Peugeot 301 M4

The Peugeot 301 (M4) is a four-door subcompact saloon that went on sale from November 2012, initially in Turkey and then across a wide range of markets including Western and Eastern Europe. It was built primarily at Peugeot's Vigo plant in Spain, with China production starting separately from November 2013. The entry petrol engine is the naturally aspirated 1.2 VTi (EB2, three-cylinder), with the 1.6 (TU5JP4, shared with the 206/207/307) as the only engine offered with an automatic gearbox. The diesel is the 1.6 HDi (DV6TED4, shared with several other generations in this contour).

The 1.2 VTi has a specific design detail worth checking directly: it uses a wet timing belt, one that runs inside the oil system rather than externally, which behaves very differently from the external belts and chains documented elsewhere in this contour. Ask specifically whether the belt has ever been replaced and what oil-change history the car has, since oil condition matters more for a wet belt than for an external one. The 1.6 petrol and 1.6 HDi diesel follow the checks already documented for those engines elsewhere in this contour.

To judge a specific 301, confirm it matches the specification for the market it was actually sold in, since Vigo-built cars for most destinations and China-built cars have some regional equipment differences. Get a full fault-code read across all control units and keep the printout.