From the November 2002 issue of Car and Driver.
A funny thing happened at the 1934 Eifelrennen race at the Nürburgring. Alfred Neubauer, the Zeppelinesque chief of the Mercedes team, directed his crew to grind off all the bone-white paint that distinguished the Benz factory racers.
2003 Mercedes-Benz SL55 AMG First Drive
Best Convertibles of 2020
Hence the origin of silver as the German color for racing. But that’s not the point. Neubauer’s motive had nothing to do with aesthetics. In those days, the competition weight regs specified a maximum limit, rather than a minimum. Neubauer’s paint trick was designed to get the cars down below the max. The rulemakers set an upper limit, because they saw weight as a dynamic asset. A bigger car would have a bigger engine, and thus go faster. The objective was to slow the cars down. Ha.
This story came to mind early in our first lap of Wisconsin’s Road America racetrack in the new Mercedes SL55 AMG roadster. The Neubauer parable flickered in my mind’s eye like a prewar movie as I hit the rumble strips on the exit of Turn Five and started up the hill. Wow. Was ist los?
See, getting out there onto the exit curbing was not the intent upon entering the turn. First lap in a new car—and an expensive one at that—lots of power, cold tires, etc. Easy does it. But when the throttle went down at the apex, the car was across the track and onto that alligator curbing before you could say, “Götterdämmerung!”
Highs: Prodigious thrust, execujet style, execujet comfort.
This little tableau, reinforced by other examples of mass exerting its relentless influence, emerged as the overriding impression of an all-too-brief Road America experience, laid on by Mercedes-Benz as the finale of its North American SL55 AMG press launch. Given the car’s capabilities, it was certainly the right venue—long straights punctuated by hard braking and generally uncomplicated turns. No esses, no tricky transitions. Moreover, Mercedes had enlisted a platoon of pro road racers to demonstrate those capabilities as dramatically as possible. The demos came after we ordinary mortals had done a few laps, and with a light rain at the end of the session, this became quite dramatic, indeed.
But as we strapped on a new SL55 to head home, the nagging question persisted: What’s up with all this avoirdupois? The standard SL500 we tested last April was certainly no wraith. When the readouts on the C/D scales finally settled, the tally for that one stood at a resounding 4172 pounds. That’s SUV territory, but even so, the AMG version is heftier: 4411 pounds. What’s the deal? Weight is the enemy. These guys must know that.
Make no mistake, this is a formidable automobile, Moby Dick mass notwithstanding. Check the motivational specs: 493 horsepower at 6100 rpm, 516 pound-feet of torque manifesting itself along a wonderfully flat curve from 2650 to 4500 rpm. It’s the most potent Benz ever offered in North America, according to the manufacturer, and also the quickest factory Benz we’ve ever tested: 0 to 60 in 4.5 seconds, 0 to 100 in 10.9, the quarter-mile in 13 seconds flat at 110 mph.
In contrast, the SL500 tested in our April issue hit 60 mph in 5.8 seconds, 100 in 14.5, and covered the quarter in 14.3 seconds at 99 mph. The disparities seem minor on paper, but the real-world distinctions are dramatic. Crack the throttle, and this posh heavyweight lunges forward like a shark that’s been invited to nibble a chunk of Britney Spears. It dissects traffic like a superbike and exudes a sense of mechanical resentment when a soulless microchip arrests the rush at 156 mph.
There’s a corollary to the traffic-sorting prowess, incidentally. This car seems to stir up civilians like few others, and not always in a delighted (read “Lookit that!”) way. All too often we’d cruise past some joker only to find him angrily attached to the Benz’s rear bumper, somehow offended at being overtaken. We believe a similar emotion animated the people who divided Marie Antoinette into two unequal portions in 1793, and we furnish this observation as a public service to potential buyers: Caveat emptor.
But we were discussing the SL55’s power and its increased mass, and in fact the two are directly related. There is, for example, the weight of the AMG car’s supercharger and its air-to-water intercooler, the latter designed with its own separate supply of fluid. Made by IHI, the belt-driven supercharger is of the Lysholm type, with a Teflon-coated screw-style impeller delivering boost up to 11.6 psi. Quietly, too. No supercharger whine.
Although this is basically the same SOHC 24-valve aluminum V-8 used in the SL500, there are significant differences. The hand-assembled AMG version is stroked from 84 millimeters to 92, increasing displacement from 4966cc to 5439, and the forged aluminum pistons drop the compression ratio from 10.0:1 to 9:0:1, an anti-detonation measure. There are heavy-duty bearings with cross-bolted mains at the bottom end, plus a new sump and a more powerful oil pump. Top-end mods include double valve springs, reprofiled cams, and bigger intake and exhaust plumbing.
The supercharged eight feeds its power to a five-speed automatic transmission that incorporates an updated edition of the Mercedes SpeedShift manumatic. This one offers three modes—normal, winter, and manual. Its basic function is essentially the same as Chrysler’s AutoStick: Waggle the lever, and you can shift up or down, or operate in full automatic mode. Unlike AutoStick, the manual mode allows shifting via rocker switches mounted on the backs of the steering-wheel spokes. And unlike the other modes, selecting manual allows the driver to hold a particular gear right up to the rev limiter.
Lows: Full-size-SUV curb weight.
Consistent with the law of opposite and equal reactions—that which goes must stop—there’s also extra mass associated with the SL55’s braking apparatus. The rotors are big enough to double as manhole covers—14.2 by 1.3 inches in front, 13.0 by 0.9 in the rear, vented and cross-drilled at both ends. The diameters are bigger than the garden-variety SL’s, and the fronts are squeezed by eight-piston calipers.
Oddly enough, braking distances failed to match those recorded by the SL500, and by a bunch: 155 feet from 70 mph for the SL500, 175 for the SL55. Moreover, although we didn’t record any brake fade during our testing, we did encounter a squishy pedal while lapping Road America, even with all the electronic enhancements (Sensotronic Brake Control) incorporated into this system.
Grip doesn’t seem to be the problem. Although the SL55’s footprints are essentially the same as the SL500’s—the only difference is a slightly lower rear-tire profile (285/35ZR-18 versus 285/40ZR-18)—the AMG edition’s Pirelli P Zeros pulled a higher skidpad number: 0.91 g versus 0.88. So the SL55’s added mass seems the most likely braking-distance culprit.
Which brings us to this car’s all-around dynamics. Mercedes refers to its “catlike handling reflexes,” which is true—if you envision a cat the size of a Siberian tiger. The key to the SL55’s level cornering attitudes is the corporate Active Body Control electro-mechano-hydraulic almost-active suspension, recalibrated in this application for firmer responses without compromising ride quality. Although this sophisticated system can’t erase weight—it’s always there, always tangible—it manages that weight amazingly well, whether the car is clawing the pavement in a fast sweeper or unkinking a set of switchbacks. This kind of activity is abetted by the SL55’s speed-sensitive rack-and-pinion steering, which seems to deliver a little more tactile information than the SL500’s system, and by the availability of all that torque for blasting off corners.
The Verdict: Proof that heft and passion are not mutually exclusive.
As you’d expect, the SL55 is posh-plus inside, with all the hedonistic goodies that distinguish the SL500, which is far from a torture chamber itself, plus some AMG fillips such as a sport steering wheel, aluminum interior trim, Alcantara suede atop the instrument binnacle and in the headliner, a superb 10-speaker audio system, silver-face AMG instruments with red needles, and, the most seductive interior element, deep leather-clad power bucket seats with serious torso bolsters, for those moments when the owner feels moved—probably rare—to rub up against the limits of adhesion.
Why rare? Check the bottom line. With a base price of $118,295, including luxury and gas-guzzler taxes, the SL55 AMG starts $30,340 north of the SL500. Start adding extras such as Distronic auto-distancing cruise control ($2950), Parktronic proximity warning ($1035), the Panorama sunroof ($1800)—an interesting touch on a retractable hardtop convertible—and the tally escalates rapidly. All of which makes this an unlikely toy for young guys prone to red mist. The SL55 is an executive hot rod for folks with lots of disposable income and Kevlar-clad portfolios. So even though we wonder what this car could do if it shed about a thousand pounds, it’s probably irrelevant. Lose the sander, Herr Neubauer. Scraping the paint off this one ain’t gonna make much difference.
Counterpoint
Hmm, let’s see here. Supercar horsepower, a shape to die for, the trickest top in the land, and active suspension. Sounds like a study-hall dream car, and for the most part, it is. But why did Mercedes leave out an automatic-shifting manual gearbox? You know, the tranny you can get at the Ferrari or BMW store? For a slushbox, the SL’s automatic tranny is fine. But it’ll never provide the control or response that a manual tranny would. I can understand the omission in the standard SL, but the SL55 is supposed to be the supercar that packs the best of Mercedes’ vast engineering talent. Am I wrong to think a $123,000 car should have it all? —Larry Webster
Behold the German Ferrari. We didn’t think those buttoned-down, left-brain Deutschers had it in ’em, but this latest AMG accurately captures the otherworldly rocket-propelled acceleration and Gravitron cornering effects and even some of the charming quirks of a small-line Italian exotic. What corporate engineer could okay white-on-white gauge legends, for example? Sure, they’re invisible most of the time, but they look so cool when you can see them. And the driver’s vanity-mirror lid that obscures the mirror’s overhead light — that’s to prove this is a serious sports car, not a boudoir, right? Message received, through all four bellowing exhaust tips. —Frank Markus
A few years ago, I likened the Mercedes 500SL to a Duesenberg SJ because it occupied a nexus of performance, style, and luxury that seemed beyond modern, more narrowly focused cars. This new SL55 takes that SL concept into overdrive. Motivated by its velvety and vigorous blown V-8, the SL55 doesn’t just accelerate from one speed to another, it gobbles velocity in leaps and lunges. Despite its fleetness, this SL feels as substantial as any convertible on the market. And its swashbuckling styling, bolstered by AMG musculature, instantly conveys its patrician bloodlines to even the densest bystanders. What’s not to like about this 21st-century Duesenberg? —Csaba Csere
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