Elvis Presley's BMW 507 has already been restored and will be shown at the Concourse d'Elegance at Pebble Beach

This year’s Concourse d’Elegance at Pebble Beach will feature a very special guest. Yes, I know that at this annual event what abounds are special and truly spectacular cars, but this particular one is a very special unit that will surely attract all the spotlights. It is a BMW 507 Roadster that already did exactly that more than 60 years ago, when it was driven by Elvis Presley.

It is a car that the American singer bought during his military service in Germany, when he was only 23 years old, and that disappeared from view after a few years in his garage. How did they manage to find it and get it back in shape? Thanks to the journalistic work of Jackie Jouret, who discovered that the car the King had driven had previously taken part in several competitions with the driver Hans Stuck. In addition, it was a display car at the Frankfurt Motor Show in 1957, and the press focused on it for promotions.

The car was bought by a dealership and put up for sale. Thanks to this, he learned that the car’s chassis number was 70079 and the registered license plate was M-JX 800. The records also led him to the moment Elvis bought the car and replaced its plates with US Army ones. This may be the reason why its trail was lost and it was not linked to him at first.

Elvis took it to the United States and changed the white color it had been bought in to a red color. The reason? The car frequently appeared with inscriptions made with lipstick, so he decided that if he painted it red, that problem would not exist. He also replaced the original 150 CV V8 engine with a Chevrolet V8 engine.

And after that, nothing more was known about the car. Until in 2006 a person read the article about the mysterious BMW 507 Roadster and contacted the journalist. He was the owner of the car with chassis number 70079, although he did not know that Elvis had been one of its owners. In fact, the car was in very poor condition, with the red color the singer had painted it.

It was missing its engine, the upholstery was in very poor condition, and elements such as the instrument panel itself were missing. The car passed through the hands of BMW Group Classic, the restoration division that set to work on the car and managed to recover its original form, adding the original engine and all the missing parts. Some had to be made exclusively for the car because, since only 254 units were produced in the 1950s, they were quite rare.

Once the restoration was finished, it will be on display at Pebble Beach, and it will surely be as sought after and desired as when Elvis himself drove it. Will lipstick inscriptions appear on its bodywork again?

Via | Carscoops