Mercedes Benz W111/112-series cabriolet (1962-19671)
The invisible man trying to impress his lady friend.
The Invisible Man has good taste.
You’re no doubt familiar with that thing that non-car people ask when they find out you’re a ‘car person’.
“If you could have only one car, what would it be?”
Most ‘car people’ groan at that question because really. They want you to say something predictable, like “oh a Ferrari”. But it’s like asking someone who’s really into jazz what their one-and-only desert island track would be. Not disc even, but track. While your erstwhile interrogator is thinking “they’ll say Take Five, I know it” you’re thinking, after you get over the sheer stupidity of just one track for Pete’s sake, whether you should say, “The Shoes of the Fisherman’s Wife Are Some Jive-Ass Slippers by Charles Mingus” because it takes ages to say and people tend to go cross-eyed about the slippers jive-assedness or whether you should go to the trouble of explaining that while “Bye-bye Blackbird” from the Miles Davis Friday Night: In Person at the Blackhawk in San Francisco isn’t the best Miles that long after you get tired of the actual music the decades of memories that you have of personal events you associate with the track will more than keep it fresh.
Anyway…
If I was pressed I could make do with the W111 cabrio’ as my one car. It’s practical, comfortable and fast. It seats four, but is equally just the thing for picnics with your sweatheart. And Mercedes still makes all the pieces so there’d be no problems with parts made of unobtainium2.
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This gets a bit complicated but as far as I understand, the W112-series car comes only with the 3.0L 6. Until 67, the W111 either comes with the smaller 6s, from 2.2 to 2.8L. The W112 cabrio ceased production in ‘67 but the W111 continued on in ‘68 and in ‘69 it got the 3.5L V8. Given my half-formed theory about cars from 1969, that’s the one I want. ↩
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I’m looking at you, Saab. ↩
