(first posted 8/16/2015) It’s not a secret that Paul N. likes himself a Peugeot wagon. In fact, if this is the first time you hear of such a thing I’d just like to say welcome to CC, I hope that you like it here. He likes them so much he wrote an illustrated history of them. However, when asked about the 405, he didn’t particularly care for it. Well, I actually do like the direction they took (for a while) and this wagon is a prime example of why Peugeot would fail miserably later on.
I think it’s mostly a case of generation gap really. I didn’t grow up with the sturdy and rugged Peugeots that could conquer whatever their drivers set out to conquer. In fact, the first time I ever saw a Peugeot that wasn’t designed and developed in the 1980s was when I visited a nearby church and in front of it stood a very battered 404 sedan. And the numbers haven’t gotten any bigger as they grow older and harder to keep running.
That’s probably the reason that when I think Peugeot I think of a 205 GTI driving through narrow country lanes, or a 405 Mi16 terrorizing the fast lane of the Autoroutes. Or the gorgeous look of the 406 coupe, which is still one of the most beautiful designs ever to wear the Peugeot lion.
Unfortunately, I also think of things like the hideous 3008, the fish-faced 407 and worst of all, the 207 compact that was sold in Latin America that was nothing more than a 206 with a rather unfortunate nose and mouth job done.
I’ve no qualms about the 405’s looks though. Pininfarina was making some very striking designs at the time. I’d say they were on a roll but they weren’t. Round was yesterday’s news. Sharp angles were in and the 405 carried them very well. Yes, the Alfa 164 carried them better, but that hardly makes our featured car uninspired or bad looking. The stylish angular lines also meant that it could be turned into a very practical wagon without having to sacrifice style.
Of course the most controversial aspect of the 405 wagon, at least for the classic Peugeot fans, was the change in approach. Instead of a rear-wheel- drive, reinforced estate with a longer wheelbase and a taller roof, you got a completely normal front-wheel drive 405 with an estate body. And the only reason that I can come up with for that is that the balance between the cost of developing an entirely new platform versus the take rate for wagons wasn’t favorable. Vehicles like the Renault Espace were eating the longroofs’ market share in Europe and in developing countries the Toyota Land Cruiser quickly became the vehicle of choice for people who would’ve previously used a lifted 504. As far as America is concerned, it was never really a volume market for Peugeot anyway but even here it was facing competition from Chrysler’s new minivans. There was still a market for wagons – that one would take a bit longer to collapse into itself – but now it didn’t make sense to spend the development cash on it.
But the simple fact of the matter is that it was still a very nice wagon. Sure, it couldn’t off-road like the ones of old but nobody who was buying it at this stage cared. The fact that it wasn’t stretched meant it was easier to park in the trendy city centers where it’d be more commonly found. To get it there, you had a choice of engines starting with a 70 horsepower 1.4-liter engine. While the sedan could be had with 160 or 220 horsepower engines in the hot Mi16 and T16 versions, estates have had to make due with a lesser 8-valve versions with 125 chevauxs.
The interior itself was very ‘90s, nothing particularly remarkable here. That was Citroen’s job after all.
I shot this example in the outside parking lot of a local university under the watchful eyes of the security guard there. It suddenly dawned on me that despite the broken mirror it was the most well-kept 405 I had seen in a long tine. I think my photography skills have become (marginally) better as well and I didn’t do a disservice shooting it. My phone cam could use an upgrade however.
The 405 continued in production until 1995 and it was the last Peugeot to be sold in the United States when they decided to cease their operations there in 1991. It was replaced by the 406, which didn’t stray too far from the design guidelines left by its predecessor, instead choosing to merely refine their design language. Unfortunately, this would be the last refinement that it would get. In 1998 the 206 brought out a new, more aggressive corporate image. It worked very well at first but as they went on giving it nips and tucks it evolved into something less… good-looking. It’s a good thing that they’ve gone through yet another cycle and now their cars look elegant instead of looking as they though have inflamed mouths. Now if they just made them rugged again, that would be interesting.
Fun fact, the 207 Compact was sold as the 206 Plus in France. It replaced the 206 as the entry level compact Peugeot. And they sold it quite well in France. Certainly one the the ugliest car ever made with the Aztek.
Otherwise, nice article, the 405 is an appreciated car here but I prefer the 406 which has better fit (Especially the restyled one), and is still a gorgeous sedan.
Even funner fact the diesel powertrain is sold in large numbers to BMW and used in their Mini
A well-balanced appraisal, Gerardo. Coming at the tail end of probably the finest continuation of wagons for any marque since the 50s, this one was a bit of a letdown. But as a standalone shape, it was still nicely rendered. I wish they’d kept the blanking plate between the rear lights from the sedan; would have worked better with the ‘hidden’ d-pillars.
Good story, Gerardo. Peugeot, the Master of Wagons (“Breaks”, as the French call them).
Here’s the Peugeot 405 Mi16 Break by Gutmann. That would be a nice all-rounder.
Amazingly poor write up considering the usual quality and depth of research put into articles on this site. The 504 was still in production in Africa well into this century for people who required a rugged station wagon, though the buyers throughout the rest of the world liked the 405 and the motoring press heaped praise on it for its ride comfort and roadholding/handling ability your assertion that PSA spent little time or money on its development is plainly wrong, the interior was designed and released in the mid 80s so looking very 90s might be considered an achievement and Citroen by the way used the same interior layout and platform for its Xantia models and the BX that preceded it,The 405 also saw in the XUD diesel engine range easily the best passenger car diesel engine ever released its actually still in production in China at the joint venture there, though no longer in use in Europe from recently with the new emission legislation.
The 406 was still on sale in 03 and that is the model you have pictured not the 95 model I show below the differences are subtle I’ll grant you but even meagre research would have uncovered the facelifted 306 and 406s of 1999 that also gained the common rail diesels shared with Fords right up to present models.
PSA may have dumped the US market but their presence is quite strong elsewhere even if they use Mitsubishi bodies for their SUV at least they get decent PSA diesels under the bonnet, Mitsubishi even now offer a diesel version the Peugeot one proved so much better to drive than the Mitsu gas engined examples but of course according to you they imploded and went away
Firstly, Bryce, “ease up, turbo!” Secondly, Gerardo was not saying the 405 received little development money, he was just saying Peugeot did not see fit to invest in a more differentiated wagon variant as they had previously. Thirdly, the focus of the article was on the 405 and not the 406.
We value your depth of knowledge and your passion for all things PSA, but there are more polite ways to criticise.
The wagons still came in a seven seat layout the same as the earlier RWD cars how much variation did they need from a five seat sedan.
Well I think he meant there was a lot less of a difference between the 405 sedan and the 405 wagon than, for example, between the 505 sedan and wagon.
Bryce, your comment is highly inappropriate and offensive against one of our writers. In case you haven’t noticed, Gerardo has been busting his ass putting out a high number of quality articles on cars from many eras and all corners of the world on a weekly basis.
Respect the incredible amount of time and effort our writers put into CC for no reward other than their own enjoyment. If you disagree with something in an article or have some factual information to correct then do so considerately and respectfully. There’s no tolerance for hot-heads who attack on writers here.
Consider this a polite word of caution.
I always like Peugeot. They have some great classics.
Of the current models the RCZ is definitely my favourite.
Yeah 1600cc 260 hp wrap it I’ll take it
The previous generation of Peugeots looked ridiculous (the “07-models”), but I’m a big fan of their current models. The 1.6 liter turbo engine from the RCZ is also used in the recently introduced 308 GTi. Good for either 250 or 270 hp.
Unfortunately, it won’t have any successor
Peugeot have developed a very poor reputation for reliability in the UK and have an uphill struggle to revive the marque. Many years ago Lancia found themselves in a similar position (because of rust) and withdrew from the market. Pity as older Pugs had impeccable engineering.
Mainly poor quality interior trim and electrical faults. Main dealer was unable to fix a buddies 406 V6 coupe alarm problem. Quick fix was to disconnect it, for good…
I feel like the 405 would’ve been more successful in the US if they had (could’ve?) priced it to compete directly with the VW Jetta rather than around 50% higher model-for-model.
Still, the wagons would’ve been niche no matter what; wagon buyers tended to be practical minded and the 405 may have been sportier and more refined than a Corolla wagon but the Toyota was, again, over one-third cheaper and arrived in America with its’ maker’s reputation for ruggedness fully present and correct.
I wonder if the timing was just off. The Audi A4 in 1996 did quite well at this size and even the Saab 9-3 sold in better volume in 2003 with a similar sized sedan, both FWD standard and wagon available.
To me 1988-89 was a great time for small sport sedans. Both the 405 and the then new Audi 80/90 were practical and yet really good looking. Torque steer was slowly being mastered and horsepower was creeping up. The Cadillac Cimmaron was also getting better every year, if it was too slow differentiating itself visually. None of these did well in the American marketplace, but maybe they should have.
I’d say a big part of it was a lack of commitment, a problem that affected all the French makers in the US, and unlike the Japanese and the Germans, who were 100% committed. Even after Audi had their near-death experience in the US after the 60 Minutes debacle, they stuck it out. As did Hyundai after their Excel gen1 disaster.
Peugeot never had an strong dealer network, and they didn’t put enough effort into the peripherals that were required for the US, so all sorts of little niggling problems arose with electrics, electronics, etc.. After Peugeot got a bad name due to these perpetual little-big problems in the US, it was a damaged brand, and never recovered. At the hands of cars like the Acuras and other competition, they just wilted away, despite the 405 being an excellent car in principle.
Americans were becoming very risk averse in the 80s, and 90s, as word got out about how utterly reliable the the Japanese brands were. Peugeot saw the writing on the wall. It’s not easy supporting a brand in the US, as a manufacturer has to have a sufficient volume to support the dealer/parts network, and also the very expensive advertising/marketing costs. Peugeot couldn’t afford to stay anymore once sales fell below a key threshold.
Did we even get the 405 wagon in the US market? I’ve certainly never seen one. Though I’ve not seen a 405 sedan on the road here in longer than I can remember, so maybe that has something to do with it. Attractive cars, but as stated, that just wasn’t enough.
The 505, on the other hand, used to be something approaching common, and I still see the odd one occasionally.
Its a BMW grade car why sell it cheap Toyota didnt have a car in that field
The Iranians ended up doing to the 405 what Peugeot wouldn’t, producing a locally-designed lifted RWD variant called the Iran Khodro RD. It uses a 405 body shell over Iran Khodro Paykan (a license built Hillman Hunter!) running gear. The FWD 405 itself remained in production there as well under the name Peugeot Pars.
Thanks for mentioning it, they also build this Peugeot 405 pickup.
I found it here:
http://www.autonocion.com/ojo-al-iran-khodro-arisum-un-peugeot-405-con-carroceria-pick-up-e-interior-modernizado/
The last few years of the Paykan were built with Peugeot engines not Hillman, the engine design Rootes released in 55 was finally euthanised but it had a remarkable production run.
For a brief period I lived in Hastings-On-Hudson, NY during while 504’s still roamed the US. The little dealership on the main street there was a beehive of Peugeots coming and going, not sure if it was service department visits, test drives, etc. I loved the awkward yet competent looks of them, but a new car was not a possibility. The people driving them were above my pay grade at that point.
Later drove a friend’s 505 TD from NY to Colorado, including a drive through the Badlands. Perfectly usable and capable car, not even remarked at many places we visited; the personality, novelty, and quirk I noted in the 504’s was not there. It was like a 98 Camry that had arrived a decade early.
They all disappeared so quickly, ubiquity to rarity in a blink.
I like wagons but this one’s an oddball. Something not quite right about the truncated, tacked on rear. Looks a bit better in red than white, though.
I loved my 504 wagon. It was ultimately destroyed by an inept mechanic. Not an uncommon fate in the USA. We just don’t “get” French cars here. When I owned mine, in 1996, I got an offer on it from an Egyptian. He was scooping up every 504 diesel he could find and shipping them back to Egypt for taxi use. Don’t know how common this was but it could explain some of the rarity factor now.
True; a good mechanic is supposed to read the Shop Manual & not assume all cars are like Shoebox Chevies. Maybe they’re simply too lazy to read. But I don’t think French carmakers “get” the US market either; Japan, a country with a culture & domestic market even more different than France’s, figured us out, despite the US having widely varying climate & usage conditions. It’s a total disconnect; the French take more trouble to understand Africa.
I’ve long been intrigued by French cars, but they may as well be on Mars so far as I can help it.
Here is a really nice 505 I recently spotted in Port Townsend, Washington. They still exist! Note the ugly US spec headlights.
Nice picture ! I think we all agree that a Peugeot 505 was certainly not a small car. Or econobox, as some would say.
But just compare the Peugeot’s super-slim dimensions with the car parked in front of it ! (what is it, anyway ?)
It’s a 2015 Nissan Altima rental car, as indicated by the small white barcode sticker in the quarter window. Yes, it looks like it can eat the Peugeot.
OK, thanks. Never heard of it, now I know. The most successful Nissan here, by far, is the Qashqai crossover. Below the current model.
No Nissan sedan models anymore (the Primera and Maxima were the last ones).
Yes it was an Altima! I think part of the apparent size difference is down to distortion from my cheap phone camera, but yes,modern cars are so much bigger.
It’s Moby Dick…
The beluga whale. 🙂
Optical illusion? Wiki shows the Altima & 505 are in all dimensions within an inch of ea. other. The 505 has a longer wheelbase, but even the curb weights are about the same.
I like the 505 & thought it improved on the 504’s awkward posterior. Ad quote: “Peugeot has little tolerance for poorly-made cars.”
Oops, now I got fooled; the Altima is about a foot longer. But its styling does make it look more bulky as well.
I’ve always liked the midsized and big Peugeot sedans, except the droopy 607 and the even worse looking 407. The 504, 505, 405, 406, 605 and the current 508. The last one is basically the successor of both the (smaller) 407 and the (bigger) 607 sedans.
And I certainly also like the 1975-1986 top model Peugeot 604. The first Peugeot with a 6-cylinder since the mid-thirties. I doesn’t get much love, but I like its simple and square lines.
Re Pug 604, me too! They were imported to the States for a couple yrs. But once again, Germany defeated France, even though I think the French idiom should’ve played well with Americans conditioned to expect a posh ride. As Paul said above, a lack of commitment was the problem.
Quite right. A very comfortable ride (and that included the quality of their seating furniture, 604-interior below) combined with superb handling, et voilà !
I feel like Tantalus here, show some mercy! I recall that Peugeot also sold 2-wheelers like mopeds, so they did have some brand exposure.
OK, they also made sewing machines, if that calms you down…
But as you can see the lady is very pleased with the Peugeot’s handling and comfort.
I also an a big fan of the 604. We in the USA got them early with a dual carb version of the Dorvan V6 and later with a turbo diesel four. The interior looks great. The formality of a Benz with an extra helping of cushiness. They seemed very close in size to the 505. To bad we don’t get the 508.
I have the Car & Driver test of the early V6. They praised the handling, except body roll of course, but what struck me was how small the tires were, like 175sr15s, on a car that weighed 3000 pounds. Michelins of course.
For a D-segment car (midsizer) the Peugeot 508, their current top model, is fairly big. But as I said, it replaced both a smaller and a bigger Peugeot sedan. It’s 7 cm longer than the 604 above, and also 10 cm longer than the current Mercedes C-Class (4792 mm = 188.7 inch).
I wonder if there is a specific reason for the ignition switch to be on the left side of the steering column in the 604. I think the Citroen CX also has the ignition to the left of its steering column. I have always been intrigued by idiosyncrasies like this on older French cars. The newer French cars have gone too mainstream in my opinion.
The 505 was considered mid-size at the time, unless my memory fails me. About the same size as a Volvo 240?
Yes. The 604, 605 and 607 were the “full-size” Peugeot sedans.
When I come to think of it, Peugeot probably suffered from the BMC or British Leyland desease, when Austin and Morris merged in the fifties, people in Longbridge considered themselves still as Austin and people at Oxford considered themselves as Morris.
Enemies at the time and probably enemies forever.
This feeling went on until the very last days of British Leyland
And Peugeot were forced by the French government to take over Citroën, while there had never been two French car makers more different then Peugeot and Citroën, just take a look at their products.
Add all this with a sauce of Chrysler Europe and voila, a recipe for disaster a large automobile company where the tail waggles the dog,
Just a thought, Peugeot were conservative and one of Pininfarina’s most loyal customers, when they started to design cars themselves it all went wrong.
I had a 406 Estate Diesel in the company which was a very, ver nice car, very good at its job, undercooled Pininfarina design, its successor, the 407, well I thought somebody put the body on the car reversed !
The first C5 series, Citroen tried to tempt me into one when I told the young sales person : Big Cits are looooong and looooow not built like this !
Of course today the C5 Diesel estate in Europe is one of the best cars to purchase with a limited budget, a great car which drives great but what an ugly piece of scheisse to look at !
“I had a 406 Estate Diesel in the company which was a very, ver nice car, very good at its job, undercooled Pininfarina design
Not a Pininfarina design; the only 406 variant that can lay that claim is the coupe.
Peugeots are now rare enough here in the States that a sighting within the last week of a 405 Mi16, though not a wagon, should qualify as a CC Effect. I passed it in traffic in my home town. Yesterday I saw a 504 Diesel (automatic, no less) at the Concours D’Lemons in Monterey but since that wasn’t a 405 and it was a car show, I won’t claim CCE status for that sighting.
Nice looking car, but I can’t remember the last time I saw a Pug in the metal here in Ontario. I imagine that our heavily salted roads did most of them in.
Here in blighty, the 405 competed against the VW Passat, which was of course a size up from the Jetta. That might explain the 50% mark up. The Peugeot equivalent of the Jetta (itself a booted Golf) was the really rather good 306.
Come to think of it the VW Quantum (B2 Passat) was similarly priced, the B3 arrived (late) with a substantial price cut that put it in line with the Camry, Accord, Taurus and GM10s which led to a substantial boost in sales at a time when VW sorely needed it.
Firstly, there is simply NO WAY any manufacturer would even contemplate for a minute developing a rear-wheel drive wagon from a front-wheel derived model. From a design standpoint, they are diametrically opposed and a rear wheel drive wagon would double the development costs, require completely different tooling and demand a completely separate assembly line.
Secondly, the 405 Sportwagon was a fantastic wagon that was the equal of any Peugeot wagon that preceeded it. I owned two and I can tell you that it was extremely durable, reliable and long lasting. Its durability, as with most French cars, was found deep down with the key components — the ones required to keep a car on the road. Rarely do these fail in a French car, unlike German cars which inversely show their quality on the surface but in the long term frequently have key component failures that take them off the road.
Finally, this wagon was VERY popular, especially throughout Western Europe and Britain, where thousands were sold every year the model was offered. The 405 was an unqualified home run for Peugeot and for many years the bread and butter of the marque. Remember, Peugeot assembled a total of nearly 3 million 405’s over 6 years of production and a good percentage of this total were wagons. You still seem them with surprising regularity all over Britain and France. Just imagine what their odometers read.
It’s a shame for Peugeot, VW, Opel and Ford that the mass-market, medium-size car segment that 4 series Peugeots used to so successfully exploit has for all practical purposes vanished in a trend that started about 10 years ago and has seen this customer transform itself into a badge-obsessed A4, 3 series and C class customer who now spends a ever larger share of their household budget on cars that basically only provide them with an increasingly watered-down snob appeal instead of a truly superior driving experience. It’s all about the surface today.
What’s surprising about that is how widely spread across Europe it is. I remember reading about it in CAR magazine and, thinking of the UK user-chooser company car culture that surely they won’t fall for it in Germany and France where people buy their own cars. But no, Germany was the epicenter…
Amen…….
Well, VW has the you-know-what in this segment. Highly successful.
Let’s see what the new Renault mid-sizer can do. Not a hatchback anymore, but a sedan. Or a berline, that would be more correct. Laurens van den Acker (Renault Corporate Design) said that Renault not offering a D-segment car in Europe would be undesirable and unthinkable.
The one really struggling in this segment these days is Toyota. The Carina E from the nineties and its successor, the first gen Avensis, were all over the place. Every later generation only showed shrinking sales numbers.
Ah yes the Corona/Carina as Ive mentioned before Toyota became very tired of being criticised by a NZ motoring scribe for their poor roadholding and handling and in the 80s let said motoring writer loose in their parts bin with if you can do better show us,
The motoring writer was none other than ex racing driver Chris Amon so he knew something about setting up cars to drive properly winner of LeMans and other speed events.
He benchmarked the new FWD Peugeot 405 as it was the best handling FWD on the market anywhere and he got close I had a 93 NZ new Corona with the Amon suspension and factory fitted wider wheels 4w discs etc and it was an awesome car on twisty back roads or main highways, I also replaced it with a 98 Peugeot wagon which at any point you had the Toyota at its limit thru a turn you could pull out and overtake,
My current car is a MK1 Citroen C5 which is built on the 405/406 platform but has hydra active suspension instead of steel springs and it drives beautifully on any road surface including the loose gravel back roads I use instead of the motorway going to where I keep my classic, incidentally I pass a 405 wagon which is parked roadside outside a rural tractor workshop it will be there forever unless someone buys it and saves it the galvanised body wont rust.
Mass-market, medium size car segment vanished? That seems a bit far-fetched. While the previous “status symbol” cars like the 3-series and A4 have become far more common, made attainable by leases and generous credit terms, I still wouldn’t say the mass market side of things is suffering, at least in the US. Camry, Accord, Altima, Fusion, and Sonata all sell quite well, with Passat, Optima, Mazda6, 200 and Malibu in the mix as well. If you’re taking a more global view and consider what I just mentioned to be large cars, then replace the models I mentioned with Civic, Corolla, Sentra, Focus, Elantra, Jetta, Forte, Cruze, Dart and 3. They don’t compete on status anymore, but there’s quite a large cohort of people who still want a reliable car, and want to buy new, but won’t accept unfavorable lease terms or don’t care to impoverish themself for a badge.
I actually saw a 505 sedan over the weekend when I visited my brother in Maine.
I had 3 Peugeot 504’s in the ‘90s. My next car probably would have been a 405 if Peugeot hadn’t left the US market. A couple of things I’ve heard (and no longer remember where) about Peugeot:
They really weren’t that crazy about entering the US market in 1958. The French government leaned on them to do it to earn foreign exchange.
If Peugeot had stayed in the US market from MY 1992 on, the plan was for all 405’s including wagons, to be AWD.
Now that’s an interesting point. All AWD–going down the Subaru route before Subie did it themselves. I wonder if that would have turned things around?
I also often found it interesting that they only imported the 4- and 5- series cars (except for the brief run of the 604). As well-regarded as the 205 was, one would think it could have been seen as an upmarket alternative to the subcompact hatchbacks that were available here in the 80’s (Sprint/Metro, Festiva, Justy, Tercel, 3rd-gen Civic, etc.)
Since 1980 Dangel does PSA 4×4 conversions. Most renowned were the Peugeot 504 and 505 models.
Below a smaller Peugeot 306 (introduced in 1993) wagon 4×4 by Dangel.
My main objection to the 405 in N.America today is that there is little reward for all of the efforts needed to keep one on the road (sourcing parts, paying for parts, getting a mechanic willing to touch it when you get stumped, and so on).
Nothing wrong with the car, but it’s pretty darn generic inside and out, FWD, and anyone not a Pug or 80s/90s euro car nut would even think it’s anything but an older Japanese car.
By contrast, nothing looks quite like the 504; iconic and very gallic (in a good way) inside and out. Owning a 504 is worth the pain of owning an orphan brand, like a DS or SM or even a 4CV.
The 505 is somewhere in the middle.
Well, now I know what my Alfa 164s would like it, if it were a wagon… Err, kind of.
Like, you said, Gerardo, the 164 carries the Pininfarina design better than the 405 and 605, did. Not being biased, either. 🙂
I think Alfa made a 164 wagon, correct? Or was this a concept? I think it’s called a GTV shooting brake… Don’t quote me though.
I don’t think there was a wagon on the cards for the 164. I didn’t find anything when I wrote this piece except for a homebake by a guy called Tom Zat.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/automotive-history-the-wagons-of-alfa-romeo/
Alfa Romeo GTV shooting brake…
Though, I thought a shooting brake was a 2 door with a wagon rear end. 😛
That’s the homebake. IIRC a Taurusable rear grafted on.
That’s a homemade car?
Wow, awesome coachmanship. I googled Alfa estate, and THAT pic came up.
Well written article, btw, Don.
Interesting article Gerardo, and I agree with your theory on the influence of the African market diminishing. At least the 405 still had some ground clearance, things would get worse with the enormous front overhangs of cars like the 407.
The long front overhang helps with crashworthiness the crankshaft is on the front axle line and theres nothing of substance in front of it, a mate of mine has a problematic 407 diesel nice car when its running but he drove my car and admitted he bought the wrong badge but used Citroens can be hard to get people dont sell them except to update or they are broken beyond the ability of their wallet.
Great article Gerardo; missed it the first time around. Haven’t seen a 405 wagon in years, but an acquaintance in town has an immaculate red ’89 405 diesel sedan as a daily driver. She had it at our place last month; it completely slipped my mind to photograph it alongside our 308 or 508. When viewing from the front or side the 405 wagon’s rear looks too truncated to me; the 406 wagon was better-balanced, the 407 wagon completely bizarre and the 508 wagon balanced and handsome.
And today, over 6 years later I reguarly visit PTPC carriers (Pure Truck Pure Car) carriers that sail the seven seas and I am still surprised how many old battered Peugeots are destined for the African continent and sitting on the quaiside. Next to the continents favorite the Toyota sedan, van and pick up literally last week I even spotted a couple of tired 404 pick ups, rusted out J5 vans and 605’s and 406’s destined to go South. They still love their Pigot down there.