Automobiliac at the Deutsche Classic!

Longtime readers know we love our Italian cars over here at Automobiliac, but vintage German machinery can also be ever so cool. There was plenty of it on display at this weekend's Deutsche Classic German car show in Fleetwood, PA.  The weather was fantastic and the drive out from the city was about 2 hours of rolling countryside.  The show was roughly evenly divided between classic BMW, Porsche, Mercedes and VW, with a smattering of Opel GTs and other unique vehicles for good measure.In addition to the beautiful cars on display, there was a small swap meet area with vendors selling all manner of replacement parts for German cars.  My personal highlights of the day were a pristine BMW 3.0 CS (The owner seemed less than interested when I told him his car was my favorite at the show...) and a really cool Porsche RSK.  There was also a gorgeous Mercedes 300SL gullwing in attendance, and Herbie the Love Bug also made an appearance. Click any of the photos to see my entire gallery of the swap meet and car show!

Winged Wunderwagens from Mercedes-Benz

My buddy Syed over at the IEDEI blog made mention of the Mercedes C111-3 prototype, and noted its similarity to the Silver Arrows of the 1930s. In particular, I was struck by the commonalities between the winged version of the C111 (above) and the Mercedes T-80 (below).  Few people know that the T-80 was actually engineered by Ferdinand Porsche -- despite designing grand prix cars for Auto Union, he was also secretly working closely with driver Hans Stuck and the highest echelons of the German government on this Mercedes record-breaker.  In the end, this 2-engined behemoth was never run in anger. 

There was no straight road large enough in Germany to handle the T-80's intended speeds, and German officials realized that a trip to the Bonneville salt flats was a tricky proposition given the political climate of the time (there had been anti-Nazi protests when the German cars showed up for the Vanderbilt Cup, but Bernd Rosemeyer won it anyway).  Add to all this the fact that John Cobb's Railton Special broke the 350 mph barrier in late 1938 during the construction of the T-80, surpassing all the targeted specifications of the Mercedes.  Finally, as they scrambled to redesign the car to break Cobb's record, the outbreak of the War sealed its fate.  The much smaller C111 (above) was created in the more peaceful 1970s, and was never aimed at the outright Land Speed Record, but it did break several records for Diesel powered vehicles.

Citation: Mercedes T-80