Subj: Mercedes 300 SLs and several related items
Date: 7/30/00 5:28:26 PM Pacific Daylight Time
From: squarerollbars@yahoo.com (a.b. shuman)
To: FastmetalBDF@aol.com
Bruce,
That was quite a bit on info on the gullwing.
Do you know the gene Winfield assisted Von Dutch in doing that flame job on
the 300SL, and they were both drunk while doing it?
Also, as a honorary life member of the Gull Wing Group International
(truly), I can tell you all kinds of things. The coupes were built from '54
thru '57 and the easiest way to tell the year of manufacture (there were no
model years then) is to look at the serial number. The first two numbers --
reversed -- give the year: 45 for 1954, 75 for 1957, etc.
There were 1410 coupes built. The '52 prototype mit carbs (vergassers) won
the Le Mans 24-hr race. THe production models had the first production
passenger car engines with fool injection...the injectors being right into
the cylinders. The frame was made of small-diameter tubing, because that's
all the procurement guys at Mercedes could get, so the gunwhales are wide
and the doors had to lift upwards. I ran the Mille Miglia Storica in '88
and '89 in a '55 Gullwing, on the official MB team, along with Stirling
Moss. The first time he had the #622 300SLR with air brake that he set the
record with at just under 100 mph in '55 (actually it was a brother car to
it, the real one was too beat up to restore) and the second year he went
with a silver Gullwing. I have home videos of both years...unbelievable
experiences.
I also mention that I had the pleasure of knowing and working with the two
MB engineers who designed the car: Rudy Uhlenhaut and Karl Wilfert.
One of the world's leading experts on the gullwing -- and a former
president of the GWG -- is Lynn Yakel, who had that chopped and channeled
'32 five-window coupe, and did the aerodynamics of so many of the
Bonneville streamliners of the mid-late Fifties, like the Shadoff Spl.
Shadoff, I might add, later became an MB dealer.
Best technical explanation of the engine and car is in Karl Ludvigsen's
1970 book "The Mercedes-Benz Racing cars, of which I have an autographed
copy."
So, there.
No fact, just brag.
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