Here at ViaRETRO we have, on occasion, gone beyond our theoretical Prime Find budget of £20,000, just so we can occasionally dream about buying the kind of classic cars that most of us will never get the chance to own. Cars such as a Lamborghini Espada or Mercedes 250SL Pagoda for £75k, or a 1938 Alvis 4.3 DHC for £120,000. Another classic that would normally be well outside our spending limit is the lovely Peugeot 504 Cabriolet, but this week we have found one that fits – just – under our ceiling, though there is a catch (of course there is) which we’ll come to.
Peugeot started a fruitful 50-year partnership with Pininfarina to design their mainstream cars with the introduction of the 403 in 1955, a co-operation that involved the Italian design house creating solid family saloons as well as stylish and elegant coupés and convertibles based on those mainstream saloons.
Among my favourite classics are the 404 coupé and cabriolet, which look nothing like their four-door, three-box sibling, ditto that model’s successor, the 504. Again, while the saloon looks pretty cool – and different to most other family cars of the time – the coupé and convertible transcend the base car in every way other than practicality.
The 504 was launched in 1968, succeeding the successful 404, and was immediately well received , winning the European Car of the Year award in 1969, which was the year that Peugeot announced the coupé and cabrio versions of the model at the Geneva Motor Show in March.
While the base saloon is hardly boring, both of these two are exceptionally pleasing to the eye – I have a slight preference for the coupé, but I’d be delighted with either. Both are 2+2’s, though I wouldn’t want to spend too much time in the back.
They were also given a bit more performance to go with the rakish looks – initially given the saloon’s 1796cc 4-cylinder with fuel injection, producing 96bhp, but within a year a bigger, 1,971cc unit was brought in, with the fuel injected version now putting out 103bhp and four years later, an even more powerful 2,664cc V6 was introduced for the two-door 504’s, giving performance more in keeping with their looks via 136bhp, offering a maximum speed of 116mph (186kmh), and the 2-litre versions were dropped. I think if I were looking for a 504 it would be a V6 coupé.
Interestingly, this V6 was developed in conjunction with Renault and Volvo and was also utilised in the 604 as well as the Alpine Renault A310, Volvo 262C and the Delorean. However, the V6 was thirsty and didn’t sell that well, so Peugeot brought the 2-litre coupé and cabriolet back, and these stayed in production until the 504 reached the end of it’s run – in Europe, anyway – in 1983, being replaced by the 505, although the two were built side-by-side for four years.
These contrasting classics shared one thing with each other and the 504 coupé and cabriolet – a V6
In all, the company built 31,162 504 coupés and convertibles, with 8,188 of them being the open-top car, and of those, fewer than a thousand had the V6. Manufacturing in some overseas markets continued for some years, particularly in Kenya and Nigeria, where the 504 saloon continued to be built until 2004 and 2006 respectively, and is still a common sight today.
Let’s get back to the cabriolet, since it is a 504 cabriolet that is our Prime Find this weekend, on sale with a private vendor in Birmingham. Incidentally, I’m well aware of the paradox of writing about a convertible while – at the time of writing – there’s snow on the ground; I just like to be optimistic.
There are three things that make our Prime Find even more special than a 504 Cabriolet already is – the first, is that it is indeed within our self-imposed budget; in fact, the asking price is £20,000 exactly. The reason is simple – while the vendor mentions a long list of mechanical work that he car has undergone, he makes it clear that while the car is usable, the body is in need of restoration – indeed, it’s being sold as a “rolling restoration”.
Mechanically, there would appear to be little to do, and the vendor states that the car drives “absolutely great”. Work done includes a rebuilt engine, and the seller claims that they have spent thousands mechanically, as well as adding new carpets and a new hood a few (unspecified number of) years back.
The few pictures in the advert make it difficult to see just how good – or bad – the bodywork is, not helped by the colour, but considering that restored examples of these graceful Peugeot’s are being offered at prices of between £35,000 to £50,000, so there’s quite a bit of headroom to spend on bringing this car up to an excellent standard, especially as much has already been done mechanically. Personally, I’d invest in a full respray in a different colour – I’m not convinced that black shows the car’s elegant lines off very well, and would probably go for a blue metallic – your mileage may vary, of course.
The second reason our Prime Find is a bit special is that it is right hand drive – I don’t know how many RHD examples were built, but I’ve only seen one before. This ties in with the third and final reason that this car stands out – there are only nine known to still be on the road in the UK, with the same number SORN, so whoever buys it is unlikely to see another at the majority of UK classic car meetings.
You can see the full advert here, and as usual, should you be interested in this beautiful car, we recommend arranging a prior inspection, in this case, not least so you can evaluate the work required on the bodyshell.
Additional brochure photos from www.peugeot504info.com
With our Saturday instalment of Prime Find of the Week, we’re offering our services to the classic car community, by passing on our favourite classic car for sale from the week that passed. This top-tip might help a first-time-buyer to own his first classic, or it could even be the perfect motivation for a multiple-classic-car-owner to expand his garage with something different. We’ll let us be inspired by anything from a cheap project to a stunning concours exotic, and hope that you will do the same.
Just remember – Any Classic is Better than No Classic! We obviously invite our readers to help prospective buyers with your views and maybe even experiences of any given model we feature. Further to that, if you stumble across a classic which you feel we ought to feature as Prime Find of the Week, then please send us a link to primefindoftheweek@viaretro.co.uk