$131 1971 Peugeot 504 :D

[kiwi303]

Well, I didn't feel like posting in the no-reply members projects zone, since this isn't really going to be a project, just a mostly-stock clean up and polish on a old car, just so I have something with a bit of character to drive around when the van is in use by some other family member and the hilux is off the road for one reason or another... such as having been used to carry stinking farm stuff, it is the official farm vehicle after all, and hauling calves and goats does tend to get crap and urine on the upholstery!

 

So with the hilux dirty beyond belief at times, and the van in use hauling my mum and/or sister off to prayer meeting at the chapel, or off shopping, or off to music lessons, I've been thinking it's time I picked up a secondary car to use.

 

An eye has been being kept on Trademe.co.nz for a while now for a dead cheap, easy to repair runabout, I was expecting a honda city, Mistsubishi Sigma, or similar old early 80's hatchbacks or compact sedans to pop up in the price range and structural condition to be useful, But instead, a 1971 peugeot 504 hove up over the electronic auction horizon

 

The auction started as a $1 reserve, clearance sale by a new home-owner who bought a deceased estates house, complete with cars on the property.

 

The 504 has been stored under the house, last WOF was passed 13 years ago, but still has live plates so no expensive, lengthy VIN test examination and expensive new registration process, just a case of awaking the hibernating current plates from their Exemption/On-hold status and getting a WOF check done

 

I'm currently waiting on the local garage guy to pick it up and haul it to his place for a check over and a WOF check, it will probably need a carb re-build and a new starter motor, after that, I'll see

 

It'll give me a classic car to drive while pottering around slowly getting a Z on the road

 

I think that's a long enough ramble for now just got to get the car here so I can poke around at it now

[slownrusty]

My Dad had a 504 Estate one of the last ones to be sold this is back in the '80s. It was extremely unreliable, but a nice car WHEN it was working. In the morning when it had rained overnight or had a high morning dew point the car would never start and I would be out there with the hair dryer drying the points and condensor, and most times it fired right up.

 

I always liked the way they looked and very comfortable, well made cars. Good luck with yours.

Yasin

[kiwi303]

Well the 504 is tucked in the shed now, Delivered by the garage guy this morning. It had locked brakes due to sitting so long unused, so all 4 calipers are off so it can be pushed around, wood offcuts will just have to do to hold it for now

 

I managed to pull the starter motor and a good squirt with de-greaser and a re-oil and a wipe with moly grease has it working again. The motor turns over, barely, but isn't locked up.

 

For it's age it's in good shape I'm looking forward to getting it on the road again

[kiwi303]

done a bit more work on it now, the carb was stuck solid, a 2 foot pry bar on the throttle arm wouldn't move it, so the carb came off and sat in CRC 5.56 for a while, and it's now as smooth as silk.

 

I need to find a solex carb rebuild kit and give the carb a proper rebiuld, plus poking around shows the coil is buggered, so a new coil goes on the list.

[zxtoy]

Cool car. Interesting story. Please keep the updates coming.

[kiwi303]

No updates for a fortnight, I'm on the wrong island and 700 road kMs away so can't work on it until I get home

 

before I left, I had a go at the surface rust spots with a wire brush and some aerosol paint, just to keep them from getting worse.

[kiwi303]

well another update, I found a guy with a wrecked 504 so I got some parts off him, the brakes on mine were locked solid, even a month soaking in a CRC5.56 penetrating oil bath and the piston wouldn't move. So $100 for 4 calipers off a wrecked 1972 504, $10 for the accelerator cable to replace my sticky one and $10 for the new coil, add $20 postage and my $131 car jumps to an almighty $271. I have a pair of point sets as well, $12.50 but they haven't been needed, I grabbed them because they were available, and NOS. Who knows where I could get the right sort later if the points go.

 

I've gotten it idling now, the motor runs, not very happily, but it's been unused for 13 years so that's to be expected.

 

 

 

Now I need the pads to go in the brakes... at Repco semi-metallic street pads are $128 plus courier from head office, same for the rear. Or I could make do with cheap base budget pads for $57 plus courier. so that would be another $256 plus courier as I don't believe in budget brakes, It's more important to have sufficient Whoa in an emergency than to save a few bucks on cheap ****.

 

Rockauto stateside however, for both front AND rear, want $35 or so, dependant on just which of quite a few different pad makers is chosen... A HELL of a lot cheaper... even after shipping to NZ is added, the total of $95 USD after conversion is not far off what repco wants for ONE end of the car using decent pads

 

You guys don't realise how lucky you are when it comes to car parts!

 

 

Anyhow, I've got to pay for and collect some Cleveland V8 bits for the 280ZX before I can buy the pads for the 504, so they will be a post-Xmas purchase... But with new pads, a new muffler (ripped out of a car from the junkyard methinks), the calipers returned to their places on the car with the new pads, and a new set of spark leads, It should be ready to run and set to pass a road-worthiness check

[eec564]

[Lazeum]

Good luck with your build

 

I don't know if I could be of any help but looking at my location, it might get easy for me to get parts to your project...

[kiwi303]

Thanks for the offer Lazeum I think however the same problem as sourcing bits from stateside may crop up, namely Postage costs.

 

 

Did a bit more today, The same evening as posting the rant about how lucky you US guys are on pricing for old stuff, up came an auction on Trademe for a set of rear 504 pads. After a hard look at the front pad sets, one is only half worn, and in good condition... so I got the new rears in the mail today.

 

I was out digging holes this afternoon, my mother and sister came home from prayer meeting and turfed me out to go dig house pile holes for a lady who came to prayer meeting with a stuffed back, and for whom her builder was also off with a sore back. The council building inspector is due tomorrow, so off I was sent to get everything **** and span for the inspector. The holes had to be deep enough and wide/long enough to pass building code standards for the piles to stay there when concreted in.

 

SO while on the way home since I passed a friends place, I stopped by and grabbed his air compressor. I've just spent 2 hours blowing out the brake lines, clutch line and fuel lines. Tomorrow I'm off to town to pick up my brother from the train station after his trip up from Christchurch, so I'll drop the compressor off on the way past his house and in town grab a couple of bottles of brake and clutch fluid, a new bottle of oil and a couple of filters for the engine.

 

 

 

It's getting closer to being completed the Whoa part will soon be finished the Go refurbishment is still underway.

[260DET]

Good tough car those, made before the euros went soft later on Fairly sure the front ventilated brake rotors off them fit a 260Z using Hilux calipers with just a little machining. Or was it a later model, not sure.

[kiwi303]

Ventilated fronts? Not on this one, maybe on the later models, but the 1971 models didn't have ventilated. I'm pretty sure of that since mine is the top specced model and it has solids, which would mean the lower specced ones wouldn't either.

 

 

 

I've got the rear pads in the calipers and the rear calipers on and set, having a cuppa and dinner before heading out with the work light after dark and installing the fronts. I only have the one set of axle stands, so I'm going to have to be taking wheels off and putting wheels on to access the brakes to bleed all 4 since the lines were blown dry of old fluid. If I had 4 axle stands I could have pulled all 4 wheels off and had everything nice and exposed Don't need 4 axle stands often, but a second set is on the shopping list now! just in case

 

While in town today I got 1.5 litres of DOT 4 brake fluid for the brake and clutch, 5 litres of 20W-50 muiltigrade SJ, high zinc/high detergent mineral oil and 2 oil filters. I'm going to pull the sump off after draining the old oil and physically scrub the old settled crud that presumably settled out and caked on the bottom of the sump pan over the last 13 years. then run the new oil for a while with one of the filters before changing that for the second filter. I expect there to be quite a bit of old crud in the engine after 13 years, oil film tends to turn to a varnish like coat when left to sit for a LONG period. Not a problem in over-winter storage, but certainly somethign to look out for after multi-year periods of abandonment.