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In automotive design
Automotive design

Automotive design is the profession involved in the development of the appearance, and to some extent the ergonomics, of motor vehicles or more specifically road vehicles....
, a MF, or Mid-engine
Mid-engine design

A mid-engine layout describes the placement of an automobile internal-combustion engine between the rear and front axles. Another term for this is mid-ship....
, Front-wheel drive
Front-wheel drive

Front-wheel drive is a form of Internal combustion engine/transmission layout used in motor vehicles, where the engine drives the front wheels only....
 layout is one in which the front wheels are driven by an engine placed just behind them, in front of the passenger compartment. In contrast to the front-engined FF layout, the center of mass
Center of mass

The center of mass of a system of wiktionary:Particles is a specific point at which, for many purposes, the system's mass behaves as if it were concentrated....
 of the engine is behind the front axle. This layout is typically chosen for its better weight distribution (the heaviest component is near the center of the car, lowering its moment of inertia
Moment of inertia

Moment of inertia, also called mass moment of inertia or the angular mass, is a measure of an object's resistance to changes in its rotation rate....
).

However, the mid-engined layout does use up central space, making the resulting vehicle rather long.






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In automotive design
Automotive design

Automotive design is the profession involved in the development of the appearance, and to some extent the ergonomics, of motor vehicles or more specifically road vehicles....
, a MF, or Mid-engine
Mid-engine design

A mid-engine layout describes the placement of an automobile internal-combustion engine between the rear and front axles. Another term for this is mid-ship....
, Front-wheel drive
Front-wheel drive

Front-wheel drive is a form of Internal combustion engine/transmission layout used in motor vehicles, where the engine drives the front wheels only....
 layout is one in which the front wheels are driven by an engine placed just behind them, in front of the passenger compartment. In contrast to the front-engined FF layout, the center of mass
Center of mass

The center of mass of a system of wiktionary:Particles is a specific point at which, for many purposes, the system's mass behaves as if it were concentrated....
 of the engine is behind the front axle. This layout is typically chosen for its better weight distribution (the heaviest component is near the center of the car, lowering its moment of inertia
Moment of inertia

Moment of inertia, also called mass moment of inertia or the angular mass, is a measure of an object's resistance to changes in its rotation rate....
).

However, the mid-engined layout does use up central space, making the resulting vehicle rather long. This may be why no manufacturer currently offers the MF layout.

Examples of road cars using the MF layout include the Cord 810
Cord Automobile

Cord was the brand name of a United States automobile, manufactured by the Auburn Automobile Company from 1929 through 1932 and again in 1936 and 1937....
, Citroën Traction Avant
Citroën Traction Avant

The Citro?n Traction Avant is an automobile produced by the France manufacturer Citro?n. About 760,000 units were manufactured from 1934 to 1957....
, Citroën DS
Citroën DS

The Citro?n DS is an executive car that was produced by the France manufacturer Citro?n between 1955 and 1975. Citro?n sold nearly 1.5 million D-series during its 20 years of production....
, Renault 4
Renault 4

The Renault 4, also known as the 4L , is a hatchback economy car produced by the France automaker Renault between 1961 and 1994. It was the first front-wheel drive family car produced by Renault....
, Saab Sonett
Saab Sonett

Saab Sonett is the name of a series of automobiles from Saab Automobile. Broadly speaking, the mechanics of Sonett models were shared with the equivalent family cars of the same dates....
 mk1, and the Citroën SM
Citroën SM

The Citro?n SM was a high performance coup? produced by the France manufacturer Citro?n between 1970 and 1975. The SM placed third in the 1971 European Car of the Year contest, trailing its stablemate Citro?n GS, and won the 1972 Motor Trend Car of the Year award in the US in 1972....
. This layout was adopted by Renault from the 1960s until the end of the 1980s.

Traditionally, the term mid-engine has been reserved for cars that place the engine and transaxle
Transaxle

A transaxle, in the automotive field, is a major mechanical component which combines the functionality of the transmission , the differential and associated components of the driven axle into one integrated assembly....
 behind the driver and in front of the rear axles, as in the Lamborghini Countach
Lamborghini Countach

The Lamborghini Countach was a Mid-engine design sports car produced by Italian automaker Lamborghini from 1974 to 1989. Its design both pioneered and popularized the wedge-shaped, sharply angled look popular in many high performance sports cars....
 or Ferrari Testarossa
Ferrari Testarossa

The Ferrari Testarossa is a 12-cylinder Mid-engine design sports car manufactured by Ferrari, which went into production in 1984 as the successor to the Ferrari Berlinetta Boxer....
, but an engine placed in front of the driver's compartment but fully behind the front axle line also qualifies as mid-engine.