The Mercedes 6.9 almost didn’t make it to the US, due to the energy crisis and issues with federalizing it. But the demand was great in the US, especially from former 300SEL 6.3 owners ready for a comparable replacement. They got, finally, two years after the 6.9 first went on the market in Europe. And it was worth the wait. And the money.
Its engine was of course an updated one that made the 6.3 such a legend in its time. Now packing 6.9 liters, its rated net output was a rather modest 250 hp at an equally modest 4,000 rpm. Torque was ample, at 360 lb.ft. at 2500 rpm. It may not sound like much, but this was 1977, and it was enough to scoot the heavy (4400 lbs test weight) big sedan from 0-60 in 8.2 seconds (6.3: 6.9 sec.). And it could hit 138 mph.
The 6.9’s other major unique asset was a hydropneumatic suspension system, a la Citroen, but using nitrogen and oil. It was highly effective, in terms of offering a very svelte ride at lower speeds but the nature of nitrogen meant that it became progressively stiffer with increased demands on the system.
The 6.9’s interior (this one is well used) was of course classic Mercedes of the times, meaning a bit too spartan and austere for the times, and even somewhat more so than its 6.3 predecessor. Power seats? Nein!
They all seemed to be brown or some shade of copper…Quite the car and very imposing visually while not looking particularly different from the other (LWD) variants of the line. I think John Frankenheimer brought the 6.9 to a while new generation of fans though when he placed one prominently in “Ronin” two decades ago now.
The Mercedes star on the trunk lid is literally as big as it could possibly be without overlapping the edges. But the little 6.9 numbers say everything anyone needs to know.
What a engine! What a machine! Back when owning a M-B actually made a statement. Today’s M-B? Total yuk from me.
For sure ! In the 80’s when I was a kid, MB was “the” car. What went wrong since then?
My opinion on a good question… the burgeoning yuppie “I can have it all” trend in the 1980’s made displays of wealth (whether having it or not) a must for all too many people. Borrowing big for a depreciating asset has never made sense, but I recall many folks who should have known better to do just that to get their Bimmer (oops, they always said “Beamer”) or Benz.
This persists even today, to the extent that I know recent college grads using student loan money to buy upscale cars… of course, their folks were yuppies.
When I see an expensive car these days, I don’t think “wealth.” In the ’60’s, however, I did.
Thanks for the comment Jeff. I totally agree with you.
As for “When I see an expensive car these days, I don’t think “wealth.”” it’s my opinion too.
I might be wrong but I think probably a high quality and highly durable MB may not make sense no more, in a market place perspective.
A partnership with Chrysler. MBs were built to an engineers specification .Built to Last 30 years and even a radio was an extra cost option. “Buyers prefer to choose their own radio” .Ok. Chrysler found that most owners only had them for the length of a lease so why make cars to last when they only really have to last 3-4 years?. I couldn’t believe how crap the build quality was on as 210 series E class compared to a 124 series. These and the C class go for beater money if your brave enough… Now Tec is perceived to be luxury than build quality.
Mark, the merger between Daimler and Chrysler happened in 1998. And the W210 came out in 1994, and was of course developed in the several years before that. So blaming it on Chrysler is a bit off base, eh?
The real reason Mercedes drastically cut the quality starting in the early ’90s was because of….Lexus. The LS400 was much cheaper, and eating Mercedes’ lunch. They had no choice but to cut prices on the W124 in its last few years. And substantially cut the costs of its replacement, the W210.
Mercedes realized that the old formula of “build it to a standard and then charge what it costs” was broken, thanks to Lexus.
Thanks Paul. I totally agree with you, as far as it concerns the USA market. But maybe they got something else going on in Europe (for sure not Lexus, but maybe BMW and Audi eating up their market share ?).
But the Lexus was better quality than the MB. Compare an LS400 with any post 140 series S class.
I switched from working at an MB dealer to a Toyota/ Lexus. The 210 series E class was garbage build quality compared to even a Corolla.
I did not fully appreciate the degree that the price on a top line Mercedes was in super car territory in that time. A car for celebrities in the US, old money Europeans and dictators elsewhere.
Being from the Midwest, someone here has to put on their flyover cap and say it: In the same year you could pull together an Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight LS with some handling goodies, a slick top and a 6.6 liter (403 cid) engine and get to 60 in about 10.6 seconds, for right about $40,000 in 2020 dollars. Play the option list carefully, and for the price of the Mercedes, you could have a walked out of an Olds dealer with the Ninety-Eight, a Delta 88 for the dear wife and a cadre of Cutlasses for the kids and had change.
Granted, this is a typical Ninety-Eight with the Regency trim and a vinyl top, but it still has a nice square jaw look that I think holds up well with the handsome Mercedes….
Not sure what “super car” is. However a 1977 Rolls Royce Silver Wraith II was more than $60,000. Today an AMG S class with some options can run over $160,000.
My buddy in high school had a 79 olds 98 coupe. Had a 403 and a turbo 400. And that big machine would fly by 1991 standards
These are very elegant, top class cars, but the US versions were completely ruined by those gawdawful, ridiculous bumpers. The sealed beam headlights don’t do it any favors either.
GM were able to do it several years earlier with the trim elastomeric bumpers on certain Pontiacs, so surely Daimler’s engineering, design, and manufacturing prowess and resources could’ve made U.S.-compliant bumpers much less hideous than these. I have no direct evidence, but I suspect they chose not to for the same reason a lot of German cars came with remarkably poorer-than-they-could-have-been U.S.-spec composite headlamps in the mid ’80s to early-mid ’90s: something along the lines of “The Americans think they want this junk? Fine, we give them this junk!” (see also: Amerikanischer tink cahs neet seit mahkah lights, ja? Fein, ve giff dem gret bik seit mahkah lights!).
+1
A partnership with Chrysler. MBs were built to an engineers specification .Built to Last 30 years and even a radio was an extra cost option. “Buyers prefer to choose their own radio” .Ok. Chrysler found that most owners only had them for the length of a lease so why make cars to last when they only really have to last 3-4 years?. I couldn’t believe how crap the build quality was on as 210 series E class compared to a 124 series. These and the C class go for beater money if your brave enough… Now Tec is perceived to be luxury than build quality. Pool
Sorry…what? I’m having difficulty figuring out your argument here. Partnership with Chrysler…?
With the way these are trimmed below the headlights and taillights it looks like 5mph bumpers underneath smaller bumpers. I find that trim busy looking in general but it’s not as weird looking with the small European bumpers. The round headlights are the worst part, they didn’t even center them in the housings
A friend of mine in high school had one of these—a very used one. It often wouldn’t start or run correctly, and we put more miles on my NAPA discount buying very costly parts for it—I seem to recall the distributor cap listing for most of a hundred bucks—than we did on that car itself. But when it was running, even poorly, it was quite posh.
My over and under for what constitutes a reasonably quick car has never really changed. I base it on published road test numbers for the fastest car of the Depression. That this car takes four seconds longer to hit the ton than something built almost forty years earlier makes me highly suspicious of the sincerity of a statement like, “there is just that feeling that only a Mercedes seems able to covey, but with the dizzying acceleration and speed that only 417 cu in can produce.” 137 miles an hour only seems like a high top speed today because most cars are governed. You can pretty much extrapolate how many cars sold in the past twenty-five years would be faster ungoverned by their trap speed in the quarter mile. 90 miles per hour isn’t laughable, but it is the same trap speed as a four cylinder 2019 Toyota Camry. Mind you the Camry gets there half a second sooner, but I don’t think anyone would be made dizzy in the process.
I am impressed by the accuracy of the speedometer. Was this before the TUV started requiring speedometers to read high enough that they wouldn’t be rendered inaccurate by oversized snow tires and chains, or whatever the motivation was for the 10% high readings of German cars?
In the context of the day, this was a very fast car. A Corvette of this era was not this fast. The power figure isn’t what matters here anyway. The 6.9 made prodigious torque, was strong like bull and made amazing sounds. Even a 6.3 in the much lighter car wasn’t much faster.
The speed wasn’t the only thing. These cars were built like tanks. The nitrogen suspension gave superb road holding. Unlike any solid axle American car, you could rocket across rough pavement with aplomb.
“That this car takes four seconds longer to hit the ton than something built almost forty years earlier”
What car built in 1937 could do 0-60 in less than nine seconds? Please tell me because I’d like to know. The only car that could be even close would be a Duesenberg.
This car was built over forty years ago. At that time, 137 mph was very fast. One cannot compare it to a 2019 Camry, because the Camry is 41 years newer. In 1978, a car that could do 120 mph was exceptional. A Corona of the era might do 90, which is a much better comparison than a 2019 Camry.
“My over and under for what constitutes a reasonably quick car has never really changed”
Really? A Tesla Model S can do 0-60 in 2.28 seconds. My VW Golf will do 0-60 in seven seconds. A 2020 Corvette takes 2.8 seconds. Show me an 80 year old car that can do this.
A Ford F-150 can do 0-60 in 5.5 seconds
My arithmetic was incredibly poor, but 17 seconds to reach 100 is the number often quoted for the Duesenberg Model SJ. That’s my bogey for reasonably quick. There are certainly much faster cars. I don’t think the Hellcat is as powerful as an 1/8th mile Chevelle that a classmate commuted to college in thirty years ago. That being said, a car that reaches a hundred in seventeen seconds gives the impression of acceleration at any speed used on US streets.
A 1978 L82 Corvette completed the standing quarter mile in 15.1 seconds, per a data table for a Bill Mitchell Camaro in the November, 1978 Car and Driver. That’s much, much quicker than 16.1 seconds, pretty much the difference between seventeen seconds to a hundred and twenty-one seconds to the same speed. Keep in mind that the people reviewing cars in the mid to late seventies knew just how fast every solid lifter Detroit muscle car had been, so they would have also known that 16.1 seconds in the quarter mile did not a rocket ship make. It was quick for a car when everyone was struggling to meet emissions standards and improve fuel economy. That’s not the same thing as actually being quick. The forces exerted on your neck muscles by an 8.2 second run to sixty in the 6.9 exerted no more strain on one’s neck than the same acceleration experienced in a Chrysler Pacifica.
That does sound about right for a Duesy SJ, but the degree to which the SJ beat everything else on the road for pure power… is almost beyond comparison. It’s like a 1930s Veyron, not really akin to anything mass-market.
I have a 1982 500SE, European spec as all SWB 500 were; in 1979 when the w126 series debuted MB claimed that the 5.0 replaced the 6.9 and the 3.8 the 4.5… the performance is about the same. In 2020 I wouldn’t call it a fast car, but a “fast enough” car. It feels unruffled at 120 mph in a way that must have seemed otherworldly in the early 1980s. I’d say better than my decade-newer 540i, in the 100+ range.
A Duesenberg SJ is not at all a relevant yardstick. As someone else pointed out, it was the Bugatti Veyron of its time. 36 SJ’s were ever built.
I wasn’t using the SJ as a yardstick in 1934. I said it was the fastest car of the Depression, and it was almost a fifty year old target when I read about their performance and compared it to the fastest cars of the early ’80s. While it is true that I picked it as my yardstick at a time when I had driven on a farm in one car and perhaps 35 miles per hour in my neighborhood in another, it has stood up as a great over/under bar between what constitutes a responsive car that can do everything I ask on the street and one where I need to plan my moves and conserve momentum. Your perspective may vary, but it works just fine for me.
My yardstick hasn’t changed since the late 80s when I first started reading car magazines, but the entire US vehicle fleet has moved way up the list during that time.
0-60 1/4 mile
10.0 17.5 @ 70 Nearly necessary to safely merge
8.0 16.5 @ 80 Much more satisfying
7.0 15.0 @ 90 Even better, feels mighty in traffic
6.0 13.0 @ 100 “very fast”
Even now, I’ve only driven a few cars that would fall in the “very fast” category, though there are LOT more models today than 1988 which would beat that requirement. When I see “family car’ tests with 0-60 between 6 and 7 and 14 second quarters in the 90s, I’m really amazed.
This Merc’s 0-60 and 1/4 mile times would put it in category 2, but its trap speed is in category 3, showing that it’s weight holds it back off the line, but it eventually builds a mighty head of steam. I love Ronin and I’m certainly impressed with this car’s performance the year it debuted, but the S class that came after this one is the one that really like.
I meant the last 1/4 time to be 14, not 13. I don’t believe that I even saw a street car test into the 12s until well into the 90s. Stuff like a 911 Turbo or ZR1 typically ran low 13s at well over 100, and certainly sounded fast enough.
Car & Driver’s 1977 review of the Ferrari 308GTB (Fiberglass body at the time) had these stats:
C/D TEST RESULTS
60 mph: 7.9 sec
100 mph: 21.1 sec
1/4 mile: 16.0 sec @ 89 mph
Top speed (C/D est): 140 mph
(Road and Track tested it too but I couldn’t find their stats.)
The Mercedes pretty much hangs with the Ferrari. 0-100mph are identical, the rest of the figures are within a normal margin of error. The Mercedes was extremely fast *for the day* as Canuck noted. If you’re going to compare to a Camry then you need to use a 1977 Camry (or Corona I suppose) again as Canuck noted. The Ferrari is bog slow compared to today’s cars so the yardstick has obviously moved, back in ’77 it wasn’t slow. If you were driving a 308GTB and a big copper Mercedes stayed on your bumper as you were merging onto the freeway at full throttle you’d wonder what the heck was going on. Of course, the Ferrari was cheaper by $10k in 1977 dollars than the 6.9.
The Ferrari with emissions controls was a dog. I notice you’re not using the numbers for a 1977 911 S, which did the quarter in 15.5 seconds before improving when the SC arrived for 1978. You’re not using an L82 Corvette either, which was faster still. Then there was the Pontiac Trans Am, which completed the quarter in 15.3 seconds. More importantly, the frame of reference for much faster cars was only a few years:
https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15142816/pontiac-firebird-trans-am-sd-455-archived-test-review/
“On the seventh of February, 1973, our test Firebird Trans Am SD-455 swept through the quarter-mile at Orange County International Raceway in Irvine, California in an elapsed time of 13.751 seconds and at a terminal speed of 103.56 mph. That is fast. That, in fact, is outrageously fast even within a five-year-old frame of reference. And it was done in a street legal car—a 1973 street legal car—with a full tank of gas (3854 lb. curb weight), street tires and, wait for it . . . automatic transmission.”
I was comparing same year cars performing to the same emissions regulations from the same publication. 15.7 @ 90.9mph is the quarter mile that C&D got in their test of the MB 6.9 which is a bit better than the R&T article of this post. https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15143513/mercedes-benz-450sel-69-archived-road-test/
The 1977 911S was a 15.5 car but at a slower trap speed per the same C&D source as the Ferrari. https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15142026/1977-porsche-911s-archived-road-test-review/
But that’s fine, I don’t think the world was used to seeing a huge automatic equipped 5-passenger luxury sedan perform less than 2/10’s of a second off as compared to a 911S. I’d imagine that’s within the normal variance of any number of potential factors that wouldn’t necessarily be corrected for.
The L82 Corvette for 1977 doesn’t seem to have been tested by C&D beyond a quick short take without numbers but for 1978 they state that it should be faster than the 1977 and estimate mid 15 second quarters so again the same ballpark but no actual published number. https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15143501/1978-chevrolet-corvette-road-test/
The standard TransAm for 1977 seems to be slower to the tune of 16.9 @ 82mph per the C&D writeup (same source as the others) I could find. The gearing seems to have hurt it and it apparently topped out around 110mph. https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/comparison-test/a15142491/chevrolet-camaro-z-28-vs-pontiac-firebird-trans-am-archived-comparison-test/
I won’t comment on a four year older car that per your link seemed to be able to not have to meet the same emissions rules as other 1973 cars due to being grandfathered in. Those “few years” are arguably the most pivotal in terms of performance as any ever.
Somehow I’d missed the 1977 F-body comparison test, as the Trans Am with 455s and 400s were always seemed to be much quicker than comparable Camaros in the years on either side of 1977. The 1978 Pontiac 400 was close to 15 seconds, and was celebrated for everything other that its over the top appearance. The 1979 400 T/A was still quick too.
Anyway, my main point was that nobody writing for car magazines was sincerely blown away by a 16 second car after the mid ’50s, when such performance was genuinely exciting compared to mass market cars built for a 50 mph world. It may be true that the only way to match the 1973 SD’s numbers would have been a turbocharged exotic in 1977, but that doesn’t erase it as a reference point for anyone testing cars. Many enthusiasts were still driving 1973 model year cars on a daily basis in 1977, especially if they listened to Car and Driver’s advice about what was coming down the pike for 1974.
I don’t know if I forgot the actual displacement or never knew it, but 6834cc is kind of pushing the truth of the “6.9” badge, isn’t it?
Nothing new here- Chevy badged their 402 big block as a 396 in mid sized cars and a 400 in their full-sized models, Ford’s 4,942 cc V-8 wore “5.0” badges starting with the 1978 King Cobra, and BMW model numbers stopped tying into actual displacement in the early eighties.
I’m sure others can provide additional examples where the vehicle badging did not tie into actual engine displacement.
The Dodge 3700GT had the 3,682cc (224.7 cu in) “225” Slant-6.
With the way these are trimmed below the headlights and taillights it looks like 5mph bumpers underneath smaller bumpers. I find that trim busy looking in general but it’s not as weird looking with the small European bumpers. The round headlights are the worst part, they didn’t even center them in the housings
To be fair, they didn’t centre the reflectors behind the lenses on the European headlamps, either, so the rest-of-world version of this car has an oddly crosseyed look to it with the headlamps lit—the same effect can be seen on the Euro-spec ’91-’96 Caprice.
@ Evan:
the strange badging has been caused by German car tax regulations: The owner had to pay as if it had 6900 cc.
Another example: Some 1980s early Audi 5cyl turbo 200 hp engine @ 2109 cc was called “2.2 litre”. And yes, the owner had to pay as if it were …
Regards, Joe
Ah, thank you!
At a guess, this strikes me as deliberately-orchestrated recompense by the automakers for the German Government’s very industry-friendly policies at that time.
For two years I ran one of these in Australia’s Northern Territory when just about all the rural roads (and it’s a very rural place) had no speed limit. What was interesting was that most folk tended to drive about 80mph rather than explore the possibilities and I guess that’s the comfortable cruising speed of most modern cars.
Although impressive by the standards of the 1970s, R&T’s reported top-speed of 138 mph might sound disappointing for a 6.9 litre V8 but it matched the old, un-strangulated, 300SEL 6.3 and the improved aerodynamics of the W116 allowed those sold in Europe to go faster. Models sold in North America and Australia had more restrictive emission controls and were less potent than the toxic versions sold elsewhere; journalist Paul Frère tested one in Germany and said the things would hit 148mph if given enough road.
There were interesting aspects to the 6.9. As R&T noted, one can’t expect low fuel consumption for something of this size but it was little worse than their 4.5 litre V8 of a more recent design and my experience was similar, under similar driving conditions, the 6.9 sometimes used less fuel than a (strangled) 450SLC I ran later and, surprisingly, barely more than a manual (toxic) 350SL (which had to be treated very gently to see 20mpg (in imperial (4.5l) gallons)).
The hydraulic suspension is of benefit only at speed. In normal, urban driving, the 6.9 feels almost clumsy which is probably the wrong word but I struggle to think of another. Although compared with many of the full-sized vehicles it shared the road in the 1970s it was more an intermediate, the W116 is a big car and the nose-heavy 6.9 with steering affected by the hydraulic suspension exacerbated the feeling of bulk. Speed transformed these cars, above 100mph they’re a different experience and seem to shrink although the driver does need to adjust to the behavior. What most testers called the tendency of the suspension “to hunt” manifests most obviously on fast, sweeping curves where the feeling is of a chassis tracking through the corner with the body at a slightly different angle, sort of like the body wanting to oversteer while the chassis doesn’t. This was noted also on the system fitted to some of the later W126s and all hydraulic systems seem to have their quirks; I’ve never driven one but can imagine the amusing movements reported of Citroën DS’s if hustled at speed over humpback bridges.
The only place and time in Australia worth owning this sort of a car! More than somewhat envious (though not of rural NT fuel bills).
Very elegant things, when not gormlessly staring and preceded defiantly by an enormous rubber chin as the US version had to do.
In Oz, these were total exotica, and at $80KAUD, the price of at least two good houses of the time (though housing rose disproportionately since). A govt inflation calculator suggests close to $400K now. Still not inexpensive, that.
I have wondered why they gave a dry-sumped, injected, OHC V8 a redline of just 4,000. Perhaps the fuel economy would be unmanageable if 5,000 or 5,500 was available, but surely the thing would have been then the fastest car of any type had they done so.
The dry sump was like the 300SL’s gullwing doors, an engineering necessity rather than a choice. The M100 V8 (6.3/6.9) was a good fit under the hood of the 600 and the 300SEL 6.3 but the W116 was much lower and with a wet sump, the thing was too high. A bonnet bulge was presumably unthinkable so a dry sump it had to be.
Redline was 5300 but the M100 was intended as a 6.0 litre (the 6.3 displacement came about when the 1959 Rolls-Royce V8 weighed-in at 6.25) powerplant for limousines; a sporty was never considered. The M-100 actually doesn’t breath very well and is unsuited to high revs, it’s all about low and mid-range torque; attempts to turn it into something competitive for the Can-Am were not successful.
You can argue about whether the 300SEL 6.3 was sporty but it was certainly fast and it was years before XJ12s or even three litre BMWs. The story about the 6.3 ending up in a W109 body by virtue of a engineer secretly testing one in a W112 is entertaining but may be a bit of myth-making a la the story about the grand prix cars of the 1930s switching from white to bare aluminum because the weight of the paint put them over the 750kg limit. What I’ve always suspected is the factory, expecting to sell a thousand 600s a year, had poured a lot of iron blocks and, allowing them a year or two to cure, expected to have a thousand-odd ready for machining each year. They never got close to selling that many, 345 an encouraging start in 1965 (the first full year of production) but that was the high water mark. Thus, I’d imagine they had literally thousands of blocks and no prospect of building enough 600s to use them. The 300SEL 6.3 was thought the most obviously salable creation possible; despite the prototype being a 300SE coupé, it was never thought likely to sell in the volume a big-engined sedan would enjoy.
I knew the reason for the wet-sump in the 116 body, but not that the engine was not a good breather.
I too have thought the story of the secret 6.3 might be at least a bit of a tale – though I must sheepishly confess that I’ve never doubted the Silver Arrows paint story till you raised it just now! – and your explanation seems a very good possibility. The 6.3 was also a good use for the compressor and air suspension set up from those under-selling 600’s too.
I’m significantly more inclined to believe the commonly-held origin myth of the 6.3. The Germans, and the folks at Mercedes in particular, were very rigid about the relative class structures of their cars. The 600 absolutely towered over the 300 series, rightfully so. The idea of dropping in its engine would not likely have occurred to them in the abstract. It would have taken a ride in Erich Waxenberger’s “hot rod” 300 by Ulenhaut to joggle that rigid hierarchical structure.
Timing is also important. It was 1966, and in the US muscle cars like the GTO were huge, which of course were mid-sized cars with big-block engines. I doubt Mercedes would have done this in 1963 or so. But folks were beginning to let their hair down a bit by 1966, and the idea of a hot rod Benz was now not so antithetical.
Anyway, the story is pretty well documented. Ulenhaut confirmed it. Why should they make it up? It’s how things often happened. DeLorean didn’t ask permission to drop a 389 into the Tempest. He just did it. That’s how creative engineers work.
I hope the Waxenberger / Ulenhaut story is true, it’s a much better tale than accountants fretting over surplus block castings. Even if not, we should stick to it; as comrade Stalin noted: “The truth is so precious it deserves an escort of lies.”
So what do you base your story of “accountants fretting over surplus block castings” on? You’ve admitted it’s purely your personal speculation. I find it hard to imagine that MB cast way more blocks than they needed. It doesn’t jive with my sense of how they ran their business.
As to the factory expecting to sell “thousands of the 600”, my understanding is that they were built almost by hand in a very special facility. I’d have to do a bit of research, but I’m going to suspect that they didn’t have the capacity to produce the 600 in substantially larger quantities than they did.
Sorry, but I’ll take the substantiated story that also sounds quite plausible over your speculation.
I was hugely impressed by these cars. I’d done a lot of research on them. I knew that parts were very expensive. I considered a 560 SEL also. I ended up with a two year old Cadillac STS (94) this car was quicker and faster, got better mileage, and being much newer served me well for five years. These early STS and ElDorados were fantastic road cars. Maybe they weren’t to the big Benz standards but were really good American alternatives.
Hello,
once upon a time my granddad considered such a car. Lending one for a test ride on steep hilly winter roads in central Germany produced the fact that even a Golf Mk 1 had better traction and would heat up the cabin quicker. So why spend so much money? Just to have a Benz? Benz owners always were good customers of snow chains, VW owners did not need something like that.
For someone living in southern CA, the point of view may be very different!
Joe
Mercedes went to the same place as Rolls Royce to get their suspension set up, Citroen, riding on nitrogen since the 50s, yeah it does give a nice ride and works at speed on bad surfaces the way no steel system can which is what this Benz was designed for, high speed touring was its forte not stop light drags mind you it was faster in that role than a lot of sporty cars then on the market.
Many years ago, when a 6.9 was the most prestigious car one could possibly own, I knew a guy who bought one. This was about 1979/80. Let’s call him Wally; his name was in fact Wally. He was possibly the most obnoxious, entitled, presumptuous person I knew then, or ever. I did not like him but I did have to deal with Wally. And I knew what the 6.9 was, what it meant and what it took to be able to drive one.
At a concert at Madison Square Garden, when rock bands were huge and I was working there, Wally drove his black 6.9 up the five or so level spiral ramp to the backstage area – completely unaccosted by police/security. Now this would have been a difficult thing for the band’s limos to sort out with the building and staff but Wally had somehow the leverage to be able to do this, walk from his car to wherever he went backstage and have someone take the car back down the ramp to park elsewhere. Wally was a heavy hitter and had all the power in the New York concert scene, at that time, that he needed. And the 6.9 was so impressive, just then, that I can not imagine anyone stopping him.
Wally met an unhappy end. I hope someone today has that car and is preserving it.
At that particular time in American culture the 6.9 had so much presence, so much impact that if Wally had tried to do his stunt in a Seville or 928 or XJ6 it simply would not have worked.
These were a great car for their time, without doubt. And very different in execution to the XJ12 Jaguar, perhaps the closest template/competitor.
I remember reading a Mel Nichols story in CAR, from summer 1977, crossing from LA to NY in one of these with David Davis. One of my first great travel and car stories in CAR, and one of the reasons I still subscribe. The story was titled “Road America and the Silver Trashcan”, from a CB moniker they gained. Absolute classic.
Car’s not bad either. James Hunt drove one for many years.
Hunts car ended up on bricks in his front . It sold for just £4k a year after his death in 94. The Topez brown with brown hide seats car sold for a mere 27k at auction 3 years ago. A steal as a one owner car., RHD Euro model.
No tilt wheel, either. When did MB finally break down and offer them?
I sat in a 450 SEL when they were new. The door sills were uncomfortably high (how they were “vault-like”), the rear leg room considerably less than our Buick’s (the magazine pic has the front seats way up). But it felt like quality.