SPORTING LIGHTWEIGHT

Few cars encapsulate glamour as neatly as the R107-generation Mercedes SL. We chart its long life

Paul Wager

The story of MercedesBenz's ‘Sport Licht’ range may have begun many years before with the 1954 300SL and continues to this day, but the car which would spring to mind for most people asked to identify an SL would be the 1971-1989 ‘R107’ generation. The original gullwinged 300SL had been an exotic creation built with motorsport in mind and the outwardly similar-looking 190SL had built on the 300's halo appeal sufficiently for the company to introduce a more mainstream model in 1963 in the shape of the W113. The car we now know as the Pagoda on account of its doublebubble hardtop roof was such a success that by the late 1960s no less than half of the production went to the USA. Clearly this identified a booming market which…

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Classics World (Digital) - 1 Issue, April 2025

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