2015 Mercedes Club NSW Concours

Today was the annual Mercedes Club concours and while it threatened to rain all day, the weather held off and a nice variety of cars showed up, including a gaggle of 190SLs, four 600s including a 4 door pullman and a decent number of cars from the ACT.   With all those 600s, I expected to see a dictator with a chest full of self-awarded medals and his secret police rounding up dissidents, but he must have kept it low key.

2015 Mercedes Club NSW Concours

Highlights for me were seeing the 600 pullman and the 190SL display.   Interestingly, 3/4 600s were USA models in LHD and US headlights.   Considering Mercedes sold a decent number of 600s in Australia (especially in Melbourne), it was interesting to see so many US cars.     There were no pre-war cars this year, the oldest car being a 1951 170.  The 170 was sold new in Australia –  The war was still only 6 years ago when this car was sold, so an interesting choice for the buyer.   There were a good amount of W113s on display.   Surprisingly, given their growing popularity, not really much of a showing for W123s, and few 6 cyl W108/9s.

I entered my car in for judging, mostly because I had never done it and was interested in the process.   I didn’t expect to do all that well – my car is very nice but I would rather drive it than detail the engine bay and there are a couple of non-standard items including the polished rocker cover and intake manifold.    I’m glad I did it, but next year I will probably just go in show and shine.  Despite that I was a finalist, although there was a 220SE which will be the likely winner.

One thing I noticed was that a number of the 190SL owners were in their 30s, which is in line with my theory for the future of old car ownership.   Really special and iconic cars will find a new generation of owners, but I do worry about regular, but interesting cars finding that next generation of owner.  While that will keep the prices lower for me, a critical mass of owners is important for parts availability, skills etc.

1 comment to 2015 Mercedes Club NSW Concours

Leave a Reply

You can use these HTML tags

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>