Mercedes-Benz Gullwing
The highest-performing, most technically sophisticated car of its generation, the gullwing would see its flip-up doors widely imitated, even by John DeLorean, with his ill-fated DeLorean sports car.
A head-turner today, the 300SL was a production version of the all-conquering Mercedes 300SL race car of the early 1950s. Its flip-up doors, which resembled a gull's wings when opened, were necessitated by a race-style tubular space frame chassis, which couldn't accommodate conventional doors.
The $6,820 Mercedes-Benz Gullwing was so exotic it featured sodium-filled exhaust valves and the first application of fuel injection to a production car's gasoline engine. Injection only became common on other cars in the 1980s.
Having won all the races it wanted with the 300SL racer, Mercedes never really wanted to make a production version, but Max Hoffman - a fast-talking, big-league foreign car distributor - offered to buy 1,000 production Gullwings, which could run all day at 140 m.p.h. Mercedes, recovering from World War II, needed the money. Some 1,400 Mercedes-Benz Gullwing were made from 1954 to 1957, and asking prices today go up to $600,000 if you can find one for sale.
Mercedes 300CE coupe lives up to its price tag
Auto world at large: The price of the new $53,340 Mercedes-Benz 300CE coupe is between you and your banker and creditors. But if you are one of the world's lucky souls who can swing that figure as easily as you can swing yourself into one of the 300CE's luscious, leather-covered seats, you'll find the car to be simply grand.
That was my impression while testing the 300CE, first new Mercedes mid-size coupe in a decade. Despite the price, the car has flaws. One is sluggishness off the line because a six-cylinder engine with only 180.8 cubic inches working with a four-speed automatic transmission can get a 3,300-pound car moving only so fast. Except during steady highway motoring, the 177-horsepower car responds best when the transmission is kept in third gear instead of in overdrive fourth gear. Keeping it in third holds the smallish but smooth six in a rev band more conducive to acceleration.
Not that the 300CE is slow. Once moving, it resembles a fast freight train. It hits 60 m.p.h. in 8 seconds and keeps on pulling all the way to 137 m.p.h. The car's powerful brakes, with an anti-lock system, haul down the 300CE quickly and surely, but there's above-average nose dive during quick stops. About that price ... even your banker may raise an eyebrow, particularly if he knows the 300CE coupe shares mechanical components with the less costly $44,400 Mercedes 300E sedan, one of the world's top four-doors.
The 300CE is racier than the 300E, and shares little sheet metal with the sedan. The coupe's new metal provides a new roofline, flatter back glass, two-door midsection and lower rear end. Sheet metal forward of the windshield is from the sedan. The coupe is 1.4 inches lower and 3.3 inches shorter than the sedan. The 300CE doesn't resemble anything from Ferrari. But then, Mercedes hasn't sold a coupe in the Ferrari class since dropping in the 1950s its fabulous but horrendously complex 300SL "Gullwing" coupe with flip-up doors.
"The 300CE weighs 115 pounds more than the 300E because of the need for structural reinforcement called for by removal of the 300E's center post," said Mercedes spokesman A.B. Shuman. The extra bracing for the top and the usual near-flawless Mercedes construction give the coupe the feeling of rigidity one gets in the 300E. It's a feeling that the beautifully painted car is hewn from a granite block. The coupe offers sexy looking, supportive seats set in your typical, subtly elegant Mercedes interior. But the Becker radio is way behind the times in sound quality, and the "economy driving" indicator with its wildly swinging needle on the dash looks like it's from the old gas-crunch days of the 1970s. The indicator is silly because 300CE owners, no matter how hard they try, are doomed to spend lots for gasoline because this is a heavy performance car. The 300CE gets an EPA-estimated 17 m.p.g. city, 22 highway.
Steering, ride and handling deserve superlatives, and roadability should keep even hamfisted drivers from harm. A driver's-side air bag and emergency tensioning retractors for front seat belts are on hand if an accident occurs. Noticeable resistance to Mercedes prices is being seen for the first time in the United States. But the 300CE's price doesn't seem high, considering construction, performance and expectedly high resale value. Mercedes competitor BMW now offers the limo-style rear seat spaciousness of its flagship $69,000 750iL 12-cylinder sedan in a new $58,000 735iL sedan. The 735iL has the $54,000 735i's six-cylinder engine but comes with the 750iL's 4.5-inch longer wheelbase. BMW, also well known for motorcycles, continues as a pacesetter. It has just announced the first production motorcycle with an anti-lock brake system (ABS), the BMW K100RS Special. "During years of development, it became clear ABS for motorcycles had to confront different demands than a similar system for cars," BMW spokesman Rob Mitchell said. "Motorcycles have different stability characteristics and behave quite differently when brakes are applied. For instance, a car won't fall over even when front wheels are locked, while a locked front wheel on a motorcycle will amost inevitably cause it to fall over."
From: Chicago Sun-Times
Date: June 13, 1988