What happens if you crash your very expensive one-of-333 Audi R8 GT quattro coupe? Well, you can either send it through some also very expensive repairs, or you can part it out. As it turns out, though, there’s a third option: make it into a “kart”. Karts are just about as on trend as “Safari” conversions, and if you’re unfamiliar the recipe is quite simple. Basically, you strip off everything you can, slap some auxiliary lights and roll-over protection on, and done. In this case, they went a step further, not only lightening this R8 GT, but slapping two turbos on it. If the GT was aimed at being a higher-horsepower lightened version of the regular R8, this one has gone not only to 11, but to 1111 – as in, it’s claimed to make over 1,100 horsepower. Yikes! But if that sounds ridiculous, wait until you see the price.
Month: November 2021
In my modest collection, my oldest car is 1980 Mercedes-Benz S-Class. I don’t drive it much at all, a few hundred miles a year at most, but I can’t seem to let it go. Just this past Sunday I gave it a really deep wash and applied a coat of wax on it for the upcoming winter, and then thought there is no way I am selling this car after I was all done with it. It is literally the definition of “They don’t make them like they used to” in terms of Mercedes-Benz products. The car will be 40 years old soon, but it still drives and functions like a 4 year-old car despite over 225,000 miles on it. The flaws of the chassis are few, with the biggest one being a climate system they outsourced from Chrysler, of all brands, which turned out to be total garbage. Imagine that!
Today’s car, 1980 405SEL up for sale in California, seems to have a bit of an identity crisis. At first I thought it was a Euro car as it has the Euro headlights, bumpers, and plate holders, but peeking inside I’m seeing a speedometer in MPH and the aforementioned garbage automatic climate control. What is going on here?
CLICK FOR DETAILS: 1980 Mercedes-Benz 450SEL on eBay
2 CommentsBack in April I took a look at a rare FIA homologation special not too many people know about – the 450SLC 5.0:
The 107.026s were very limited production cars, with a total of under 3,000 produced in all (1,636 450SLC 5.0s, along with 1,133 500SLCs manufactured in 1980 and 1981). So it’s really neat to see them come up for sale – even when they’re not in perfect shape. Today’s car will need a lot of love to get back to its glorious roots, but is it worth it to do so?