Even though there hangs a faint air of retrograde desperation about the new Gullwing, with its signature design element a structural necessity on the 1952 racing original and a mere styling choice on the new car, it is a sight to behold in the flesh.

Yes, it may be nothing more than a sports car with a quirky door. But if you do shell out the quarter million dollars it will cost, you’ll end up with a Gullwing-ish car for half the price of a vintage 300SL.

With the added benefit of AMG’s fabulous 6.3-liter V8 and the relief of not having to care about what will soon be a 60-year-old car.

If you want to go for grungy race car looks, make sure you order yours with the matte black disguising elements seen on the leaked photos of test mules, complete with the bumps reminiscent of the skin of humpback whales.

And should you look real close at the picture on top, you will see yours truly in the Frankfurt mayhem, crammed up against the right door in a lobster red backpack, aiming a white telephoto lens at Lewis Hamilton and Dr. Z:

Hi Lewis!

Photo Credit: SASCHA SCHUERMANN/AFP/Getty Images, Mercedes-Benz, Gawid/autoscoop.biz, TORSTEN SILZ/AFP/Getty Images

The car was built because when you're a billionaire and you got nothing better to do with your money, then why wouldn't you get the oldest auto company in the world to bastardize one of its most sought-after classics? The completely camouflaged car has been equipped with completely upgraded mechanicals including a 6.0-liter V8 and we're assuming an automatic transmission.

Some things money shouldn't be able to buy, like self-respect. We could understand if an outside tuner shop created this abortion, but for Mercedes to have a hand in this is just so wrong on so many levels. [HypeBeast]

Like all great stories in motor racing, Mercedes’s dominating debut is a story of timing, innovation and resurgence, with a healthy sprinkling of treachery on top. It began on a November day in 1953.

It was at the conclusion of the fourth season of Formula One, a mere eight years after the war situation in Europe had developed not necessarily to Germany’s advantage. Dominated by Alberto Ascari in his tiny Ferrari 500, the young sport was about to go through its third major rule change in four years: the 1954 season would drop the Formula Two regulations in place for 1952 and 1953 and dictate a maximum displacement of 750 cc for supercharged engines and 2,500 cc for naturally aspirated ones.

Mercedes-Benz, on the heels of their successful victory with the 300SL Gullwing in the Carrera Panamericana, decided to enter Formula One. The old team which ruled the European Grand Prix Championship with the supercharged Silver Arrows was back. Team manager Alfred Neubauer—the man who invented pit signaling—returned with his hat, trenchcoat and stopwatches, while London-born technical director Rudolf Uhlenhaut was tasked with creating a new car from scratch, codenamed W196 R.

And what a car it turned out to be! The engine a straight-eight, fuel-injected, naturally aspirated 2.5-liter marvel, with power taken off at the middle of the crankshaft, running on a cocktail of benzol, methylene, gasoline, acetone and nitro. It was driven by desmodromic valves—only seen today on Ducati motorcycles—which enabled higher revs than allowed by 1950s springs. The whole assembly was canted 37º to the right to make for a lower hoodline and a smaller frontal area. The car was wrapped in sheets of Elektron, an ultralight and very flammable alloy of magnesium.

By the time Uhlenhaut’s team was done, the 1954 season was already underway, with Juan Manuel Fangio racking up wins in the brand-new Maserati 250F. But the lure of the new Mercedes proved too hard to resist for the Argentine, and after winning two of the season’s first three Grands Prix, Fangio swapped his Maserati for a seat in the W196. After a 15-year absence, the stage was set for Mercedes-Benz’s debut on July 4 at the French Grand Prix, held at the ultra-fast circuit of Reims-Gueux.

Tweaking and testing continued even after Fangio and teammate Karl Kling—who had taken a vulture through the windshield of his 300SL Gullwing two years before in Mexico at 130 MPH—secured the first two positions in qualifying. Fuel consumption was higher than expected, and in a wonderful move, technical director Uhlenhaut hopped in his own Gullwing and raced it all the way to team headquarters in Stuttgart to have expanded fuel tanks manufactured overnight for the W196’s. No vultures were encountered on the Autobahn and at 2:45 the next afternoon, off went Fangio and Kling to begin the 300-mile race.

It was a massacre. The streamlined cars outpaced the rest of the field by 4 seconds a lap. As Fangio took the checkered flag half a car length ahead of Kling, they were the only two cars on the leading lap. Two Maseratis, two Ferraris and a lone Gordini driven by Jean Behra limped in long after them, the rest of the field decimated in the grueling race.

Incidentally, it was on this very day that Germany’s national squad beat what was perhaps the greatest football team ever in the finals of the 1954 World Cup: the Hungarian Aranycsapat, stopped in its tracks after an unbroken string of 33 wins.

The W196 would go on to win 8 of the next 11 races it was entered in. The streamlined body was replaced with an open-wheel version for the more technical circuits, and a young Stirling Moss joined Fangio for the 1955 season.

Mercedes-Benz also entered the car in sports car racing as the 300SLR, with an engine bored out to 3 liters, producing 300 HP. This was the car that carried Stirling Moss to his famous victory in the Mille Miglia—and which, a few weeks later, got catapulted into the crowd at Le Mans, where it became all too clear just how flammable that Elektron chassis was. Over eighty people perished in the flames, including racing driver Pierre Levegh.

The accident spelled the end of the W196 and its brethren. Neubauer withdrew the 300SLR’s from the lead several hours after the accident. At the end of the season, with Fangio claiming the Formula One World Championship in the W196 and the team taking the World Sportscar Championship in the 300SLR, Mercedes-Benz withdrew completely from motor racing.

Fangio would become World Champion two more times. His victories came in cars he had defeated in his Mercedes: the Lancia-Ferrari D50, and for his final championship in 1957, the very Maserati 250F he had abandoned three years previously for the W196.

The 300SLR lived on as Rudolf Uhlenhaut’s daily driver. It was made into a street-legal coupé which Uhlenhaut commuted to work with.

A hyper-Gullwing, capable of reaching speeds of 180 MPH in a sad, gray, post-war Europe, blasting down empty highways at warp speed, forever chasing a racetrack it would never set wheels on again.

On the other hand, it must have made for a memorable childhood for Uhlenhaut’s son Roger:

Photo Credit: Daimler AG, Autocar

Before we can get to the car we're actually talking about, we need to first discuss the world-beating racecar the 300 SL was based on. And that car is... the 300 SL. There is a difference; the racer was known internally as W194, while the production car's designation was W198. Prior to the war after the war that ended all wars, Mercedes-Benz was an established motorsports marquee. In fact, its track prowess extended back to the 1900s when MB's ultra-low (comparatively) Simplex purpose built-racer dominated the competition for almost a decade, up to triple-batshit Silver Arrow racers of the 30s pumping out nearly 650 supercharged horses, hitting top speeds of 270 mph and battling neck and neck with Auto Unions of the day (including the midengined, 500 horsepower, 6.0-liter V16 monsters). But then Hitler had to go all crazy and the German car industry... well, you know the rest.

300 SL W194 Racecar

Wanting to get back into the thick of it, Mercedes introduced the 300 SL (W194) to the world in 1952. And the world scratched its head. Sure, the 300 SL was a hot looking little number, but a 170-horsepower race car? Really? Yeah, really. Immediately following WWII Mercedes-Benz could do little to get back on its once mighty feet other than produce Dodge clones with an MB grill tacked on (180 & 220). The company eventually started producing the upscale 300 (W186) in 1951 with its relatively modern 3.0-liter inline-six good for 115 hp. That engine, fitted with three carbs, found its way into the 300 SL racer, pumping out around 170 horses. Despite the lack of muscle, the 300 SL took second and fourth at its Mille Miglia debut, took first and second at Le Mans, finished 1, 2, 3 at the Nürburgring and 1 and 2 at the Carrera Panamericana. How? An extremely lightweight chassis and body from the extensive use of aluminum, sophisticated aerodynamics and superior, never-say-die reliability.

Obviously, a roadgoing version of such a superstar would be bona fide. But Mercedes had no plans to build any. The problem was Germans didn't have any money. But guess what? Americans did. A lot it. Yes, the postwar years were kind to the US of A. Capitalism, democracy and freedom had triumphed (unless you lived within the Soviet sphere) and our wallets were bulging. We needed shit to buy. Expensive shit. Enter Max Hoffman. For those who don't know, Hoffman was the guy who (besides living in a Frank Lloyd Wright home and getting Wright to design his Manhattan Jaguar dealership) brought both the Porsche 356 and the BMW 507 to American soil. The Austrian born "Maxi" also convinced Daimler-Benz that a roadgoing version of the 300 SL would be economically viable. In fact, Hoffman took (and sold) 80% of all the 300 SLs built (about 1400 total) and helped to establish Mercedes-Benz's considerable reputation in the States by doing so.

Let's talk doors. To create such a lightweight vehicle, Mercedes ditched the traditional platform-type chassis and opted for a tubular spaceframe. To give the high-tech chassis strength, engineers were unable to cut into the sills where normal doors would go. So, they (ingeniously) hinged them to the roof. At first Mercedes was worried that the unusual setup might cheese off racing officials, but after pouring over the rulebook racing chief Alfred Neubauer famously said, "Nowhere is it written that a door can only open sideways." Getting in and out of the racecar was a nightmare, and only partly helped by the production car's lower sills. The steering wheel was hinged so you could flip it up during ingress/egress. Put it this way; Britney, wear panties. And that's how timeless design icons are born.

The engine was the first series production car ever fitted with fuel injection. Little-known fact: There are two bumps on the SL's hood. One is for the fuel injectors and the other is only for the sake of symmetry. Stunningly advanced for its time (and Project Car Hell worthy today) the mechanical Bosch units increased the engine's power from 115 horses in the 300 sedan to 215 in the SL. That's officially. But, as certain 300 SLs could hit 161 mph — making them the fastest production cars ever built in 1954 — actual output was probably closer to 240 horsepower. As much as we love those numbers, we love the fact that the mechanical fuel pump (one of three) would continue atomizing fuel and forcing it into the cylinders after the engine was turned off even more. This would dilute the engine oil, especially if the motor hadn't been wrung out enough to generate enough heat to evaporate the gas. Hence, Mercedes recommended oil changes at 1,000 mile intervals. Many owners wound up disconnecting the oil cooler altogether. Stoichiometry at all costs, right? Thank God the Fantasy Garage has that mechanic.

Everything about the 300 SL was epic. The 3.0-liter engine, which had to be mounted at a 50-degree angle to clear the hood, requires 10 liters of oil. The gas tank holds 34.7 gallons and the car gets 22 mpg. That's a 760-mile range. At a time when American cars were ballooning faster than the XBox generation's waistline, the trim super coupe weighed just 2,866 pounds. All four wheels had their own suspension setup at a time when most cars still rode around like buggies.

The internet abounds with owners' tales of driving the car for four hours straight at 120 mph through Death Valley in utter comfort. Both personally (the roof featured flow-through ventilation outlets) and mechanically (that's what you get with production endurance race winners). And we believe them, for how could grand touring get any better? The price when new was more than a house, but that was just for the normal steel bodied car (though the hood, doors and deck were aluminum). For more than double the price you could purchase one of 29 all-aluminum examples, which dropped the curb weight by more than 500 pounds (to a stupid-svelte 2,351!). By the by, the alloy-bodied coupes were the cars that could hit 161 mph.

Even The Convertible Makes You Drool

And never mind any of that. Just look up. That, my dear friends, is timeless indisputable beauty. Even when they hacked the top off it the 300 SL managed to remain gorgeous. Stunningly gorgeous. To summarize: looks that slaughter, 'Ring-crushing handling, massive top speed, technically innovative, a range of over 750 miles and Gullwing doors. I can't think of anything else to say except, happy voting.

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

The Jalopnik Fantasy Garage, So Far:
RUF RT12 | 1978 Aston Martin V8 Vantage | Honda 1300 Coupe 9 | 1931 Daimler Double Six 50 Corsica Drophead Coupe | Ferrari 288 GTO | Chevrolet Corvette ZR-1 | 1970 Buick GSX 455 | First Generation BMW M Coupe | Bugatti Veyron 16.4 | Ford GT | Citroen SM | Porsche 928 | Jensen FF | DeTomaso Vallelunga | Audi Quattro S1 | Buick GNX | Nissan Skyline R34 GT-R | Honorary Fantasy Garager: The LS1 Powered Rotus | Lamborghini LM002 | Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe | Ferrari 250 GTO | Bentley Speed Six | Talbot-Lago T150C SS Figoni et Falaschi Raindrop/Teardrop Coupe | Porsche 917 | Audi RS4 Avant | Maybach Exelero | Lamborghini Miura | Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9 | BMW E39 M5 | Jaguar E-type

Around tha Jalop, guitars owned range from Gibsons to Paul Reed Smiths to whatever kind of bass the Loverman plays. And while the Les Paul-loving Jalop has always had a massive crush on the Fender Telecaster, he's really only begun to appreciate the Strat in the last few years. Regardless, it is an iconic instrument, and it shares an anniversary year with the Mercedes-Benz 300SL Gullwing, which Captain Slow posits is the world's first supercar. Bonus? Scorpions! – Davey G. Johnson

Related:
Future Classic Top Gear: Captain Slow Goes 407.4 Kilometers Per Hour! [Internal]

Somehow, one would think that most all 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300SLs that've survived to the present day would all be restored and accounted for. This one, however was found in a barn, where it had languished for the last three decades. It seems to be of a piece, by and large, but as is the case with such vehicles, you might wanna be sure to give it the ol' once over twice. Need more details? Aston-Martin of New England has 'em. – Davey G. Johnson

1955 Mercedes Benz 300sl Gullwing [Aston-Martin of New England & Lotus Motorsport, Inc. via German Car Scene]

Related:
Ahoy! StarQuest Bonus! Redux! Whatever! The Gullwing Starion! [Internal]

Finding runners up for the Most Badassed Carpenter in the Western World award just got easier by one. Udo Haase of Germany, absolute murder with a band saw, carved this Mercedes 300SL gullwing replica out of pine, part by part, and constructed it without the benefit of modern contrivances like nails and screws. By way of sheer skill, a shiteload of sandpaper, and a few hundred nights of hard labor, Hasse created the world's largest and sexiest paperweight. Stunning.

Wooden Mercedes 300 SL Replica [eMercedesBenz]

Related:
What Wood He Do for a Floating Ferrari? [internal]