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The Renault Avantime is a coupé crossover marketed by the French manufacturer Renault, designed and manufactured by Matra,〔 between 2001 and 2003. As a one-box design without B-pillars, styled by Patrick Le Quément, the Avantime combined the space of a MPV with the style of a 2+2 coupé. The name is a portmanteau of the French word "Avant" (meaning "ahead") and the English word "time" — with the latter using the English /taɪm/ rather than French pronunciation /tiːm/. ==Conception and design== The Avantime was designed and developed in-house by Renault affiliate Matra and was conceived by Philippe Guédon, head of the automotive division at Matra, who "believed that the children of Espace owners remained loyal to the car even after they had grown up and left home. As a result, the renowned MPV was gaining a generation of new drivers."〔(【引用サイトリンク】 publisher = Renault.com )〕 Styled by Patrick Le Quément, the Avantime was intended to combine the space of an MPV with four-place pillarless qualities of a coupé.〔 Regarding the styling, Thierry Metroz, design project manager, said, "We wanted someone walking around the car to be continually astonished."〔(【引用サイトリンク】 publisher = Car and Driver, Ray Hutton, February 2002 )〕 Anthony Grade, Renault´s vice-president of design said "The exterior and interior had to be coherent. Using the Espace as a base, for instance, meant we had the central instrument display, but that´s part of the innovative character of the whole vehicle".〔Paul Horrell, Car, January 2000, pp 80-84.〕 ''Car'' magazine described the interior as architectural and luxurious.〔Paul Horrell, Car, January 2000, page 82.〕 The one-box design eliminated B-pillars and featured an aluminium structure, aluminium panels for the greenhouse and a full sunroof of strengthened heat-reflecting glass.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 publisher = 21stcentury.co.uk )〕 The interior featured four seats each with built-in seatbelts and Bridge of Weir leather.〔 To facilitate access to the rear seats, two long doors featured a double parallel-opening hinge system (marketed as "double-kinematic") that maximized access with minimal outswing of the doors.〔 Front side windows lowered automatically when either of the front seats folded forward to further facilitate entry to the rear two seats.〔 Windows featured power-deployable sunshades,〔 and the H-points of the rear two seats were higher than the forward two seats, giving the Avantime "theater seating."〔 The luggage compartment featured a retaining system using retractable straps,〔 and all Avantimes featured a two-tone look created by the exposed aluminium of the greenhouse. The windows and panoramic sunroof could open automatically via a single, headliner mounted control,〔(【引用サイトリンク】 publisher = Automobile Magazine, April, 2009, Matthew Phenix )〕 to give the Avantime an 'open air' mode. The design borrowed the automotive space frame of the first generation Renault Espace (load bearing galvanized structure with non-load bearing composite panels) utilizing Renault's 24 valve, 207 hp (152 kW) 3.0L V6 engine, which was coupled to a 6-speed manual transmission or 5-speed automatic transmission. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Renault Avantime」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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