Launched at the 1958 London Motorshow, the DB4 offered outstanding performance against its peers, with a 140mph top speed and 0-60 in 9 seconds. The DB4 was also the first production car capable of 0 to 100 to 0 mph in less than 30 seconds, a remarkable feat for a road car at the time.
Chassis DB4/574/R was delivered through the French Aston Martin distributer, Garage Mirabeau, on 10th February 1961. The first owner was Monsieur Liandier, a well-known Bugatti collector. It’s unusual in that for French delivery he specified Right Hand Drive, but with a Kilometre speedometer for Continental touring. Other particulars of non-standard equipment noted on the build sheets were fully chromed road wheels and an oil cooler.
Monsieur Liandier lived in Fontenay-sous-Bois, just outside Paris, and we believe this Series II has lived in France its entire life. There is correspondence on file between the Aston Martin factory in Feltham and Liandier before it was delivered – it seems as though Liandier was concerned that, to date, there had been no road test reports in French!
Liandier kept the DB4 until at least 1983, with copies of both photographs and documents from his ownership.
The history file, with invoices dating back to 1972, shows the previous owner methodically attended to all the key components. Acquired by him in 1998, he sent it to the UK where marque specialist Aston Engineering completed extensive mechanical work. Most importantly, they undertook a full engine rebuild in 2000. Other work by them includes:
- Stripping, rebuilding and refitting the rear axle
- Removal and restoration of the dashboard, instruments and interior
- Fitting a stainless steel exhaust system
- Removal of the front suspension, completely refurbishing before refitting
- Rebuilding the chrome wire wheels
Back in France, in the custodianship of the current owner, the DB4 has been regularly looked after and maintained by RPM in Paris, with a great number of invoices on file to support this. He also decided to have a bare metal respray, completed in May 2014, so the paint is in excellent order, the deep Dubonnet sitting well next to the black leather interior. Chassis DB4/574/R is a very well presented, matching numbers and excellent driving example of one of the great Aston Martin road cars.
