Citroen DS19 Pallas 1965
Discussion
Hi All, a long time lurker here, finally signed up. Have enjoyed the readers car section for ages so thought I'd upload one of my cars.
The story behind this car is basically that when I was growing up (i'm 29 now) my old man and I spent a lot of time together driving in the car. He and my mum split when I was a wean, so every other weekend we'd have at least 4 hours in the car. This is what got me into cars - we used to count up trucks (Eddies, Willi Betz, James Irlam etc) and just generally watch out for cars. He would always tell me, at least once a month, how his Dad had a series of 5 or 6 DS as he was growing up and he loved them so. My grandad whom I never met was a relatively well known folk singer and song writer and part of the communist movement back in the day. So when he tried to buy a Citroen SM Maserati, naturally his wife (my grandmother) pointed out the irony in that and he moved onto Saabs instead.
If you're still with me after that bit of family history....basically the seed was planted a long long time ago as we enjoyed those bi-weekly roadies and I watched out for a DS for a long time. About 7 or 8 years ago I was in the USA touring with my grandmother (who's also a folk singer) and I had a couple too many sherbets one night and did the classic ebay trawl. Except this time I bid and won this very car which was in Bordeaux. It arrived before I got home and to be honest I enjoyed several years trouble free motoring with relatively little maintenance. All good things come to an end though and by 2016 it needed a lot of work. I mean a lot. I've had everything done to this car. Mechanically she was surprisingly sound, but structurally she was not. Total chassis and floor strip down, new floor entirely, new interior upholstery, lots of paint, new sphere and pump system, all in all she was away for a year and a half. If anyone is interested I will post pictures of the repairs as they went.
Turns out she's actually a very rare early "pallas" car - very few came out in this spec, and as a '65 car its relatively unique. The chap taking the photo of the car is a very good car photographer - Practical Classics came by last week - she should be appearing in an article at some stage in the future. I for one am looking forward to the pics!
For me, this is more than a car. My other cars I can look at and think that they are nice assets that I can enjoy but they also serve a financial purpose (end of the day you can't drive a house). But not this one, this one I will never sell - it's an emotional link more than a financial one.
Thanks for enduring that, hope you like the pics.
Alex.
The story behind this car is basically that when I was growing up (i'm 29 now) my old man and I spent a lot of time together driving in the car. He and my mum split when I was a wean, so every other weekend we'd have at least 4 hours in the car. This is what got me into cars - we used to count up trucks (Eddies, Willi Betz, James Irlam etc) and just generally watch out for cars. He would always tell me, at least once a month, how his Dad had a series of 5 or 6 DS as he was growing up and he loved them so. My grandad whom I never met was a relatively well known folk singer and song writer and part of the communist movement back in the day. So when he tried to buy a Citroen SM Maserati, naturally his wife (my grandmother) pointed out the irony in that and he moved onto Saabs instead.
If you're still with me after that bit of family history....basically the seed was planted a long long time ago as we enjoyed those bi-weekly roadies and I watched out for a DS for a long time. About 7 or 8 years ago I was in the USA touring with my grandmother (who's also a folk singer) and I had a couple too many sherbets one night and did the classic ebay trawl. Except this time I bid and won this very car which was in Bordeaux. It arrived before I got home and to be honest I enjoyed several years trouble free motoring with relatively little maintenance. All good things come to an end though and by 2016 it needed a lot of work. I mean a lot. I've had everything done to this car. Mechanically she was surprisingly sound, but structurally she was not. Total chassis and floor strip down, new floor entirely, new interior upholstery, lots of paint, new sphere and pump system, all in all she was away for a year and a half. If anyone is interested I will post pictures of the repairs as they went.
Turns out she's actually a very rare early "pallas" car - very few came out in this spec, and as a '65 car its relatively unique. The chap taking the photo of the car is a very good car photographer - Practical Classics came by last week - she should be appearing in an article at some stage in the future. I for one am looking forward to the pics!
For me, this is more than a car. My other cars I can look at and think that they are nice assets that I can enjoy but they also serve a financial purpose (end of the day you can't drive a house). But not this one, this one I will never sell - it's an emotional link more than a financial one.
Thanks for enduring that, hope you like the pics.
Alex.
CQ8 said:
Beautiful DS. I prefer the early single headlight front on these, it's the one I would go for.
Have you got any pics of the interior?
Hi Guys/. Thanks for your responses so far. This is an early Pallas model hence the double headlight. The guy who did the restoration for me was seriously excited about it when it arrived, it's rare. The ID series from 1955 had the single headlamp through 1967 when they brought out the covered lamps.Have you got any pics of the interior?
In terms of details of what's been done and progress pictures, can you help me with what you want to see? I mean I could detail literally everything that's been done in a series of posts, along with pictures of work going on plus some before pics?
I had the car resprayed about 3 years ago, I wrote to Citroen who gave me the original factory build spec on the car so it's a true colour combination as it left the factory in May 1965.
Nunga said:
That colour is simply stunning. No other words for it.
Did you have much luck when writing to Citroën? There’s some stuff I’d like to ask about my DS (paint code being one such question).
Feel free to post up everything you’ve got about the car!
Will compile some stuff together and get something posted later.Did you have much luck when writing to Citroën? There’s some stuff I’d like to ask about my DS (paint code being one such question).
Feel free to post up everything you’ve got about the car!
Yes, Citroens were amazing. They wrote back direct from France HQ in 3 working days with no charge, with the original build sheet.
So as I previously said I have had this car extensively worked on. It took me about a year to find the right company and only after talking to a few companies did I realise it had to be Paul at Pallas Auto down in Kent. Him and his partner Rad are the most knowledgeable chaps I have ever come across and their work is outstanding. They have a sister workshop in Poland for really in depth work which is where the chassis and floor were fixed. They basically take two out as they bring two back. Maybe they work about 6-8 cars a year. I had to wait nearly a year for a space to become available to book my car in. And then the car was there and in Poland for about 16 months in total.
Here are some pictures of the car in the old garage at the old house before it was taken away to Pallas Auto. These pictures really just show a very rustic, well used interior, as well as the under bonnet stuff which is a lot cleaner now. I am by no means a concourse enthusiast - in fact it does not do it for me at all, I want the car to be as immaculate as it needs to be, but never perfect.
Sorry for the low light conditions. I'll try and gather some more pics of the whole process and try and outline all that was done to the car. If anyone has any questions Id be glad to answer anything you want to know, running costs, general upkeep, project costs, insurance, well anything about the car really. I might start another thread in due course about some of my other cars as most of them have a story.
Thanks
Alex.
Here are some pictures of the car in the old garage at the old house before it was taken away to Pallas Auto. These pictures really just show a very rustic, well used interior, as well as the under bonnet stuff which is a lot cleaner now. I am by no means a concourse enthusiast - in fact it does not do it for me at all, I want the car to be as immaculate as it needs to be, but never perfect.
Sorry for the low light conditions. I'll try and gather some more pics of the whole process and try and outline all that was done to the car. If anyone has any questions Id be glad to answer anything you want to know, running costs, general upkeep, project costs, insurance, well anything about the car really. I might start another thread in due course about some of my other cars as most of them have a story.
Thanks
Alex.
idealstandard said:
Hi Guys/. Thanks for your responses so far. This is an early Pallas model hence the double headlight. The guy who did the restoration for me was seriously excited about it when it arrived, it's rare. The ID series from 1955 had the single headlamp through 1967 when they brought out the covered lamps.
Sorry, I meant I prefer the style of your lights over the later cars covered lights.
Hello all, apologies for the long post, been getting pics and stuff together and trying to collect info on what I had done. I'll do this post which includes everything up to all of the chassis/floor work and other stuff being done.
So it went off to Pallas Auto in January 2018, and then off to Poland in May 2018. It wasn't that it desperately needed all of the below, just that I figured as so much work was going to be done, why not replace parts that are not usually that easy to access seeing as the car would be in pieces for so long. I figured if I was going to have the job done, it might as well be done right.
The breakdown of what was done before it went to Poland as below:
- General maintenance and sundries
- Brake Calipers front, Brake pads
- Brake Accumulator 2 Port
- Accumulator Sphere
- Regulator LHS
- Steering Relay with steering rod x2
- Water Pump replaced
- Centrefugal Regulator, belt
- Clean chassis legs to prime and paint, paint lhs tank and gearbox cross member, paint and detail ancilleries
- Clean points and carb, prime high pressure pump and hydraulics
- [b]Seats and all leather interior removed, dispatched to Hungary for leather retrim
- Stainless parts removed and sent to UK polisher for consignment back to garage upon cars return
Car just before it was sent off to Poland, doesn't look quite as nice as without all that lovely shiny gubbins does it?
And now, the true horror that laid beneath the pretty shell.....
So as you can see it was pretty rotten all over. Hence the visit to Poland.
I'll get some pics together of the repairs as they came along for my next post. Meanwhile if anyone has any qs let me know!
Thanks
Alex.
So it went off to Pallas Auto in January 2018, and then off to Poland in May 2018. It wasn't that it desperately needed all of the below, just that I figured as so much work was going to be done, why not replace parts that are not usually that easy to access seeing as the car would be in pieces for so long. I figured if I was going to have the job done, it might as well be done right.
The breakdown of what was done before it went to Poland as below:
- General maintenance and sundries
- Brake Calipers front, Brake pads
- Brake Accumulator 2 Port
- Accumulator Sphere
- Regulator LHS
- Steering Relay with steering rod x2
- Water Pump replaced
- Centrefugal Regulator, belt
- Clean chassis legs to prime and paint, paint lhs tank and gearbox cross member, paint and detail ancilleries
- Clean points and carb, prime high pressure pump and hydraulics
- [b]Seats and all leather interior removed, dispatched to Hungary for leather retrim
- Stainless parts removed and sent to UK polisher for consignment back to garage upon cars return
Car just before it was sent off to Poland, doesn't look quite as nice as without all that lovely shiny gubbins does it?
And now, the true horror that laid beneath the pretty shell.....
So as you can see it was pretty rotten all over. Hence the visit to Poland.
I'll get some pics together of the repairs as they came along for my next post. Meanwhile if anyone has any qs let me know!
Thanks
Alex.
Edited by idealstandard on Friday 27th September 12:49
Gassing Station | Readers' Cars | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff