while realistically it’s other buff dudes miring your physique.
- Earw0rm 9mo agoWould explain why the Venn of flash-car dudes, and dudes likely to respond with extreme violence to any implication of gayness, can be described as cos^2t + sin^2t = 1. (I'm not talking here about actual car _enthusiasts_, people who restore, customize, tweak or otherwise nerd out on performance or driving skills.. the assholes who buy something performance-ish but can't actually drive it well). IDK though, think it's mostly just lack of critical thinking skill. They see a Mercedes in some music video, assume it's a symbol of wealth and that chicks will dig that, without realising that most women see straight through it.
- bloqs 9mo agothe milquetoast attempts at casting poorly-targeted stones at the beginning of this article really bring it down. Plenty of rural brits share exactly the same mentality, this just stinks of lack of cultural experience. it's a great vehicle, and I applaud the french approach to cars.
- pygy_ 9mo agoBrits are usually pretty good at taking the piss…
- Earw0rm 9mo agoTruly rural Brits - Northumbria, the Devon uplands, Yorkshire Moors, the remoter parts of Scotland & Wales, sure. Thing with England is that, being a small, flat and largely well-connected country, there's lots of places that identify strongly as rural but are, economically and culturally, more like outer-suburbia in a US context. That's where you'll find the Defender and F-150 crowd.
- Fiveplus 9mo agoThe C15 represents a time when a vehicle was a tool. I feel vehicles want to turn into a subscription service these days. I still see these running in rural Spain and France, usually held together with wire and hope, clocking like what 400k+ km? The XUD diesel engines are practically unkillable. They have no ECU to brick, no adblue sensors to fail and put the car into limp mode and thankfully none of those DRM locked headlights. The argument for the countryside need of a modern SUV usually cites reliability and safety, and in 2026, modern complexity is the enemy of reliability. If your C15 breaks down in a field, you can fix it with a wrench. If your Range Rover breaks down in a field because a sensor in the air suspension noticed a voltage variance...you are stranded until a tow truck takes it to a dealer.
- ErroneousBosh 9mo ago> If your Range Rover breaks down in a field because a sensor in the air suspension noticed a voltage variance...you are stranded until a tow truck takes it to a dealer. No, you just reset the ECU and get on with your day.
- Fiveplus 9mo agoWith all due respect, you are confusing a software race condition with a hard fault in a safety critical system. Resetting the ECU only works if the error is a transient glitch in the code logic. If the failure is a physical sensor reading out of range? Furthermore, modern automotive architectures store permanent diagnostic trouble codes in non volatile memory specifically to prevent people from "just resetting it" to bypass emissions or safety checks. You cannot clear those with a battery pull. You would need a proprietary manufacturer tool to force a relearn or adaptation. But more importantly, your argument accepts a terrifying premise. That a 2.5 ton kinetic object moving at highway speeds should have the reliability profile of a consumer router. If I have to treat my vehicle like a frozen windows 98 desktop to get home, the automotive engineering has failed me. Physics doesn't need a reboot.
- technothrasher 9mo ago> If the failure is a physical sensor reading out of range? Then you buy a new sensor and put it in, just like you would any other failed part. > You would need a proprietary manufacturer tool to force a relearn or adaptation. You can do almost anything you need to do with a non-proprietary Autel tool. I mean, I get it, the manufacturers are absolutely doing their best these days to lock up repair and maintenance. But so many folks seem to throw their hands up and over-exaggerate the inability to fix modern cars. I've always worked on my own cars, from a 1960 Triumph TR3 to a 2025 Audi A3, and everything in between. Maybe once every four or five years have I hit something where I needed to take the car to the dealer, and that was true in the 1980s as well as today. Repair information for newer cars can be somewhat difficult to obtain (looking squarely at you, BMW) but with a bit of sailing the high seas, you can get all the shop manuals.
- ErroneousBosh 9mo agoThe Peugeot XUD engine that powers the Citroën C15 (and a whole bunch of other European cars of similar vintage) is what most of the small Ford diesels were based on, right until they got into the "wet belt" nonsense. I have "repaired" one that was used to power a small fishing boat (it came out of a Xantia, and the hydraulic pump was used to operate the shooting gear). The boat sank and the engine compartment was flooded with sea water for about a week. It started up and ran quite happily after draining what was approximately a 50/50 mix of sea water and sludgy engine oil and putting fresh in, then removing the injectors and cranking it to blow the water out of the cylinders. It never quite ran right after that and was hard to start, and five or six years later the boat's owner replaced it with another Xantia engine, this time the turbocharged version.
- eloisant 9mo agoHe's mixing US/UK vs France and 1985 vs 2025. Today, Citroen's equivalent offering is the Berlingo. Starts at 26k, not as much of a tank as the other cars but still way more massive than the C15.
- geremiiah 9mo agoThere's the Citroen Nemo. It's a more compact version and I believe closer in size to the older panel vans. The new Berlingos are wider and taller than they used to be.
- msk-lywenn 9mo agoThe C15 was produced up until 2006.
- lm28469 9mo agoGood luck fitting a full palette in a berlingo though https://images.caradisiac.com/images/0/9/8/4/190984/S0-route-de-nuit-c15-683978.jpg https://images.caradisiac.com/images/0/9/8/4/190984/S0-route...
- khnov 9mo agoThe berlingo, especially up to 2014, are tankier, ther're known with the name B9 (vin starts with that) diesel 1.6 hdi has proven resilience)
- haspok 9mo agoToday's C15 is called... the Dacia... Dokker? Dacia takes "obsolete" Renault technologies and sells them for dirt cheap. Good news everyone, the Dacia Sandero might have been a laugh 20 years ago, but today Dacia are doing really well.
- ekjhgkejhgk 9mo agoNo. He's not comparing US vs France, you read that into it. He's comparing a car from 1985 (which happens to be French) to a car from 2025 (which happens to be made in the US). You're attributing the difference to different countries, but everyone else here sees it's mostly it's from a different era.
- janlucien 9mo ago[dead]
- pards 9mo agoA 1980s Toyota Hilux would give it a run for its money https://youtu.be/Yl1FNX08HFc https://youtu.be/Yl1FNX08HFc
- littlestymaar 9mo agoToyota Hilux are in their own category. They are literally combat proven. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/93/42/42/93424282cbcafce0ad814990944739eb.png https://i.pinimg.com/originals/93/42/42/93424282cbcafce0ad81...
- layer8 9mo agoIt doesn’t look like it would fit three cows.
- trizuz 9mo ago[dead]
- giorgioz 9mo agoIn Italy we had similar memes for the (old) Fiat Panda 4x4
- melenaboija 9mo agoBest car on snow ever. Like next one does not come even close.
- jacquesm 9mo agoIndeed, light and 4x4 is the best combo. I think the Citroen 2CV was pretty impressive as well and they did have that dual engine version (though it was never sold to the public).
- tim333 9mo agoTop gear driving to the magnetic north pole in Hiluxes was impressive. I figure those would compete. They were a bit non standard. (vid https://youtu.be/q0hoPNmY4oU https://youtu.be/q0hoPNmY4oU)
- ryukoposting 9mo agoThere's practically a whole meme genre for the first-gen Renault Twingo.
- riffraff 9mo agothe Amazon's Grand Tour episode which compared the Jeep Wrangler, a Chevrolet Silverado, and Panda 4x4 as jungle cars was highly satisfying.
- tmilard 9mo agoLovely. Of only they could make some in todays's world of new cars....
- mog_dev 9mo agoMy dad got rid of his C15 after driving 1 million kilometers with it (rural France) The engine was fine surprisingly, the body was rusted to the bone though
- jacquesm 9mo agoThat's fairly typical. I had a diesel from that era and it ended up in a boat when it already had 750K on it... it is still going as far as I know.
- delichon 9mo agoCan you fit an 8'x4' sheet of plywood in it? My pickup truck wants to know. But it doesn't have to worry, because my other main use for it is as a large gas powered wheel barrow for carrying yard waste, and the little enclosed C15 can't compete. In fact it looks like the love child my Ford F350 and a Citroen C2. But it can't be because I had the Ford fixed.
- masklinn 9mo ago> Can you fit an 8'x4' sheet of plywood in it? If you keep the rear doors open, the cargo platform is 1644 by 1540 (mm), 8x4 would be 2438 by 1219. Most likely you'd just put sheet goods on the roof (and yes roof racks for panel vans were common, still are). > my other main use for it is as a large gas powered wheel barrow for carrying yard waste, and the little enclosed C15 can't compete. You can certainly put yard waste in a C15, though people usually use a trailer for that (unless there's little enough of it it fits in a large builder / garden bag).
- mrweasel 9mo agoSomeone pointed out that a lot of US builders will drive pickups truck, and that it's kinda doesn't make sense, why don't they drive a van? Depending on the trade and location builders and contractors here will drive something like a VW Transporter, Mercedes Sprinter, Toyota HiAce or a Peugeot Partner. The Sprinter will fit e.g. your plywood, others will have mounts on the side or roof to transport material. They won't act as a large wheelbarrow though, not well at least.
- delichon 9mo agoNone will tow my 30' fifth wheel very far.
- kube-system 9mo agoTradespeople in the US often have both vans and trucks, depending on how they want to use them. Both are very common.
- sgt 9mo ago
- cjs_ac 9mo agoMost people who live in rural Britain today are still getting around in hatchbacks or estates (station wagons, to use the American term). The enormous SUVs are almost entirely driven by people who've used their money to buy into the countryside aesthetic.
- bubbasugga 9mo agoThis thread is so sad. A population in decline.
- talkingtab 9mo agoI'm sold. Where can I buy one!
- Padriac 9mo agoI have the Ford Ranger with the 2 litre biturbo diesel engine in Australia. It is so good it's hard to conceive that a better vehicle could be possible.
- seabrookmx 9mo agoIf that's the one with the wet timing belt, then I can think of one way to make it better!
- nicbou 9mo agoI had a Renault Kangoo and was similarly militant about its supremacy. It was a cheap, reliable thing and people carrier. It could fit five people, or two people, two bicycles and plenty of camping gear. It was cheap and ugly enough to shrug about cosmetic damage, so I never worried about kicking the doors shut or sitting on the roof. It was also tiny and easy to drive and park. It was mechanically simple and reliable. It broke down recently at 18 years of age and I can't justify maintaining a car in Berlin, but I loved that car to bits.
- indiantinker 9mo agoDesigned in the era of Use-maxing vs Status-maxing. I think modern cars are taking a lot of car experience out and putting in the phone experience in. My Maruti Suzuki 800 was such a fun car to drive. Easy to repair. Decently efficient. Repair manual was understandable. The new electrics are great. But they are less of a car and more of a transportation technology.
- finghin 9mo agoIt’s incredibly grating to get into my mom’s car and see a FYP on her dashboard with podcast recs. It makes me feel like I woke up on the moon. It just makes no sense and it’s clearly harder (for her, and in general) to use than an old-school car radio. It doesn’t help (but still besides the point) that they typically give the impression of being a stripped back Moto G4 a couple years out of updates.
- quijoteuniv 9mo agofourgonnette! Thanks to this post now i know where the spanish version of the word comes from! Furgoneta!
- carlosjobim 9mo ago"This Mastodon server is a friendly and respectful discussion space for people working in areas related to EU policy." "The Ford Ranger (2020). One of the most popular pickups in the US. A key selling point is that the cabin is so high you can run over toddlers without even noticing." Lovely people as always. Would you like to live neighbours with this person, or share communal facilities with him?
- barbazoo 9mo ago> Would you like to live neighbours with this person, or share communal facilities with him? Sure why not? Because they made that comment? It’s not that they buy trucks because they are much taller than a short person but they still are. I’d rather not live next to the person with the dangerous truck.
- carlosjobim 9mo agoIf you can read people, you know a person like this is going to be constantly invading your privacy, inventing conflicts and complaining. Probably trying to make you join in his vendetta against some neighbour, and if you decline he will make a vendetta behind your back against you. These kind of people are so easy to spot once you have some experience.
- bilkow 9mo agoAre you saying that the author engaging in online activism and presenting very common criticisms of SUVs in a sarcastic way somehow implies they're bad neighbors?
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- Hamuko 9mo agoI'd rather live next to that guy than a guy with a big-ass truck, since I walk around my neighbourhood quite a lot.
- ghyvcggvv 9mo ago[dead]
- wkoszek 9mo agoIn Poland it was Polonez Caro: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FSO_Polonez https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FSO_Polonez
- quotemstr 9mo agoWhat a hideous hunk of sheet metal
- jcpst 9mo agoFirst off, I agree with the point made, though I think a more reasonable comparison would be something like a subaru. The people I know who have to deal with excessive snow or mud on country roads commonly opt for that. Of course there’s the “men” who compensate for their lack of buldge with 350s, dualies, etc. If you don’t work a farm, those whips are dummm. That was a good perspective though- I grew up hearing Citroen makes garbage. Side note- The vast majority of pollution is from industry. By a lot. That is where the finger needs to be pointing. Pointing the finger at SUV drivers distracts from the real issue and keeps us blaming each other.
- ryukoposting 9mo ago> I think a more reasonable comparison would be something like a subaru Yeah, I get this is tongue-in-cheek but if you're going to try to convince Americans of this idea, you need to use units we understand, and a car we've heard of.
- NoGravitas 9mo agoMaybe that's why Subarus are stereotyped as a lesbian car in the US. Instead of grandstanding, they "get the job done" (as the Chappell Roan song goes).
- otterley 9mo agoUnless you’re in the Pacific Northwest, in which case, they are issued to every new resident (myself included). Traded in my Ford Explorer for a Subaru Outback and could not be happier.
- loeg 9mo agoAWD has regulatory advantage in Washington state (you're allowed to go over the mountain passes without snow chains in most conditions, even though a RWD or FWD vehicle with snow tires would be just fine in the same conditions), and Subarus are all AWD. I think that's part of it. When I bought a new car last year, I made sure to get AWD -- not because I have any specific need for AWD performance, but because of this stupid special treatment in Washington law.
- OptionOfT 9mo agoGenuine question: what about the NOx? I remember in Belgium when the laws pushed for lower CO2, and you got an influx of all these diesel engines, as you couldn't get that low with gasoline engines (that had some power). But a few years later people came to the realization that CO2 is the least bad of the global warming gasses, and those diesel engines emitted a lot of NOx. Every year there was a distance that you'd have to drive before diesel made sense (as you get more miles out of a gallon, and it was cheaper per gallon). That number kept on creeping up due to new diesel taxes, and the fact that diesel is no longer cheaper per unit than gas.
- ExpertAdvisor01 9mo agoDon't forget pm2.5 ! Especially since this doesn't have an DPF(diesel particulate filter).
- AnimalMuppet 9mo agoOff topic: That comma in the title really grates on me. It's supposed to be "dramatic pause" or something, but it can also be read as "pause while I check my notes to remember what the name of this thing actually is". Hat tip to Joel Garreau, from whom I stole this reading of that kind of comma.
- bromuro 9mo agoIt is wrong - it should be a colon “:” instead of a comma.
- ExpertAdvisor01 9mo agoHow casually people here are ignoring NOx and especially PM2.5. It has no DPF (Diesel Particulate Filter). You are emitting more than 200 times the amount of pm2.5 than a modern diesel. source:https://www.nanoparticles.ch/archive/2011_May_PR.pdf https://www.nanoparticles.ch/archive/2011_May_PR.pdf https://aaqr.org/articles/aaqr-20-02-oa-0081 https://aaqr.org/articles/aaqr-20-02-oa-0081 Also this car has only has 60hp.
- throw-qqqqq 9mo ago> Also this car has only has 60hp. And it weighs less than half of the other two (less than a ton), so less power is needed. I agree though, the C15 is slower than the other two, but less than you’d perhaps think. I own a Citroën 2CV. It has some of the same qualities: super robust, incredibly off-roady, simple mechanically, but I take my “regular car” (2017) for road trips > 100km… I’ve done numerous long road trips in the 2CV though, before I got the other car. Some longer than 1000km. I agree with the TFA, that many overestimate their needs, but older cars are also less luxurious - obviously! The post is a hot take, slightly tongue-in-cheek, isn’t it? :)
- seabrookmx 9mo agoIt's also unsafe. He's comparing it to a modern Ranger, not the Ranger of the same year as the C15 (which was much smaller and got better fuel economy), and he completely ignores the fact that the Citroen wasn't sold in North America. He seems to imply there would be no appetite for one here but I disagree. In western Canada I see imported Kei trucks everywhere and these fill a similar niche!
- Fischgericht 9mo agoSafety is relative. Ranger crashes into C15: Ranger wins, C15 passengers dead. Ranger crashes into human: Ranger wins, human dead. C15 crashes into C15: Tossup. C15 crashes into human: C15 wins, but human is less dead. The whole concept of car upsizing all the time is about that: If you crash into another moving object, you want to be the winner. Understood. Buy a tank.
- drnick1 9mo ago[flagged]
- thelastgallon 9mo agoThe French seem to be very thoughtful people who solved multiple pesky problems permanently: 1) Guillotine for the super rich 2) Nuclear to power >70% 3) C15 for people, cows, craftsmen, mini house 4) TGV 5) french fries for the fastest carbohydrate delivery, handily beating rice I wish they bring back the first 3 and do some shorts, market them to the world. Fries are doing fine.
- eeeficus 9mo agoFrench fries is not a french invention AFAIK but belgian!
- jfengel 9mo agoThere is considerable argument over it.
- isodev 9mo agoYup, French fries are Belgian. Also - it's important to cook them twice, otherwise it's just McDonalds and not real French fries.
- yurishimo 9mo agoTbf McDonalds is also double fried, just the first time happens before they are flash frozen and sent to the restaurant.
- isodev 9mo agoOkay, I didn't want to elaborate the entire recipe :)... was just a way of making a small joke by making it sound like the Champagne wine region.
- burnt-resistor 9mo agoSysco does or used to sell a french fry that was indistinguishable from McDonald's when cooked similarly. They had a catalog that visualized lined up individual representative french fries.
- thinkindie 9mo agoThis is basically the equivalent to the FIAT Panda 4x4 in small villages in Italy
- kevin_thibedeau 9mo agoThe Ranger is now a midsize truck. A better comparison is the hybrid Maverick.
- metalman 9mo agoI do get heat for my truck. I call it the truckasourus, it does take up a lot of room, I pulled out the rear seat and installed a three level shelf that fills the whole back of the cab, tools, grocieries, more tools, laundry, more food, and room on the top shelf to sleep if nessesary, then a 8 foot box, that will get replaced with a 9' flat deck, and front, middle and rear racks so I can move 24'steel, 4x8 sheets, welding gas, and whatever else, when I am not moving round bales or fire wood, other large heavy clumsy stuff. funny thing is that I have a car just for more civilised things, that costs me almost as much to sit there, as my truck costs to drive. I flashed the eprom in the truck so it gets significantly better fuel milage, and has forgotten how to go into limp mode, though the messages in the dash are dire. I could build a smaller rig, but it would fail in 1/3 of the tasks required, so it is impossible to come out ahead with running two, or hireing moving services. So the article, while funny, is narrow and snippy. Sometimes I consider a bumper sticker that would say, "Thanks for driving a Prius, I need the fuel!"
- kube-system 9mo ago> The Ford Ranger (2020). One of the most popular pickups in the US. A key selling point is that the cabin is so high you can run over toddlers without even noticing. The craziest thing about this criticism is that it is phrased as hyperbole but the reality is that this is seen as a small truck in the US. The Ford Ranger actually is the best selling pickup truck in Europe for 10 straight years, but doesn’t sell as much in the US. The larger F series trucks sell more than an order of magnitude more in the US.
- tanjtanjtanj 9mo agoThe best part about the F-150 is that it isn't even toddlers at that point. The most common F-150 variant I see in my area's hood goes up to my shoulder and I'm 2 meters tall. You often see the very important people driving these working their way through crowded parking lots and places that are primarily foot traffic with a "Wtach out for ME!" driving style.
- rconti 9mo agoYep, the hoods are higher than my wife's head.
- OptionOfT 9mo agoMy wife: 5'5": https://imgur.com/a/CVFDb0D https://imgur.com/a/CVFDb0D Not to mention the amount of stones they kick up. In AZ if your truck has a suspension lift, you're supposed to have mudflaps. But that law (and many other vehicle laws) is not enforced.
- Rendello 9mo agoBeing from rural Canada, I prefer the truck and snowmobile sizes of the 90s (but not their emissions, it's hard to breath when they drive by). All the options are so big now. Also, you may be married to Medjed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medjed#/media/File:Medjed.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medjed#/media/File:Medjed.svg
- hartator 9mo ago> CAPACITY: C15: 2.6m³ Ranger: 1.8m³ Discovery: 0.8m³ I mean this is excluding beds. C15 doesn't have one.
- wazoox 9mo agoNotice that one of the pictures isn't actually a C15, but a Renault Express, which is equally indestructible though slightly smaller inside.
- WesolyKubeczek 9mo agoThis song is not about C15, but is quite appropriate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzDg-1lEaD8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzDg-1lEaD8
- burnt-resistor 9mo agoSimilar to Nissan / Datsun 620, 720, and D21 trucks in the US. They ran forever, especially for folks who were mechanics and kept a stash of parts.
- kfarr 9mo agoYou know all those dark patterns in software? What if we applied the same concepts to gigantic mechanical devices, taking advantage of human psychological faults, and generate a profit margin on those? Sure seems what seems to have happened with motor vehicles
- jadbox 9mo agoUnrelated to the article: What I find frustrating about mastodon is how I click a link and then cannot favorite a post as there's no unified login between federated servers.
- nico_h 9mo agoI’ve been a passenger in the front and the back of a C15 and they are pure utility vehicule. You get heating in winter and ventilation in summer. The windows are manual, front seat are okay, and I don’t know if they have updated models with aircon before stopping the production.
- Fischgericht 9mo agoI can confirm all of the findings. My first car I got in Germany was a C15. I used it to transport server racks, but also had a mattress in the back and had my first sex on it. On muddy festivals where others cars got stuck, I was able to get out easily. Repairs were dirt cheap. It also had a tow bar, and was able to pull a 1.5 metric ton trailer to get equipment to a computer party. And I still was able to do 160 km/h (100 MPH) with it on the Autobahn. With or without server racks, with or without sex. Best car I ever had. It is really insane that these days cars on average weigh 25-40 times of their load. Human stupidity never ceases to amaze me.
- haspok 9mo agoMy first car was a rusty 20 year old Renault 5, in which I barely fit myself, so no sex in the car for me. (But my grandma had a flat that she did not live in during the summer months... hmm... sweet memories... excuse me, what were we talking about again?)
- JohnLocke4 9mo agoAt first I wanted to write a comment about how cars and sex are apparently very well linked. Upon thinking it over once more, it appears that the real link to sex is privacy, which is of course obvious. Thinking over it once more, we're brought back to the real selling point of cars: total privacy. Public transport is on paper really good, but it is totally devoid of privacy - which means that it is bad in reality. In other more provocative words, public transportation is bad because you can't have sex on the bus
- Fischgericht 9mo agoPublic transport porn is actually a big thing in the Czech Republic, at least according to my bookmark collection.
- jijijijij 9mo ago> what were we talking about again? I think, you were just about to tell us about your first time with your grandma.
- Raed667 9mo agoMy favorite C15 story is with my childhood friend who got it as a hand-me-down first car, we used to put plastic lawn chairs in the back and head to the beach... The gas meter was broken, so my friend had to guesstimate when he needed a refill. At one point it was stolen, but then found a week later on the side of the highway,out of gas..
- vedmakk 9mo agomissed a chance to use "gastimate"
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- kstrauser 9mo agoWhen we lived in a more rural area, and I drove my kids to school each morning (in a normal-sized sedan), I taught them to notice the contents of the SUVs they saw. The common pattern, like 90% of the time in the morning, was a lady driver in a spotless SUV with a kid in the very back row of seats. And the demographics made sense: you’d expect to see more moms dropping off kids, at least in redder parts of the country, and the back row is supposed safest (as long as you only plan on getting into head-on collisions). Still, the common theme of a ridiculous vehicle with exactly 2 occupants sitting in the farthest possible positions from each other came to be funny to us. Those ludicrous pavement princess pieces of junk are status symbols of conspicuous consumption, and that’s it. Now, a pickup with tool racks or lumber in the back, or covered with drywall dust, or bearing a ranch sticker? Fine. Those make perfect sense. Anything short of that is just bragging about how much you love donating to Exxon, like an NRA sticker but dumber.
- rngfnby 9mo agoThe ranger has a tow rating of 7500 lb. The gross vehicle weight (ie the max vehicle weight with the heifers, obviously stuffies) of the C15 is 1500 kg (hence the name) or 3300 lb. Uhaul rents a car tow trailer rated for 5000 lb that weighs 2200 lb [1]. The Ranger, then, can tow the C-15 + the heifers = 5500 lb and have 2000 lb left over to put two real heifers, and do this legally at 70mph. Citroen makes great vehicles though. Amazing off roaders. [1] https://www.uhaul.com/Trailers/Auto-Transport-Rental/AT/ https://www.uhaul.com/Trailers/Auto-Transport-Rental/AT/
- FpUser 9mo ago>"I call bullshit ..." Does anyone give a fuck? People can and do have plenty of reasons not to stick to a single model of car
- blitz_skull 9mo ago[flagged]
- hk__2 9mo agoWhere did you see angriness in this thread?
- haspok 9mo ago[flagged]
- dang 9mo agoPlease don't take HN threads further into flamewar, regardless of how provocative another comment is or you feel it is. It only makes things worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- imbecilidiot 9mo ago[dead]
- mike31fr 9mo ago[deleted]
- dang 9mo agoPlease don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- dang 9mo agoPlease don't take HN threads into nationalistic flamewar. It's the last thing we need here. (Well, tied for last.) https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Edit: your account has unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines quite a bit and repeatedly crossing into personal attack: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46526454 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46526454 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46493104 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46493104 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46422571 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46422571 Can you please stop doing that? It destroys what HN is for so we end up banning such accounts. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
- ozim 9mo agoTypical technically correct content. If you are person that doesn’t give a fuck about keeping up with Jones’s you just buy whatever does the job. I could drive much better car but I don’t have to impress my neighbors. Still with non-impressive car I get pushed around on the road by guys in big and impressive cars. But also I drive on defense anyway so I get them to go far away from me by letting them pass. I am quite fit though not super big or anything and car I drive is attributable to old geezers or ladies. Once guy jumped out of the car to shout at me he took his tone two notches down quickly. So technically you might be right but still there is whole human experience to deal with.
- tavavex 9mo agoI think you've hit the nail on the head, but not in the same way as what I was thinking. It's not about impressiveness - as in, a show of wealth or status. It's all about size. This is a relatively small car, but as far as I can tell, back in the day all of them were considerably smaller, even the ones that were pricey and designed to look cool or expensive. Nowadays, the most obnoxious and dangerous car drivers have united with the most hands-off governments and manufacturers willing to pander to them exclusively to create an arms race of building the biggest megatank that can fit within a lane and only occupy six parking spots at once.
- blauditore 9mo agoIt's a global pandemic of oversized cars. People love SUVs because it makes them feel powerful and successful. Explanations why they need them are generally along the lines of "because we have kids" (but SUVs don't actually have that much space), or "because heavier means safer" (well yes, at the cost of others).
- tonyedgecombe 9mo ago>because we have kids The tragic thing being that they often run over their own children in them.
- haunter 9mo ago>prove that men who buy SUVs and Pick-Ups are, with very few exceptions, compensating for something ;) What does that mean? The thread just repeating this compensating thing but not sure what does it try to say really. Also most women I know drive SUVs or family vans not compact cars. Are they compensating for something?
- beezle 9mo agoI don't know if it is some much 'compensating' as it is a "look at my toy" showing off type of thing which isn't really directed at women. When I drive around metro areas it is pretty clear that the large majority of trucks are "house" trucks - they are never used for truck things. They are washed, waxed with nice shiny black tires. Don't get me wrong - if you got the dough, by all means drive what you want. But most truck owners could get by with something else just as well.
- jijijijij 9mo ago> Also most women I know drive SUVs or family vans not compact cars. Are they compensating for something? Freud: Duh?!
- af78 9mo agoI think he writes 'compensate' (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/compensate https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/compensate, meaning no. 3) as a translation of 'compenser' (https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/compenser https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/compenser). There's a not-so-funny cliché: men with a small you-know-what supposedly tend to choose larger cars to make up for the difference in size.
- mattlondon 9mo agoI know it's a joke, but if you clip a curb or even a slightly chunky branch at 15mph in one of these EVERYONE DIES (...only partially joking) In a crash it'll fold up like the tin can it is, even against a car of a similar vintage and size (no comment on the cows). Up against even a modern supermini and you're literal mince meat, let alone a modern SUV. At least you won't suffer long. So if you are off roading or on a snowy road, hopefully you won't slip into a tree or roll over. Modern cars - even "small" ones -are heavier partly because they are substantially safer. A crash that would have had to have you cut out of the wreckage by the fire brigade (potentially losing a limb or two in the process) is now the sort of thing you can walk away from. Yes even in "small" modern cars (you do not need a SUV for safety). It's night and day really - just go look at the archive on EuroNCAP.. In the crash tests that left 90s and early 2000s cars as unrecognisable mounds of broken and twisted metal (e.g. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9a8PTeFDaYU https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9a8PTeFDaYU which was a car that was probably 10 years more advanced than the c15 in terms of safety...) now barely even break the windscreen of modern super-mini cars (e.g. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NaWVepTJTGw&t=1s&pp=2AEBkAIB https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NaWVepTJTGw&t=1s&pp=2AEBkAIB). Amazing.
- tim333 9mo agoI used to drive through France in the C15 days and you'd see a lot of crashes compared to England, a lot because of the road layouts. Straight in France so people went fast through villages and the like. In England everything's twisty.
- tom_ 9mo agoThe Citroen Saxo was notably terrible. It was remarked upon even at the time, especially due to the target market of its sportier versions: foolish young men. Here's another hatchback from 2000, faring noticeably better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBXNgKwWFs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBXNgKwWFs - not to say for a moment that you wouldn't still want a 2025 car.
- mattlondon 9mo agoThat video is not available for me. But it's not like the saxo was unusually bad - here is another typical car from the same era https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M0P9MistIDg https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M0P9MistIDg - the interior angles (especially the footwell camera) are particularly chilling and terrifying!
- krautburglar 9mo agoThis person is a living caricature. If Ford wanted to sell more F350s, their best advertisers could do no better than this (man's?) mastodon.
- poulpy123 9mo agoTo be fair to the SUV they weren't really a thing in France before 2 decades after the C15. To be fair to the C15 the main buyers of SUV at the beginning were urban and suburban moms that wanted to show they had money and we're feeling better in big and tall cars
- timwalz 9mo ago[flagged]
- Zopieux 9mo agoIt's funny (and depressing) because it's actually true despite the hyperbole.
- buckle8017 9mo agoModern cars have crumple zones. That's the entire difference.
- oceanplexian 9mo agoI love small cars, in fact I owned a Fiat 500 for a number of years and a number of small VWs. With that said, it really grinds my gears (Pun intended) when Europeans want to lecture Americans about large cars. Our roads are bigger, gas is dirt cheap, parking is plentiful and spacious outside dense metros, and the RAM 1500 I own is 100x more useful no mater how you want to try and spin the facts. I can tow a large trailer with my Jeep on it, a large RV, boats, etc. It is highly capable off roading on technical terrain here in Utah. It’s also insanely comfortable and luxurious on road trips and has enough room to lay on the rear bench seat as if it were a bed. I truly use all of the capabilities in a niche that almost no other vehicle besides a standard size truck occupies.
- everdrive 9mo agoThis is pretty tiresome, however the article is mostly correct. If I could get one of these and own it and drive it in the US, I would. I certainly don't want an over-expensive, over-weight, over-featured monstrosity, but that's all anyone sells in the US.
- torginus 9mo agoSorry for going counter to the narrative, but I had a friend who had an early 2000s Citroen which was made around the time when French cars had the worst reputation - and I tell you, by the stories he told, they deserved it. There was no part on this which didn't get replaced during the scant few years he owned it, and it left him stranded like half a dozen times. He contemplated setting it on fire rather than selling it, not wanting the next lucky owner to go through the same stuff he did.
- throw-qqqqq 9mo ago> made around the time when French cars had the worst reputation A reputation well earned IMO… > There was no part on this which didn't get replaced during the scant few years he owned it, and it left him stranded like half a dozen times French cars have a philosophy of more maintenance than German cars. On the other hand, Frenchy spare parts are often cheaper and easier to replace. E.g. a timing belt replacement on PSA HDI takes just a few hours and costs €2-300. On a VAG TDI, the same procedure is almost a full day at a (competent) workshop and costs ~5-10x as much. Horses for courses I think. My daily driver is a 10yo VAG, for the record.
- oxag3n 9mo agoMy family hired https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Izh_2715 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Izh_2715 in eastern Europe to move furniture few times. It was usually referred as "Pirojok", which can be translated as stuffed bun.
- fleroviumna 9mo ago[dead]
- znpy 9mo agoI get the same feelings when i see a suv driven by a single person, and i think of the good old fiat panda…
- insane_dreamer 9mo agoMy parents had 3 kids and a 2CV as our single family car for a while. We managed just fine, something that is supposedly "impossible" these days.
- Lio 9mo agoBrits are no strangers to the Citroen C15 as the article seems to imply. We liked them. It was the basis of a successful line of British built micro-campers from Romahome. https://www.practicalmotorhome.com/advice/used-romahome-on-citroen-c15-van-buyer-1987-1996 https://www.practicalmotorhome.com/advice/used-romahome-on-c... I remember looking at one as a surf-van back in the day.
- theodric 9mo agoI always had BMWs, like I only ever bought reasonably high-end BMWs, but when we bought our place in Ireland, I needed a vehicle on Swiss plates and insurance (for legal reasons) to use there when car rental in Ireland was running crazy money. I had a look on the Swiss classifieds sites for anything "rechtslenker" (right-hand drive) and found two Rolls Royces, a clapped out MG, and about 15 yellow ex-Swiss Post Renault Kangoo 2-seat car-based cargo vans. (I guess they wanted their mailmen to be able to step out onto the curb, hence RHD in a LHD country?) I bought the van. Weird config: right hand drive, but configured for right-hand traffic, meaning I had to replace the headlights and fog light and get it re-aligned to fit in. Automatic transmission, 1.6L petrol engine, no airbag, no wheel lock, no AC, knobs and switches, glass all around like the MPV version, but a cargo floor. It's insanely simple, the parts are practically free from the perspective of a BMW fanatic, and it's actually a hoot to drive. When we moved, I imported it with our stuff, and it's our only car now. Hauls firewood like you wouldn't believe, and tows a large 2.5m x 1.25m x 1.2m single-axle box trailer without complaints, meaning I can (and have done) shift all the sheets of plywood and drywall I need without buying a pickup. We live way out in the countryside, where the roads have grass up the middle and potholes down both sides, but the Kangoo's ground clearance is enough (especially when empty) that it's never been an issue. I hardly miss the BMW. A little French van is all you need.
- p0w3n3d 9mo agoMy government did everything to not allow people use old cars. Great monuments like Citroen C15 are not allowed in the whole city of Krakow.
- amunozo 9mo agoAsking seriously, what is holding us from creating these masterpieces again?
- TacticalCoder 9mo agoJust to be clear: I was a kid at that time and although the Citroen 2CV was a cool looking car the C15 was just as fugly back then as it is today. A fucking fuglier than fugly piece of ugly shit that was, already back then, making the world uglier for everybody. I don't dispute that it was useful and reliable: I remember the milkman and plumbers and electricians having these. Note that some had a 2CV and would just cut off the roof (don't tell me it wasn't a thing: I've got pictures of me as a kid in a 2CV whose roof was cut). Only the french have the "taste" to create such uglyness as the C15. It's hard to understand how a country can both produce the Concorde and the C15. Even the russian and their Lada brand never managed to create something as fugly as the 4L or the C15. Now you'll excuse me but I've got to take a look at what nature produces: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird-of-paradise https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird-of-paradise Because that C15 brings back memories from a traumatizing time where uglyness was ruling the world. P.S: I owned a Citroen VISA: it's hard to tell if it was only the 2nd ugliest Citroen ever after the C15 (indisputably the fugliest of them all) because Citroen produced soooo many turds.
- anotheryou 9mo agowhat's a modern equivalent? (and maybe a 4 seater)
- petters 9mo ago> But what if you're an environmentally conscious mother who needs to drive the 5 minute walk to your kids' school? Surely, a modern car must be less polluting? > CO2 emissions/km: No, you have already compared fuel consumption. This is equivalent.
- fattybob 9mo agoNow I want one….
- coryfklein 9mo ago> I often hear Americans & rich brits justify buying oversized, polluting vehicles by claiming they need them because they live in the "countryside". > I call bullshit, Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to introduce, the Citroen C15 But they aren’t even for sale in the US!
- msephton 9mo agoI saw Renault 4 used in similar ways in France. Hatchback fully up, oyster farmers using it like a van.
- rurban 9mo agoI still prefer the older classic CX or DS. Nothing compared to them. Casteljau also has a word. (Bezier worked for Renault, but Casteljau made the Bernstein ponynomials popular)
- luk4 9mo agoIn that spirit, France is now doing the Bagnole https://kilow.com/en/pages/la-bagnole https://kilow.com/en/pages/la-bagnole
- impostor313131 9mo agoI dream about a newer car like this. I know it’s rough out there with subscription service for seat heating and over engineered overpriced unreasonably large cars being the norm, but maybe there is a niche where pragmatism survived? A Toyota maybe? Anyone know?