A Peugeot 505SX sedan, seen at a fishing port in the great beach town of Nandaihe in Hebei Province in August 2011. The good Peugeot was as dusty as the surroundings but appeared to be in a fine shape, painted in silver with darkened windows, with the original factory wheels, and with a Chinese flag attached to the antenna. Behind the car are fishing boats, fishing equipment, a tractor, and a refrigerated truck.
The owner had added an after-market Peugeot hood ornament, and some punk had written ‘F1’ in the dust. Bad punk! It had 3M reflective tape all around the vehicle. Not sure why. Perhaps the nights can be dark down there in winter. Well, I only came there in summer. It was the beach town closest to Beijing, where I lived. The ride took about 4 hours. But the beach bored my after about… 4 hours. So off I went to check out ports and markets, no matter the weather.
The Peugeot 505 sedan was produced in China between 1990 and 1997 by the Guangzhou-Peugeot joint venture, based in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province. They also made the Peugeot 505 wagon and the Peugeot 504 pickup truck.
Cool fact: in 1991 Guangzhou hosted the inaugural FIFA Women’s World Cup for national women’s football teams. Guangzhou-Peugeot was one of the event’s main sponsors.
The rear-wheel drive Peugeot 505 sedan was powered by a 2.0 liter four-cylinder petrol engine with 105hp, good for a top speed of 167km/h and a 0-100 in a slow but surely comfortable 14 seconds.
The 505 was parked in front of the port’s offices. It had a real Hebei license plate and a fake 8888 plate underneath. The integrated spoiler was standard on the SX model. Great French car in China. Sadly, only a very few are still alive today. Emission regulations has banned these cars from the big cities but some may survive in the endless hinterlands.