A friend's review of his SL65 Black Series

Green · #1 09-19-2009, 10:40 AM

Review: 2009 SL65 AMG Black Series | The Truth About Cars

The year was 1997. As a bright eyed, recently minted med school graduate, I had two glorious weeks in Europe before the torture of internship began. One very memorable moment was in the parking lot of the MB museum in Stuttgart, where I spotted a prototype 1998 E50 AMG sulking behind a security gate. That thing looked evil, hunkered down on its 17″ alloys. It was so far removed from my Opel Astra rental car reality that I could scarcely imagine unleashing the 350 HP AMG-fettled V8 on the ‘Bahn at 170 mph in the latest heir to the Hammer.

Fast forward 12 years and the spoils of the German horsepower arms race now litter the pages of eBay. Six year old E55 AMGs with 500 hp supercharged V8s can be had for under $30K, and a “standard” Mercedes E550 will outrun the AMGs of my youth. I was busy living out my childhood dreams, with a daily-driven 604 hp CL65 AMG coupe that had a colossal twin turbo V12 oozing twice the torque of even the hottest V8s of days past. Nothing, not even MB’s own cartoonish V8-powered SLR could unseat this luxurious beast as the king of the autobahn. Or so I thought...

As great a cruiser as the CL65 was, it’s still a 2.5 ton tank with narrow tires and a peg-leg differential; the smaller two seat SL65 roadster was no lighter. In my cerebral skunkworks, I often imagined how a lightweight Benz fitted with superior underpinnings would allow the biturbo V12 to shine. Apparently the good folks at Aufrecht Melcher Großaspach agreed. Enter the SL65 Black Series.

You’ve seen the recipe in the buff books: take a regular, semi-sane, but portly SL65 AMG barchetta, pull off the bodywork (sans doors) and replace with DTM-like flared carbon fiber pieces that add 4 full inches to the track width. Throw in a faster fixed carbon fiber roof, an aggressive front fascia to cool the supersized heat exchangers, and a retractable speed sensitive rear wing. End result: a slinky, crouching muscle bound fastback coupe that looks like it could leap over left lane squatters in a single bound.

To wit: when this ride rolled out of the trailer from a dealer in the Midwest with 1.7 miles on the odometer, those of us in attendance just sat and stared at it. And stared some more. And shook our heads. It really takes some time just to absorb the presence of this thing. The more you examine the fastback roofline, the way the front fenders meld into the air extractors, the CF exhaust surrounds . . . it’s just not the same on your computer monitor. Open the hood or trunk to see the beautiful raw carbon undersides of the panels. The trunk space reveals a beautifully stitched box covered in the same leather as the seats, with the engine builder’s plaque affixed to it. Contained within is a bespoke car cover and a letter welcoming me to the AMG owners’ fold...
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