1932 Mercedes-Benz SSKL - Jay Leno’s Garage

[Music] [Music] episode of jail out of the garage today we have been visited by true automotive royalty this is one of my favorite cars of all time or a version of one of my favorite cars of all time this is a 1932 mercedes-benz SS KL office this is a race car based on the legendary SS k7 liter engine supercharged dual carbon this was the height of technology in the late 20s and early 30s one of the most amazing cars of all time in fact the SS K is probably the basis for every bed replicar kit you seen over the years like the Excalibur and some of these other things with the open fenders it's just an amazing car with this supercharger that makes just the most screaming noise you've ever heard oh it's just a legendary car we're gonna drive it today this car has been recreated by mercedes-benz it is an actual SSK chassis this car was built by mercedes-benz using all authentic mercedes-benz components they commissioned the body to be an exact replica of the actual car that won the race let's bring in Michael Kunz from the mercedes-benz classic Center Michael how are you thanks for bringing this I'll be here this is just unbelievable you know this is one of the cars I first saw when I was a little kid you know it just made all the right noises and and and look massive looked imposing this just frightened the hell out of every other race car that was around back in the period and it's seven liters correct correct overhead cam yep and with what they call the elephant blower the elephant supercharged yeah yeah I was fortunate enough to be able to go for a ride with Paul Russell he rebuilt the count Rossi copy and I think they're one in Pebble Beach but we took it out for a run and when you put your foot in it and the horsepower would jump from I think then what was every 160 to go over 200 make this a noise and it was legendary because I guess all the all the drivers had the instructions to not have the supercharger on for more than 10 seconds over do it and timber can that's how he won that time he overheard one of the German of mechanics down there I do not go more than 10 seconds or the it was tastic pots you know but yeah so he he pushed the car he you know he pulled up next to him and kept egging on his his Bentley against the Mercedes and and it's supercharger finally that guy just all those great race stories you know so so tell us about this how long it took what was the impetus behind it well it's about reliving history right and this car has an interesting history in that it is an SSK l version so a lightened version of the car that one the original car won the office race in Berlin and that race was on a track that was created for testing highway use basically the acronym stands for vehicle testing of run and you basically could take a car on it and see how it handled so it's basically a straight ahead course five miles down five miles up with a turn around on each side on what our public roads today and public roads back then as well and this of course to me the standard SSK road model is the most attractive because aesthetically pleasing to the eye aerodynamics did not play a part in that it's just aesthetically pleasing this is so odd looking especially with that front you know it looks like somebody punched it in the face I got a big ready I mean this is proof that aerodynamics aren't always the most pleasing to the eye you know you'd think it would be but but it's not like we're talking earlier like the Countach people think it's aerodynamic it's like a brick a Volkswagen bug actually has better aerodynamics in the Countach yeah and the same thing with this thing cuz it looks it the front almost looks too big but I guess that's for the air to go around it and they're also channel into it that huge opening mm-hmm because about what two feet into that opening you see the standard radiation yeah for the SSK mercedes so the thought was back then you know to gain a edge on on competitors so this particular car went back to Stuttgart in that area and got a aerodynamic body based on the principles of a designer early early aerodynamic designer Baron fund Foxen felt and he knew that you didn't have to continually make the engines larger you could gain something by aerodynamics so they built the aerodynamic body and and sure enough when it ran at Ava's against another privateer with an SSK it was 20 kilometers faster on the straightaways on that race and so it proved that it really did make a difference they called the car the Cucumber it does kind of look like a cucumber it's not necessarily pretty to your point but it's effective and that is how that came about you don't need to make the engine bigger but this was a big engine then he standard of the deck it was seven liters yeah with twin carburetors mhm two valves per cylinder okay so okay so the whole line of those cars he s the SS and the SS K and s is Cale these were often referred to as white elephants because they were large the racing color at the time was white right worst German racing color they were large or imposing they were fast or you know kind of a car that you could not overlook so they were called the white elephant this particular car did not get its paint because they didn't have time right and the car was driven after they completed the body driven right to the race to practice at the race and it was no time to paint the body this is where also the origins of the Silver Arrows lie we know from a radio broadcast there was a radio broadcast at that event the first radio broadcast at a racing event they referred to the car as a Silver Arrow we know it's interesting that there were so many rumors that's what I love about this era the rumor was the car was white not this one and it was like a few kilos a few kilos over the weight limit so he demanded the paint be stripped off that got it under the limit any truth to that there is truth to that that is not really the origin of the rally right the origin of the phrase lies with this car because they often reference that radio broadcast room back then where they talk about the silver you know it's such a you know it's almost fluent correct to say that's our manly car back in the day but it really is you know the I mean the steering wheel everything when you look at Bugatti or somebody tying stuff very light yeah whereas the German stuff was always metal massive yeah just bulletproof and of course seeing these legendary names on the side of the car just kind of I don't know it just brings back a lot of impressionable memories because when I was a teenager you'd read about these you know but you never think you're gonna see one yeah yeah and this is what I love about the Mercedes classic Center no matter what Mercedes you have even an SS caves and like this or say these men will supply the part yeah in this case we made the body right yes yeah it's just just amazing and it still looks powerful you know there's nothing antiquey looking about you know it doesn't look like oh what a silly race car that is oh yeah yeah I mean it looks like something that could still scare you yeah yeah because you're running it 140 150 yeah they could run 150 and and in the office race was a pretty much a straight line race so you have to be pretty brave three speed a fourth speed train for speed is forced to be transmission okay I find the the rear of the vehicle much more attractive than the front you know this is sort of the the era of the you know the the can back had not yet come into play this sort of looked like the natural flow because even to Germany have wind tunnels at the time or did they just sort of I think there was just sorting that out just getting with that right because they didn't really understand what aerodynamics were it was really a theory at that point and then they could prove the theory with a car like this and of course as even today the real limiting factor in these automobiles was tire technology mm-hm because no tires that ever got a hundred and fifty miles an hour 32 and so it took a lot of guts to drive these things you didn't know what was gonna happen right I mean there's no roll bar this is not a roll bar no recovery really something goes wrong yeah and yeah and of course all manual steering no disc brakes mic fade was fairly common yeah it took a lot your stops yeah yeah and that almost looks like the dashboard from the production model it is it is what you have underneath is really a standard SS KL there are only four SS Cal's two in total built so this car the frame was an SSK frame that we then lightened and drilled to replicate the SS KL configuration but it is a standard SS k underneath yeah that was sort of people did not know the true tensile strength of metal so they would just build the biggest heaviest frame they could and then all right let's drill holes and see what up let's see what happened well let's show people the real heart of this piece because this is an impressive piece of engineering the engine compartment okay that's a serious business that's quite impressive here is the famous elephant blower that we spoke out and that probably took 25 horsepower to run would you say okay twin carburetors the barber ators are actually even newly constructed we had to make them we didn't have them anymore for this particular yeah so they're they're actually newly made but as they were back in the day and the supercharger blows into the carburetor mm-hmm this is a like an auto vac well it's a it's a additional tank and basically under boost its pulling gas from that tank at a higher pressure so when so when you engage a supercharger you're sucking more fuel from here from there yeah yeah and this probably gets about two miles it probably doesn't register at all didn't matter but it's just such a beautiful piece of engineering look at this oh my god one of the great engines of all time and it's so massive for a 6-cylinder engine yeah as we said seven liters which is about 421 cubic inches if you're an American a steering box right oh yeah and then about an SS configuration 225 horsepower in SS K and an SS KL 320 horsepower I mean it doesn't sound like a huge amount today but when you realize the Ford v8 was 65 course mm-hmm I mean nobody went more 45 miles an hour when you hear you're doing 150 yeah 150 miles an hour be like 250 today it'd be like 300 I mean it's it's not me I figure most people can can relate to you know what used to happen when they used to have the city-to-city races in Europe people had no idea how to judge speed so he'd walk out in the track and they'd watch the car because they couldn't believe fastest thing they'd seen there's a horse galloping horse you could get out of the way usually get run over and you still have that today to some extent in Germany if you're on the Autobahn and you have to be able to judge that traffic coming at you very well because he's going much faster than you are and look at the radiator the famous V I mean look at the tolerances how close it is there and this is a gear driven fan yeah I mean just so over-engineered just beautiful oh man this is an amazing amazing vehicle and when do you hear that supercharger it's it's really fantastic can we open the other side yes yeah we're gonna take the hood totally off so we have to kind of undo this a few pin you undo that side there's a pin once you're ready I'm gonna pull the pin want me to lift it it's gonna get the pin out okay we're out and then we're gonna go forward with it okay it's amazingly light aluminum oh this is how it should be seen but I just love the sheer mechanical nosov it it's all form follows function you can logically see how everything works you know modern cars are so much electronics you've got a black box here that can control everything from the brake lights to have no idea you just have no idea what anything does here you can follow everything to its logical conclusion yeah just just I can't imagine what this engine must weigh obviously cast-iron mm-hmm what else do we massive piece of machinery oh it is it's it's it's so impressive look at those big shocks down there and the cross hydraulic brakes with fimbriae it's a it's a rod based system that pushes the rod out into eccentrics that push it against the brake push the brake shoes out no it's not hydraulic there's what is odd there's a rod over here that's connected to the pedal that's now I would have fought by 32 that they would have you know but I guess afraid of a boiling fluid y-yeah well of course the origins of the car a little bit earlier right you see a rod down here yeah that's actually the brake pedal rod and what you're doing is you're pushing these rods out that are in the arms there to Anik to eccentrics that are pushing shoes out to the brakes so that once again it's all mechanical yeah but all foot pressure no booster you I mean you're on those brakes both yeah yeah well you know that was Henry Ford's thing he didn't like hydraulic brakes you know save the safety of steel from pedal to wheels yeah because I thought like well let's flew in there and then flew a good leak out but I would imagine running fluid at 150 miles an hour you could boil it fairly easily yeah yeah I mean you do lose a little bit of pressure through the rod the rod flexes a little bit - yeah it's totally optimal really but it is what it is from back then yeah I mean you're not so funny cars have always been fair the real sophistication is the braking and the handling you know because you can go fast can you stop it hundred miles an hour there's a problem with just what do you do when you get there you know oh just fantastic but it shows you the just the integrity of the design it's basically the standard engine from the road car I mean obviously tuned to optimum performance and everything but there's nothing here that you couldn't get no I mean you could you could buy these cars as road-going cars whether it was an S in SS or SS k not an L of course they're just for else alright were made but these were road going machines and they came with touring bodies all sorts of configurations yeah so whatever you wanted you could get that I mean driving something like this in 1932 I didn't know what the equivalent would be today bugatti chiron maybe there was nothing well you think about a modern car how easy it is to drive a modern car this is not easy to dry thoroughly the controls are very heavy yeah so it's it's a quite a different error but I imagine its speed a probably like this yeah yeah okay I look at it and I say this is a like a mechanical device pure right yeah I mean there's nothing other than heavy mechanics working here yeah you know in this engine the entire vehicle for that matter and that supercharger is really just just a work of art yeah on demand via a clutch and off of the crank yeah as you said just design for short bursts but if you wanted to be competitive you kind of pushed pushed it more but there was an issue with that to your point the race were the Bentley driver egged the other driver on right and I knew that you know okay you couldn't sustain that so it was really intended for a short term yeah and these really didn't break just massive dependability just just hugely impressive piece of machinery well let's show people what you had to do to drive a race car in 1932 obviously your steering wheel this is your advance and on the ignition so you put it here to start and then what you're running you advance it this is a hand throttle which is more for the road going car that a race car you have an arrays effect cruise control for kids yeah they're like a cruise control this is your speedometer right here which is very unusual to have a spawn of a race car and a clock which is even more unusual because they say what time it is think of bigger problems on your mind if you're driving this thing about it in 50 miles not hey what's the time yeah so that's pretty close straight from the production yeah but this is the only gauge that matters this is your tachometer notice it only goes to 4,000 I guess 3000 is probably just about the end of the line isn't it well they would push it to 4,000 right yeah yeah but those are huge revs oh yeah oh yeah I mean something moving at 4,000 revolutions per minute just seems unbelievable insane yeah yeah they're like 14000 rpm Formula One car today you know pretty amazing just unbelievable can we we fired up now we've brought a friend I brought a friend Michael another Michael Michael plog he is the team leader that built this car from our classic Center enjoyable job beautiful thank you very much these guys just do amazing work because their engineers and their historians and and the love and care I mean it's it's just to see a piece of history like this is it's pretty amazing to have it in person you know because it's when you're a kid when I was a kid none of this stuff even existed anymore nobody even thought to save old racecars they were just sort of driven and thrown away you know yeah and yet you gentlemen like this can recreate these things exactly they were and they see these legendary names on the side it's it's just fascinating we've always been very good about having good archival information so we're able to do that and we think it's important that people can relive something right now just look at it in a book but here it may be drive in it and experience what it was like back then well that's what I like about the classic Senate you know one of my favorite Mercedes of all times is my 68 6.3 and I needed the leveling system was airbags and I needed a new pump and a few other things and then you know people complain oh look at the price of this it will find one find you go find what you know but the nice thing is whatever part you have for any Mercedes even going back to SSK they have it and they can find it and that's that's the cool part there's nothing you can't fix or recreate well on the thing is like we often think of some of the cars that we take care of us being relatively young but you do the math and even the cars that you think are young or 60 years old that's right yeah so that's pretty amazing yeah yeah and this is yeah it doesn't and this is almost a hundred year old race car I'm thinking about that I mean yeah okay give or take ten years or so well very good let's let's put the hood back on okay and we'll take it with spin Michael you gotta come with me yes sure you see you don't let Americans just get in a drive long yeah German yeah yeah we're in neutral hit the button Mike yep spray ready yep tell me one go on the throttle yeah okay ready the condition is okay you're in neutral okay you're home there you go already ready I'm ready to go are in the hole go [Music] you know I got to go feels like it's made out of billet oh it's a good one it's been too long we need to help climbing crowd yeah yeah people go crazy when it came out yeah yeah every muscle in your body and drive this thing [Music] [Music] [Music] like going to the gym when you drive it may be dominant fun I like it you know I like you to bump it with the car you know long after you put in the more you get out the honey fret to break the best know it all with Wendy's love the great time all wonderful technology was moving so quickly [Music] [Music] well I want to thank my to Michaels that was unbelievable what a treat I mean to really drive a piece of history and that classic Mercedes water temperature perfect oil pressure perfect nothing broke did a lot of time to take old cars oh yeah still waiting LA traffic they didn't even dream dream about traffic like this in 1932 but just to feel the power in the torque everything is physical there's so much to do I love the hand brake and the fact that I mean these brakes started fading at 66 60 70 miles an hour I can't imagine 140 pressing that puzzle have a go to the floor oh my god these guys had a lot of guts to to drive it and again you you mentioned that you you rode with him on promise right he was 90 years old yeah in this car yeah no it was another one millimeter yeah cow okay well that would that must have been an honor yeah but someday you'll be the old man you know come to you and ask you how you built it it'll be cool it'll be fun just to be the custodian of a piece of history like this is such an honor thank you my friend thank you very much for the Mercedes class you know they bring us so many of these great cars they preserve history they save history they really are true enthusiasts so thank you very much this has been a thrill a lifetime I will see you guys next week [Music]

Channel: Jay Leno's Garage

Views: 615,372

Rating: 4.9415121 out of 5

Keywords: Mercedes-Benz, SSKL, Classic Center, race car, German car, supercharged, supercharger, blower, elephant blower, aerodynamic, Jay Leno, Jay Leno's Garage, car reviews, compares cars, classic cars, vintage cars, sports cars, super cars, cars, car gear, McLaren P1, Porsche 918 Spyder, Camaro Z28, jay leno garage, jay lenos garage, car collection, cnbc, episode, motorcycle, ford, corvette, tour, dodge, lexus

Id: DNuI65dT4Ck

Length: 27min 49sec (1669 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 12 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/Rusty_Desmond]

Advance to 'Go' and collect $200

[u/OGtoker416]

Beautiful car

[u/PlaneReflection]

The OG Clownshoe?

[u/tangre79]

And they say jacked up trucks are obvious compensation.