 the citroÃ«n ami is an automobile in the supermini class, produced by the french automaker citroÃ«n from 1961 to 1978. the ami was for some years the best-selling car model in france. production totalled 1,840,396 units. john reynolds. citroÃ«n 2cv. isbn 978-1-84425-207-7 the ami and stablemate citroÃ«n dyane were replaced by the citroÃ«n visa and citroÃ«n axel. although not its commercial name, in france the ami was often referred to as the citroÃ«n 3cv trois chevaux, or "three horses", cv originally being the initials for "chevaux-vapeur" (horsepower - lit. 'steam horses'), but used here for "chevaux fiscaux" in short. the "cheval fiscal" was a french fiscal unit based on engine size ; smaller cv usually meant economical cars. the 602 cc engine of the ami was fractionally above the upper limit for the 2 cv taxation class. the 3cv nickname differentiated the car in the market place from the long established citroÃ«n 2cv, but was never applied to the ami 8, only to the ami 6. ==overview== thumb|left|1968 citroÃ«n ami 6 (rouge corsaire) the citroÃ«n ami had its formal french launch on 25 april 1961, four months ahead of the august introduction of the by now widely anticipated renault 4.{{cite journal| authorlink = renÃ© bellu | title =automobilia "les premiÃ¨res photographes exclusives de la future petite renault fut publiÃ©es par l'auto-journal le 
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