Citroën SM – Flamboyant French with an Italian Heart

During the 1960s, Citroën embarked on a venture into sportier cars under the fitting name "Project S". The aim was to create a competent and efficient grand tourer, capable of taking on the finest gentleman's express cars from Britain, Italy and Germany. The car was to be low, elegant, and highly aerodynamic - something the French had mastered well. However, Citroën lacked a suitable engine to provide the power required for the project. After extensive searching, negotiations began in 1965 with Italian marque Maserati in 1968, making it a subsidiary of the French automotive giant. 

Maserati's engineering genius, Giulio Alfieri, was tasked with developing a compact 90-degree V6 engine with enough power to propel the streamlined French creation beyond 200 km/h. The engine was built in classic Italian fashion, featuring dual overhead camshafts and three twin-choke Weber carburettors. To fit the engine behind the gearbox in an almost mid-engine configuration, essential functions were integrated in an ingenious yet somewhat less reliable manner.

Hydraulique Fantastique

At Citroën, an inventive young man named Paul Magés was hard at work. Magés was not particularly academic and received mediocre grades at school. At the age of just 17, he sent his CV to several French car manufacturers and soon landed a job at Citroën as a service technician for tools and machinery.

In 1936, he was promoted to technical supervisor for drawings and construction, where he devoted himself to studying various suspension systems and chassis designs. To his surprise, the prevailing automotive literature asserted that comfortable, soft suspension was inherently incompatible with good handling on twisty roads. He was now faced with the challenge of developing a suspensionsystem that could do both, without making too many compromises.

The solution was a variable suspension that remained soft and compliant at low speeds but firmed up at high speeds and during hard cornering. This led to the creation of Citroën's greatest trump card, or piéce de résistance, for the francophiles among us, namely, the hydropneumatic, self-levelling suspension. This innovation not only answered all of Magés questions but also allowed the car's ride height to be adjusted up or down, making loading and unloading easier, simplifying roadside wheel changes, and improving drivability on poor road surfaces. Many believe that Monsieur Magés would never have solved the suspension problem had he received a more traditional academic education. The French writer and playwright Marcel Pagnol once said, "Everyone thought it was impossible, except for the fool who didn't know any better, and solved the problem." Fittingly, Magés had a copy of this quote on his desk.

With its futuristic coupé body, low drag coefficient, 170 horsepower, flat underbody, and teardrop-shaped design, the Citroën SM reached a top speed of 220 km/h, making it the fastest front-wheel-drive car of its time. Its high cruising speed was made all the more usable thanks to its stable road manners. An undeniable advantage when blasting down the French autoroute, en route to the holiday havens of Juan-les-Pins or Cap-Ferrat on the French Riviera.

Vive la France

The Citroën SM was relatively well received and sold respectably despite its high price, both in the USA and across Europe. However, sales declined sharply following the 1973 oil crisis, and the last car rolled off the production line in 1975. It was a car ahead of its time and avant-garde in the truest sense of the word. Offering electric windows, adaptive headlights, and rain-sensitive wipers as standard equipment in 1970 was nothing short of revolutionary. A total of nearly 13,000 SMs were producede, available with either a five-speed manual gearbox or a three-speed automatic. Today, the SM has achieved true icon status, with connoisseurs around the world coming to appreciate just how unique this Franco-Italian creation really is. This is reflected in today's prices, which for the finest examples are approaching one million Swedish kronor. At long last, this misunderstood and somewhat unfairly maligned trailblazer has earned its redemption.