All you need to know about Matra.
Born: 1964 Nationality: French
Matra was founded as a sports car company when Mechanique Avion Traction bought out the small racing car firm of Rene Bonnet - it had been supplying the fibreflass body of that company's D'Jet since 1962. The car, powered by an 1100cc Gordini engine, had been raced successfully by Bonnet and a special version took part in Le Mans.
Before the Matra takeover, production of the various D'Jets had been in the low hundreds, but the car had a good reputation. Developing the D'Jet 5, Matra increased sales to four figures. In 1966, the last D'Jet version was introduced, the 6.
Matra launched the 530 at Geneva in 1967. It was the first fully-Matra designed car, powered by a Ford 1699cc V4 and exceptionally light. It provided its own share of the prestige Matra was building in Formula 1, Formula 3 and at Le Mans.
In Formula 1, Jackie Stewart raced Matras for Ken Tyrell in 1968 and 1969, and in that latter season became World Champion. With its V12-powered 670, Matra won the Le Mans endurance race in 1972, 1973 and 1974. The distinctive raucous engine was a 3-litre unit of Matra's own design.
In 1973 Matra entered into an agreement with Chrysler to have access to its dealer network. A new car, the Bagheera sports coupé, was introduced in 1974 and initially powered by an 1100cc Simca engine (Simca was then part of Chrysler). The fibreglass- bodied car had unusual 3-in-a-row seating, and the engine - later a 1442cc Simca unit - was mounted just ahead of the rear axle. The name came from Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Book - Bagheera was the black panther.
The 1442cc Bagheera had top 190 km/h, but a prototype version, the U8, had a double-four configuration and could reach 240 km/h. The deluxe X was produced in 1977. The Bagheera was very successful - selling almost 48,000 up to 1980.
Matra launched the Rancho in 1977 with a very smart SUV look. It could seat up to seven and was powered by the same Simca engine as the Type 1 Bagheera. Some 56,000 units were sold before it was retired in 1983.
After Bagheera production ended, the Murena was introduced in 1981. Also a mid-engined 3-seater, it evolved through three engine options, a 1592cc capable of pushing through 100 km/h in a modest 11.8 seconds, and a brace of more powerful 2150cc power units.
To replace the Rancho, Matra came up with the Espace MPV concept. But the Simca brand with whom the Rancho had been developed was by then part of the PSA Peugeot-Citroën group, who weren't interested. Matra brought the project to Renault, and unintentionally established the first true European MPV. In 1983, having got the Renault agreement, Matra stopped production of its other cars to concentrate on building the Espace. Between 1984 and 2000, some 720,000 were sold. A concept Espace F1 was produced. In 2000, Renault took "in-house" the building of its next generation Espace.
In 1999 Renault accepted an Avantime MPV concept, but production was delayed over safety issues. It went into production in 2001, but Renault had already run out its own version, the Vel Satis. So, demand for the Avantime was so low that production stopped in 2003 after only 5,000 were built.
An M72 "Smart-buster" car shown at Paris in 2000 was planned for production by the end of last year. A 20bhp version of this was to be available to young people, who wouldn't need a full licence to drive it.
At Detroit last year the company presented its P75 urban MPV concept, which also looked set for production. But the original Matra company had by now become a major aeronautical and weapons conglomerate, the Lagardere Group, which finally sold the automotive division to Pininfarina last September. Pininfarina has now set up Matra Automobile Engineering as a protototyping and testing operation.
Best Car: Murena 2.2S
Worst Car: Early versions of the Bagheera; the chassis of which rusted badly
Weirdest Car: Many would say the Avantime. My choice would be the Espace F1 concept in 1994, which could accelerate from 0-200 km/h in just six seconds, with four people on board.