Legendary oldies to be displayed at 2024 George old car show

The biggest gathering of original Mercedes-Benz 300SL sports cars will take place at the 2024 George Old Car Show on the weekend of February 10 to 11.

Eight of the nine original series 300SLs residing in SA will be on display. These are the cars that earned the 300SL the title of “Sports Car of the Century” in 1999.

“We are thrilled to have committed entries of these magnificent cars”, said Waldo Scribante, chairperson of the organising club.

“Seven of the 300SLs are Roadster versions, and for the first time an original Gullwing 300SL Coupé will be joining the Roadsters at our event. The Gullwing is presently the only one of these original SL series coupés in SA,” he said.

“What I find intriguing is that the SL 300s entered for next month’s show hail from many parts of the country. The cars are arriving from as far afield as Johannesburg, Klerksdorp, Cape Town, and Paarl, — while one of them is a local machine owned and garaged here in George.”

“And even more significant is that our SL display marks, almost to the day, the 70th anniversary of the Mercedes-Benz 300SL,” Scribante said.

Juan Manual Fangio scored two of his Formula One world championships in the Mercedes W196 Grand Prix machine in 1954 and 1955 and the car famously won the 1955 Mille Miglia driven by Stirling Moss.

A 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Coupé racing car — one of only two ever built — was sold for a world record sum of $142m (R2.6bn) recently.

The road-going Mercedes-Benz 300SL was launched in coupé form at the New York Auto Show in February 1954. It was derived from the first 300SL which was built by Mercedes’ competitions department for the 1952 Carrera Panamericana, a tortuous 3,500km road race run over dirt roads in Mexico.

The heavy tubular chassis bracing along the flanks of the competition-spec 300SL resulted in very high door sills, which made cockpit access difficult for the average person. So, Mercedes came up with the novel solution of extending the door openings into the roof area, and hinging the doors so they flipped upwards, instead of outwards. This access system was carried over into the production 300SL coupés built between 1954 and 1957.

This resulted in the famous nickname of the car, the “Gullwing” as the doors resembled seagull wings when they were both opened. But there was a lot more to the 300SL that was trailblazing from an engineering perspective.

The 3.0l straight-six overhead camshaft engine was the first production engine in the world to feature direct petrol injection. The engine was rated at 179kW and canted over to one side to achieve the famous low SL bonnet line. Also helping achieve that low bonnet line was a dry-sump lubrication system.

Depending on the rear axle ratio, top speed of the SL ranged between 235km and 263km/h, making it the fastest production car in the world in the mid-1950s.

By 1956 sales of the Gullwing coupé had tapered off and Mercedes released the 300SL Roadster version in 1957. It featured the same mechanical layout as the coupé, but the side sections of the chassis frame were modified to accept conventional doors.

Most roadsters featured leather interiors to contrast with the ivory of the steering wheel and gear lever knob and stainless steel dashboard insert. A hardtop option was added soon after production began.

In total some 1,400 Gullwing coupés and 1,858 roadsters were built between 1954 and 1963 and famous owners of the car include Sophia Loren, Pablo Picasso, Clark Gable, Bernie Ecclestone, Hugh Heffner and Paul Newman.

Owners of pre-1985 classic cars who wish to show their vehicles should visit www.scocc.co.za. Only preregistered cars will be admitted to the show grounds.

Venue: Eden Technical High School, Union Street, George.
Times: February 10 9am-6pm and February 11 9am-2pm. 
Tickets are available through iTickets. Prices for Saturday are R100 for adults, R80 for pensioners and R50 for high school scholars. Children under 12 are free. Sunday ticket prices are R80 for adults, R50 for pensioners, and R50 for scholars.