The car that gave the motoring world its first taste of front wheel drive – and led to Michelin’s four decades in the vehicle manufacturing business – has turned 80. The Citroën 7A, the first Traction Avant, went on sale in May 1934. This was the beginning of the range’s 23 year production run, which eventually saw 759,123 Traction Avant units manufactured at Citroën’s Javel factory in Paris and in plants in the UK (Slough), Belgium (Forest) and Germany (Cologne).