My 504 Daily Driver Project

Doors

Scott,

Don't the later doors (i.e. 1980 onwards) have side intrusion bars? If so, and you don't want to keep yours, I'd be interested in swapping your 1980 doors for my 1974 push button ones (doors are sound apart from some minor dents on one side). I did not see any rust in the doors when I inspected the car the other day. Just an idea as I am about to get a 74 504 and I have been thinking about side protection as I was once slammed on the driver's door in a 1980 Lancia sedan by a runaway P plater in a Honda Odessey. Those doors were solid enough and I was OK. The car wasn't OK.

I am in Canberra which would make this a logistics exercise if you are keen but a long country drive in the GTI wagon could be fun. Might need to swap some hinge bits also?? Anyway, just putting it out there.

Also, will you have to get your car engineered with the ZDJL engine in it?

Thanks,
James
 
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Graham - Yes, I'm prepared to weld in the fixings for the door catches. I will probably leave the later model spring-loaded hinges though, and remove the straps from the early model doors.

James - I've got an excellent, complete set of early model doors (actually they're from 4 different cars and in 4 different colours) that I've scrounged over the past few years in preparation for this project. Two of the doors on the new car are no good though, one is bent badly and another is rusted out a the bottom.

As for the side intrusion bars, ADR 29 which requires the side intrusion bars was introduced in 1977, so I can guarantee that all 1977 model year 504s onwards had them fitted. But I have a feeling that they might have been fitted by Peugeot before this, I'm sure my '75 model had them as well. I could be wrong though.

I would love to find a set of push-button doors with side intrusion bars, in fact the thought had crossed my mind of fitting them to my set before I paint them up. I've never had an experience of the protection afforded by the bars from the point of view of the vehicle occupants, but I was unlucky enough to be impacted by a car that failed to give way while riding my motorbike, I left a perfect leg-shaped imprint in the passenger door of a Nissan Navara 4x4, with the obvious outline of the side intrusion bar corresponding perfectly with the 4 fractures in my leg. So they definately work, just avoid being in my situation!
 
Demannu said:
James - I've got an excellent, complete set of early model doors (actually they're from 4 different cars and in 4 different colours) that I've scrounged over the past few years in preparation for this project. Two of the doors on the new car are no good though, one is bent badly and another is rusted out a the bottom.

As for the side intrusion bars, ADR 29 which requires the side intrusion bars was introduced in 1977, so I can guarantee that all 1977 model year 504s onwards had them fitted. But I have a feeling that they might have been fitted by Peugeot before this, I'm sure my '75 model had them as well. I could be wrong though.

I would love to find a set of push-button doors with side intrusion bars, in fact the thought had crossed my mind of fitting them to my set before I paint them up. I've never had an experience of the protection afforded by the bars from the point of view of the vehicle occupants, but I was unlucky enough to be impacted by a car that failed to give way while riding my motorbike, I left a perfect leg-shaped imprint in the passenger door of a Nissan Navara 4x4, with the obvious outline of the side intrusion bar corresponding perfectly with the 4 fractures in my leg. So they definately work, just avoid being in my situation!
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No worries Scotty,

I have thought about adding side intrusion bars into the earlier doors also - big effort I think.

Cheers,
James
 
I have thought about bars before.
With the doors off, can you drill through both sides of the door with a large hole saw and slide some reasonable pipe in and weld on the outside of the doors ?
When you open the door you could see through the pipe if you know what I mean !
 
Bob - that's good thinking there. The trick would be making sure it doesn't interfere with the window mechanism.

And here's some photos of the latest acquisition, the '80 model. Still rust, but a lot less than the '70 model.

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Demannu said:
Bob - that's good thinking there. The trick would be making sure it doesn't interfere with the window mechanism.

And here's some photos of the latest acquisition, the '80 model. Still rust, but a lot less than the '70 model.

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Side strips are already removed, a good thing, they look hideous.
You will need to fit the early dash though.
Looking at the Iranian Presidents car the other day it looked fantastic compared to the typical late 70s metallic brown 504 with plastic side strips, dual headlights and horror of horrors mesh headlight protectors.
Graham
 
Graham,
Early model dash why? Apart from a missing dash centre clock it all looks origine.
The steering wheel pad is from an earlier model, should have a black lion.
Mesh headlight covers? Good temporary protection for your French trapezoidal lights. Will diffuse the light of course.
 
Wildebeest said:
Graham,
Early model dash why? Apart from a missing dash centre clock it all looks origine.
The steering wheel pad is from an earlier model, should have a black lion.
Mesh headlight covers? Good temporary protection for your French trapezoidal lights. Will diffuse the light of course.
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Early dashes were slimmer and not as shiny, to my mind one of the more important interior styling differences of the early cars.
Then I don't like chrome headlight rims on 404s so feel free to disregard this advice!
Scott, I reckon all you need to do is fit trapezoidal headlights and repaint the car a nice colour with the side trims removed, maybe the dash depending on individual taste and you will have the desired effect.
Graham
 
Interesting that your 11/80 GLD has a "504" badge on the nose while my 12/80 GLD doesn't. Maybe they ran out of badges after they made yours?
 
Wildebeeste - I'm not sure about the steering wheel, I don't think I've ever seen a black lion on a 504. My '83 wagon still had the gold lion.
And the mesh headlight protectors aren't quite my cup of tea!

Graham - Are you sure the dash is slimmer? At a glance the only difference I can see is that the early one has two chromed stripes along it, the late models only have one. But you're right, the early ones are much nicer, and that's what I'll fit.
I do really have quite an aversion to the lift-up door handles, so I will definitely be making the change to the earlier doors. And I completely agree about the horrible side strips!

Stephen - Apparently 1980 was the changeover. Strange, this car has quite an assortment of badges on it. On the back it has the plastic '504' and 'GLD' badge, plus the Daihatsu '2000' badge, plus the metal 'Diesel' badge. A very busy back end. And of course the '504' in front of the bonnet.

This car also has the intermittent wipers, so that's a bonus.
 
That is cheating! Just replace some rotten sheet metal out of your 80 504 to your 69. 69 is a rare model and I'd love to tell some of the car freaks out here that my car is a 69 when they ask things about it! In the 69 504 was so advanced car but in the 80's... not so much anymore...

Don't do the easy route...

Everybody was saying that I should do a body swap to my Dangel. Why in the gods sake? Then it's not an original Dangel anymore. No matter what you guys say. That's not the lucky body shell what they turned to a 4wd in the Dangel factory.

Do the 69! Your cheating otherwise! :p
 
Query

Demannu; plus the Daihatsu '2000' badge said:
At the 404 50th Rally here in NZ we had a talk from the CEO of Campbell motors in the period. He told us of having the 2000 badges manufactured here in NZ, copied from Toyota and they sold many hundreds to Australia as a contra on imported parts. According to him it also crossed a treshhold for "local content" to reduce tax (along with other local stuff).
My query then is, is he wrong?
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kiwia110 said:
At the 404 50th Rally here in NZ we had a talk from the CEO of Campbell motors in the period. He told us of having the 2000 badges manufactured here in NZ, copied from Toyota and they sold many hundreds to Australia as a contra on imported parts. According to him it also crossed a treshhold for "local content" to reduce tax (along with other local stuff).
My query then is, is he wrong?
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Daihatsu and Toyota are the same company.
 
Erska said:
That is cheating! Just replace some rotten sheet metal out of your 80 504 to your 69. 69 is a rare model and I'd love to tell some of the car freaks out here that my car is a 69 when they ask things about it! In the 69 504 was so advanced car but in the 80's... not so much anymore...

Don't do the easy route...

Everybody was saying that I should do a body swap to my Dangel. Why in the gods sake? Then it's not an original Dangel anymore. No matter what you guys say. That's not the lucky body shell what they turned to a 4wd in the Dangel factory.

Do the 69! Your cheating otherwise! :p
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I tend to agree and what's more I reckon it will be more work to convert the late car than simply fixing the early one.
And I've got to add that if anyone wanted an early car they should have simply bought LeTi's car, a great car at a bargain price.
Graham
 
GRAHAM WALLIS said:
I tend to agree and what's more I reckon it will be more work to convert the late car than simply fixing the early one.
And I've got to add that if anyone wanted an early car they should have simply bought LeTi's car, a great car at a bargain price.
Graham
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They DID!
 
Erska said:
Just replace some rotten sheet metal out of your 80 504 to your 69.
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:roflmao: If only it were as easy as that.

You could counter that with the grandfather's axe principal though. Isn't it better that some of the old one gets re-used rather than struggle on as a half finished project that eventually gets chucked because after a couple of years progress hasn't been great because of the level of difficulty/effort required? I've come to the conclusion that life is too short to spend doing major bodywork repairs and paying someone to do it wouldn't be economical for a 504.
 
So I sat down and had a think about what I want to achieve here. The plan all along has been to get a nice early model 504 on the road, and if I convert the '80 model to look like the '70 model, no matter how well it's done, I'll still know.

So I'm going to repair the 1970 model. Problem is, I don't want to cut panel bits from the 1980 because I think it's too good to do that too. A future project down the track perhaps.

So it's a whole lot of metal fabrication ahead of me now!
 
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