In 2022 they had a car representing every year from 1950 to 2022.  In 2024 they did generations of the S-Class. They also did an AMG display one year, but I wasn’t able to make it.  This year the theme was 50 years of the W123.  Given the theme, I took my 1981 240D.   This is the second trip my 240D has made to Canberra this year, as I also attended the 50 years of the W123 event in January.

I’ve always enjoyed this event, there are normally a good variety of cars.  The last few times i’ve been it was held at Queanbeyan showground.  However, from what I hear, Queanbeyan council are not as friendly to car clubs as they once were, so its was moved to Canberra.   The new location is Thoroughbred Park, which is a horseracing track in Lyneham.

I had refuelled my 240D at $1.879 on the days the pointless war in the middle east started.  My goal was to get there and back on one tank and have fuel to spare since diesel is almost at $3 per litre.   I left Saturday afternoon and ending up driving through quite a big hail storm near Marulan.  There was so much hail on the grass beside the highway it looked like it had been snowing.   The W123 is made of thick steel, so I didn’t encounter any damage.

The Wheels event was held in the customer parking area and some parks nearby, not on the actual track.  Lyneham is a central location, and easier than Queanbeyan showground, but there is far less room.   In previous events the ACT club has been able to spread out and make a really good display.   This year the space allocated was quite small and the cars were all jammed in.

Nevertheless the club attempted to show off the W123s by having a ‘fan out’ display in the middle of the allocated area.  It worked reasonably well, but would have ben better with more space.  There were quite a few cars that had to park outside the main area.  The issue seemed more allocation than lack of space in general, as there was a big paddock behind the military vehicles that was mostly empty.

As with the W123 event, I was parked next to the 300D in 476 Goldbraun.  Such a great colour and a car that has been in the owners family since 1981.   There was a good selection of nine W123s including a coupe, a wagon, and all the popular models (280E, 230E, 300D etc).

In addition to the W123s the ACT club also had a nice selection of other cars, starting with a pair of nice roundies, a lovely red finnie, a beautiful W111 3.5 coupe, a W109 a couple of W116s, W126s W124s etc.  It was a pretty good selection of all the major models of Mercedes-Benz.

As for the other marques, space seemed to be a bit of a challenge for the too.  The BMW display only had a couple of classics.  The new ones are all nostrils and a bit hard on the eye.  Getting past those, there were some really nice and interesting cars on display.  This included a huge American convertible with a folding metal roof.  the rear of the car was very long to allow it to be stowed away.  There were interesting curiosities like a Stanley steamer, a couple of Bristols and a pair of landcrab utes.   The Jaguar section was quite good.  There was a lovely Series 1 XJ6 with a manual transmission and a red interior.  While white isn’t my favorite colour, a red interior and a manual transmission makes it very tempting.  The red XJC was also very nice.

They didn’t just have regular cars, there were also military vehicles and micro cars.   The Microcars were quite good.

The ACT club had a catered lunch which was a nice touch.  The food at these sort of events is normally pretty bad and overpriced.  Sandwiches and fruit from the club was a far better option.

The drive back was pretty uneventful.  I arrived back late afternoon after covering 610km with abut a quarter of a tank left.  I’m still undecided if I should refuel the 240D now, or park it for a few weeks to see what happens.  Most of my other cars are full and I don’t really fancy $3 diesel.

I think the club made a good choice to hold the rally outside Sydney.  Sydney is no place for a car event   Terrible traffic, expensive parking etc.   A regional centre is a much better choice.

I didn’t do the whole rally but when the club announced they would offer day passes, I decided to go up for the Saturday.   The events on that day were much more in line with my interests than some of the other days.   The programme was to a convoy lap around Mt Panorama, led by former racing driver Colin Bond.   Then a show and shine at pit lane, followed by a tour of the Bathurst racing museum.

I decided it would be a perfect day to take my 250SE Cabriolet and two of my kids wanted to join me.   We left early, departing home at twenty to six, as the start of the guided lap was 9:30.  It was absolutely perfect weather for a convertible after weeks of hot and muggy weather in Sydney.

Complicating things were the surge in petrol prices due to yet another pointless middle east war, plus the structural failure of the convict built Victoria Pass, the main road over the blue mountains from Sydney.   I would have normally taken bells line of road anyway, as I detest the great western highway.  However the media were predicting it to be a parking lot.   Turns out it was totally overblown and the traffic was even less than normal.   We used the extra 20 minutes for a pitstop at McDonalds Lithgow.

Coming out of Lithgow, all of sudden i heard something, like there was something on the road that had hit the underside of the car.   I figured perhaps a stone or something like that.  Nothing else seemed to be amiss.  However, going around the next corner i realized I no longer had power steering.  Water temperature and the charge light were both fine, so it looked like I had lost my power steering belt.

Since there wasn’t much I could do by the side of the road, I proceeded to Bathurst.  The car was perfectly drivable, but with increased steering effort.   Lower speed and tighter turns were obviously a lot more effort.

We arrived at the Rally at 9:35AM, perfect timing as the convoy was just assembling for the lap of the track.  We joined up the rear behind a 420SE.   It was quite a cool sight driving behind over 100 Mercedes-Benz around the track.  We ended up doing four laps as it took quite a while for the cars earlier in the convoy to get into pit lane and parked.   The extra laps certainly gave my arms a good workout.

I was surprised how many of the cars were moderns, I had assumed more classics would attend.   I’m not sure if it was due to the fuel prices, or that is what people planned all along.  Certainly I am sure that some people dropped out altogether and I’m sure more would have come up from Sydney from the day too.  Having said that, while the prices are very high, they are not substantially higher than they have been over the last couple of years.  I filled the 250SE up at 2.539 per liter, and looking at my fuel log, it was only 10c less than this at the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

As well as all the moderns, there were some nice classics on display from interstate.  My favorite was a Horizon Blue 280SE W116 from Queensland.  Apparently it had been in long term family ownership and it’s a real credit to the family for keeping it in such nice original condition.     Not too many older cars, although a couple of roundies had come in from interstate which was awesome.

There were some new MBs on display.  Chief among them was a massive Maybach SUV.   I don’t see the appeal at all.  To my eyes, it was tacky and overdone and more of a conveyance for footballers and rappers to be seen in than anything else.  I would have the blue 280SE any day of the week.

It was also good to catch up with a few interstate members that I know at this event.

Lunch was at a food truck near the event which was overpriced and had a massive wait. The quality wasn’t worth the wait either. I would have thought the day pass should have included lunch, as it wasn’t cheap.

After lunch we went to the museum which is quite good.  I covered this more extensively for Youngtimer Sacco day 2024.  The tour back then was more comprehensive, at the Rally it was more of an introduction to the museum.   There are some very interesting cars there and its well worth a visit.

We left at roughly 3:30PM.   As with our arrival, the traffic from Lithgow to Darling Causeway was less than normal, so we made good time, finding more traffic through Dural and Pennant Hills than the area with road closures.  Taking the W111 through these roads sans power steering certainly gave my arms a good workout.   We arrived home at around 7PM after covering 472km for the day.

On the way I filled up my 240D for the first time on this trip.  I had gone through 627km from 62.7 liters of diesel, which I don’t think is that bad with my foot to the floor the whole time and the A/C on max. I have a 80 liter tank from a 280E in my car, giving it very good range.

We had a pretty good turn out of W123s at the cafe and everyone was able to grab some breakfast before heading over to the Show and Shine at the Spanish Club for the 10am start.

As each car drove in, they were allocated a number for judging.  This also made it easier to see how many cars we had.  The numbers slowly ticked up and up as more cars arrived.   We had the cars arranged by body style, with a couple of rows for Saloons, plus a row each for wagons and coupes.

In the end, we had 83 cars there on the day.  That was an amazing result.   I went around and cataloged all the cars on display.  I must have missed a couple, as my count ended up as 80 cars, which consisted of:

• 300D – 17
• 280CE – 17
• 280E – 16
• 230E – 10
• 300TD – 7
• 240D – 4
• 280TE – 3
• 250 – 2
• 200 – 2
• 230TE – 1
• 230 – 1

Like with the number of cars from yesterday, the models were heavily skewed towards enthusiast models.  It also had at least one example of every model sold new here in Australia, and a couple that were not like the 200.   The 230 and 250 were sold new here, but few now remain and it was good to see a few examples.

The states were also well registered, with the 80 cars I counted registered in the following states.  Some of the NSW registered cars were probably local, from places like Queanbeyan.

• NSW – 34
• Victoria – 23
• ACT – 11
• Queensland – 10
• SA – 2

As would be expected, we didn’t have any cars from Northern Territory or Western Australia.  It would have been a stellar effort to drive one across the Nullabor in the peak of summer.  Regardless, it shows the popularity of the model, with so many people driving so far to attend the event.

It was also striking how many really nice cars there were on display.   Additionally, how well some cars wore their milage.  There were plenty of cars that were totally immaculate with over 300,000km on the clock.

As well as displaying the cars, everyone got to compete for some prizes.   The first two awards were by vote.  The crowd favorite was exactly as it sounds.  I voted for a lovely 300D in 476 Goldbraun.  It had been in long term family ownership and these period seventies colours are so thin on the ground now.  The deserving winner was the 300TD that won best in show at the ACT concours last year.

The next award was the workhorse award, which was for a car that had lived a full life but was still on the road and being used and here at the event.  The fitting winner of that car was a 300D with over 600,000km and plenty of battle scars to show for it.   This car was also piloted by the winner of the youngest owner award, fitting to see the next generation of W123 owners at the event.

We also had an award for the rarest and most unusual options.  Each person had to fill in the options list for their car.  My car, being a 240D, scored a goose egg for the options list.  Its not even sporting a lockable glovebox.  I did pick up some points for still having my Becker radio.

After some confusion with quite a few cars apparently having ABS brakes and column shifters, we worked out that the car that had the rarest options was a 300TD with a five speed manual transmission, cloth interior, sunroof and a few other options.

The next award was for the car with the highest mileage, standing at almost 850,000km.  Quite the contrast to the car that won the lowest mileage award with 28,000km.  There was also an award for the longest distance travelled to the event, a little over 1500km from Queensland.

There were plenty of cars that has been in low term family ownership.  However, the car that won the award had been picked up by the owners father brand new from the factory in 1977.  That car was one of the now rare 250 models on display.

As well as the awards, everyone was able to get a commemorative grille badge for their car.  These were only available on the day, so it will become quite a status symbol of being one of the 83 W123s that were there on the day.

The number of cars really exceeded all expectations, and it really showed the passion of the W123 owners group for their cars.  Not just for owning them, but also for using them.   I think its a bit sad that some models of Mercedes-Benz have become so valuable that they have passed into a different type of owner who rarely use them.  Pagodas are now like that for the most part.

I really enjoyed walking around and seeing so many amazing W123s.  And the range of colours on display was pretty special too. The weather was very hot, but that didn’t seem to deter anyone.  I know a few cars that left after the show and shine to head back to Sydney struggled in the heat a little.

After the show and shine, there were some optional activities.  I did the one at Questacon, which is a favorite of my kids.   Surprisingly they are far more interested in this than W123s.   Given how how it was, it was air conditioned which was good.

The final part of the day was the official dinner at the Belconnen Labour club.   This was where the awards detailed above were handed out, as well as a trivia competition and some other prizes, such as Penrite Oil.   The dinner was fun and low key, much better in my opinion than the ‘gala’ dinners that often go with events of this nature.

50 years later, the Australian Mercedes-Benz clubs and the W123 facebook group, led by MBCACT are celebrating the anniversary of this model that appealed to taxi drivers and luxury car buyers alike.

The event is being held in Canberra, as its the most centrally located city for such an event, being very accessible from both Sydney and Melbourne, and reasonable accessible to Adelaide and Brisbane.

The core of the event is over the Australia day long weekend.  Today is mostly about getting to Canberra and attending the welcome BBQ.   The event has been designed to be as accessible to W123 owners as possible.

Instead of a fixed agenda and a cost to register for the event, it has been set up as individual events that people can choose to attend or not-attend as they like.   That means some people may choose just to attend the show and shine only, while others like me will attend the entire thing.   I think this is the best way of doing things.   That includes there being no event hotel.  People can choose to stay where they want in Canberra that fits in with their budget.   On car events, I prefer to choose basic accommodation as I’m only using it to sleep, and don’t spend any time in the room.  It just needs to be clean, have air conditioning, a private bathroom and decent parking.

While a lot of the heavy lifting to set this event up has been done by MBCACT, each of the state clubs had a volunteer to be part of the event committee.   I volunteered to be the MBCNSW representative.   This involved creating a drive down for those who wanted to do the entire event.

We met up with a group from MBCQ at Pheasants Nest to do the main part of the drive down to Canberra together.   In the end we had 12 cars, although we picked up one of them along the way.   Seven from NSW and Five from Queensland.   That included two coupes (both 280CE’s) and a wagon (at 300TD), with the rest sedans.   The sedans were made up of 240D, 300D, 230E and 280E models.     I would have liked a few more cars from NSW, but I know quite a few people are driving down tomorrow.   Mileages in our group ranged from the 300TD with almost half a million kilometers to one of the 300Ds that only had 28,000km.

We drove together from Pheasants Nest to Weereewa Lookout at Lake George.  I found my 240D was able to maintain normal freeway speeds on all the hills except for one.  I think that is pretty good.   This was with my AC on max the whole time.

At Weereewa Lookout we stopped to get some photos of our whole convoy.  From there, we went our separate ways to our various accommodation.

At 6PM, most of us met up at Black Mountain Peninsula for a welcome BBQ.   I was impressed by the number of cars we had at the BBQ, given how many are coming in tomorrow.   The event was kindly catered by one of the MBCACT members, which was incredibly generous.   There were a good number of local cars as well as quite a big contingent from MBCV and at least one car from South Australia.     There was a good variety of cars in various different colours.  Its a great reminder that it used to be possible to buy cars in colour, instead of monochrome like today.  There were a few cars that are now rare like the 230 and 250.

The weather was the total opposite of the original Launch in Stuttgart. It was hot and sunny, and I am very glad I had my A/C regassed for this event.

As with last year, I drove down on Saturday afternoon to attend the pre-concours dinner.  It is a good way to catch up with friends in the ACT Club and is not too formal.   After the dinner I took my car to the 24 hour car wash to try and get it ready for the day.    There was a decent contingent from MBCNSW on the day, but the rest of them drove down Sunday morning.

I took my 1978 450SE this year.   I decided to go into the full concours event this year.   My car is probably more suitable for road class, but I thought there was a reasonable chance I would be the only car in my class.   As it turns out, there was a concours worthy 1977 280SE.  That car was a very worthy winner.

The event was very good as usual.   This year it was back close to Canberra city.    There were probably about 50 Mercedes-Benz there, and around 200 cars overall.   W123s were the biggest contingent, which bodes well for the 50th anniversary event to be held in Canberra in January next year.

Not only were the W123’s the biggest contingent, but a W123 was the outright winner.    The 1981 300TD is probably the best one in Australia and was a very worthy winner.   It is the same car that won its class last year and was even better this time around.

Surprsingly there were more W116s than W126s.  As well as my 450SE and the 280SE, there was also a very nice 1974 450SEL.   The early cars are not that common.    The ACT club normally does well with some models that are not common in the NSW club like compact sedans and older models.   There were fewer of the older models this time, but there were to very nice compacts.

As you would expect there was also a good contingent of W124s, cementing the W124 as an emerging and popular classic.   Among the models was a very rare E300D.   Surprisingly, there were only two R107s, normally a mainstay of these types of events.

The other marques were well represented.   The BMW display was skewed towards newer cars, but there were some nice classics on display.   There were also some interesting Audis and other niche marques, and the VW display was dominated by beetles and Kombis, as would be expected.

The drive there and back in my 1978 450SE was smooth and uneventful.  The W116 is a very good long distance cruiser.

Unlike last year, there was a fairly decent size group from MBCNSW going down for the event.   They were driving down early this morning.   In the last couple of years I have been going, I prefer to drive down Saturday afternoon, attend the pre-show dinner and stay over in Canberra.    It makes for a far more relaxed weekend.    I stayed in the Ibis Budget hotel up the road from the event for only $90 per night.  I thought this was well worth it.    That meant I didn’t join the rest of the NSW group, who arrived later in the morning.

As well as attending the dinner, which I always enjoy, I was also able to take the car for a wash the evening before the show.    I entered my car in display only this year.   MBCACT has a great system where they have gold class, which is proper concours, silver class which is basically a road class for cars that are regularly used, and then display.   This is a system I wish we would adopt in NSW.    One of the things that works well about it, is that if you have won road class, you have to compete in gold class the next time.

Most of my cars are suitable for silver or road class. However, my 560SEC is more of a driver and fits better in display only.   I was parked next to a very nice 380SEC with only 104,000km which was naturally being judged.

As well as the system of judging, the other things I like about the ACT event is how they try to park the cars along with other similar models.   For example 123s and 114/115s together, 126s and 116s and so on.   I think this makes for a much better display.   The ACT club also normally do very well with older cars, like the 170D that was on display this year.   In other years they have had good displays of roundies, W110s, 114/115s etc.

This year the event was in a new location.   I understand the council in Queanbeyan no longer allow cars on Queanbeyan park, which is a shame as that was a superb location.   This event was held at the racecourse.  It wasn’t a bad location, but it was a bit cramped compared to the last few years.

As this was the 2024 ACT German car show, the other German car marques were on display.   The BMW and Porsche displays are far more focused on modern performance cars that don’t hold a great deal of interest for me.  However, the BMW display had a few really nice models on display such as a nice E24, nice survivor E3, and plenty of E30s.   Didn’t see to many E28s which is a model I like.    The VW display was tilted towards Beetles, Kombi Vans and Karmann Ghia’s, with some modern VWs for good measure.   The Audi display was quite small, and there was a Borgward and Trabant.

Overall the Mercedes-Benz display was a bit smaller than in other years.   Not sure if this was the location, or perhaps there were competing events in Canberra this year. In addition, it was such a shame to see the 170D have its guard bent by a W126 LWB that misjudged the turn.  The damage is eminently fixable, but that won’t make the owner feel any better.   Despite that, there were still some real highlights in terms of the cars on display.

The biggest one for me was the pristine 1981 300TD Wagon.    It really was immaculate.   It had a little over 200,000km on the clock, but it looked like it had less than half of that.   Most of these cars were used up as family cars, yet this one remained totally original, even down to the radio delete plate.   I would own it in a heartbeat.   There is a big W123 event planned for the Australia day long weekend in 2025, to celebrate 50 years of the W123.  I suspect this wagon is one of the best in the country and it will be interesting to see it against the other wagons at that event.   I’m already starting to get my 240D ready.

Next I really liked the Black 220SE Coupe.  I have a soft spot for the W111 coupe and cabriolet models, and this car was very nice.   Black with a red interior is also a colour combination that suits the model far better than the more ubiquitous white.   Given our climate, not many were delivered in that combo, and I am not sure if that car was originally sold in Australia or not.

I also liked a W115 240D.  I’m not sure of the name of the colour, but it was a sort of burnt orange.  It was a lovely original car from Wagga.   It also had all the things you would expect to see in a country delivered Australian W115, such as the stone guards, AWA speakers, towbar etc.

There was also a nice selection of cars from MBCNSW.   MBCNSW members did quite well with some of the awards on the day too.  My standout pick was the 1985 280SE in Manila Beige.  Like the 300TD wagon, it is a real time warp and such a lovely car to see.

I really enjoyed the day and was glad I made the trip down.

MBCACT always puts on a special display for this show and Wheels 2024 was no different.   The goal was to show the different generations of the S class (and predecessors) and the E class (and predecessors).   I wasn’t able to go last year, but the theme was AMG cars.   In 2022, I took my 450SLC and the theme was a car from each year from the 50s to today.

In order to show the different generations of the S-Class, I was asked to bring my W111 Cabriolet.  This was a great opportunity to take the car on a longer trip now its running properly.  Of course, less than a week after I agreed to show the car, the power steering pully disintegrated, but I managed to get a used pully and have it installed in time.

On the drive there, the engine ran perfectly, but the ride wasn’t all that good.  I think it may be related to the tyres, perhaps they have flat spots.    They are 8 years old now, so its time for a change.

As in 2022, the show was good.  MBCACT was allocated a much smaller area this year, although there was actually plenty of room at the showground.   Probably something that can be addressed for next year.

There are some nice cars in the MBCACT and this year was no different.   I had a very original 230S W111 on one side of my car and an immaculate 280S W108 on the other.    The 230S is still with the original family.    Having all the S-classes lined up allowed for the different design features to be observed from one generation to the next.   It was intresting to see that the W116 still had tiny vestigial fins.  Kind of like the vestigial legs of a whale.

The rest of Wheels 2024 was also very good.  There was a lot of variety.  For example, it was quite cool to see a Stanley Steamer puffing around the showground.    A bit smaller than in 2022, but that probably had to do with the weather.  While the morning of the show was hot and sunny, the day before had been stormy and storms were forecast for the afternoon.

On the way back, the rain was torrential.   All the modern SUVs were pulling over onto the shoulder, and few seemed to understand how to operate their rear fog light.    The W111 Cabriolet just kept going, albeit at about 50km for long stretches.

The night before the ACT club normally organize a dinner.   This year was a fun informal event, where we all had to guess some rare Mercedes parts, including a C107 glove box torch, fuse pliers, a wooden tool for pre-war radiator caps and more.   The one we couldn’t work out was why some compact (W114/W115) lug wrenches have a tab that means you can’t use it on alloy wheels.     And the same part number as lug wrenches that don’t have that tab.

This year I took my 560SEC and entered it the ‘Silver’ road class.    I figure it would be a good trial run for the road trip to Melbourne I am planning for November, especially after the recent transmission rebuild.    The car went very well and I didn’t notice anything I wasn’t already aware of.    The wheel wobble that I already knew about was quite annoying though.    I didn’t win anything, but I didn’t expect to.  My SEC is very much a driver, and would be lucky to even win Silver class.   As I have covered before, I think the Silver class is great and I wish the NSW event would do something similar.

This year one of the judges had to pull out, so I was asked to help.   I’ve never judged before and it was a good experience to do it for the first time.  I learned quite a lot and it also helped me really look carefully at the Gold class cars I was judging.  My allocation was exterior judging.   I think there were about 15 cars to judge.

The thing that became apparent was the need to separate the cars to make sure the excellent cars are separated from the really nice ones and the really nice ones from the good ones.    It meant that cars that looked quite nice on the surface in a particular category might get a score of 5 or 6, because there were a few grades of nicer cars in that category.     If I ever do again, my experience this year will be very helpful to do it better.

Having been involved in the judging,   I was keen to see the results, and the overall winner and runner up were very well deserved.   The winner was a 250SE coupe in amazing condition, and the runner up a 420SEL.     While these two were the clear winners my personal favourite was a green 220Sb fintail.   The owner had driven it up from Melbourne and it had an interesting and colour combination of a green exterior with a red interior.   It worked really well.    The paint wasn’t perfect, but it had a great patina to it.

The ACT show is always so well organized.   The event team had pre-painted lines on the grass for where all the cars should park.    The gold class cars were arranged in a circle around a circular flower bed.   Different models were parked together with signs explaining some details about the cars.    There were less cars from NSW than normal, as MBCNSW had a different event today.

Being focused on the judging, I didn’t spend as much time looking at the other marques as I usually would.   The BMW and Porsche clubs are more modern focused, but the BMW display had some nice older models.   The VW display is also quite varied, with plenty of beetles, Kombis and also more modern cars.

As with the 2019 event, I chose to drive down on Saturday so I could show a car and attend the dinner.   This year I chose to bring my 560SEL on the trip.   The running issues on my 250SE are not quite fully sorted out for a long drive, and given the weather all year, I expected decent rain.   I also didn’t have undercover parking this year.

I entered my 560SEL in the silver division, which is basically for road going cars.   Its a great idea and one that I wish the club in NSW would adopt.   It really opens up the event for everyone vs people who have nut and bolt restorations or spend weeks with white gloves on finding that last spec of dust.

They have quite a good system where if you win silver class, you must compete in gold next time (full concours).  And if you win gold you must compete in champions class.   Next time I bring my 250SE, I’ll be in gold, as I won silver in 2019.   Assuming I don’t win in Gold that year I can compete in Silver the year after.    That promotion/relegation system means that everyone gets an opportunity.  Its a great system.     And a huge contrast with NSW that collapsed the categories putting it out of reach except for the super wealthy.

The highlight of the show was the 1938 230 Cabriolet B, owned by John and Sandra Green.    It’s an amazing restoration when you look at the before and after pictures.   pre-war Mercedes-Benz models are very rare in Australia and it was great to see one of this quality on display.

The ACT event always does well with the roundies too, there was a great display of them parked nearby the 230 Cabriolet.   I also noticed how many nice W114/115 saloons there were on display at the show.   That model seems far better represented in the ACT than in NSW.  I also admired a W109 six cylinder in very nice condition.  I love all the small luxury touches on the W109 you only spot if you look closely.     On the other side there are generally more SLs at the NSW event.  Maybe it’s the weather.

Overall there were about 80 Mercedes-Benz on display with a good selection of the various models.   Probably the only real exception were the ‘presidential’ class of cars such as the 300 Adenauer and the 600.   For various reasons, we only had about 4-5 cars on display from NSW this year.   In other years we have had up to 20, so hopefully next time we will be able to bring a big contingent.

The BMW display was very large this year.   You can see the different focuses of the clubs – the BMW club is far more focused on the new M models vs the classics that were in quite small numbers.   The same went for the Porsche and Audi displays.   The VW display on the other hand is a bit more diverse, with the Beetle and the Kombi favorites.

The 2022 ACT German car show was held at Queanbeyan park.   I thought it was a good location – better than the greyhound track used last year.   There was plenty of room for more cars if they choose this venue again next year.

Not only was it fun to go down and be part of the Wheels 2022 display, it turned out to be a great shakedown run for my 450SLC.   I’m planning to taking the car on a 4,000km road trip for the Mercedes-Benz clubs national rally next month.  COVID restrictions have meant few opportunities for longer drives, to make sure there is nothing I need to attend to before the rally.

In addition, the Wheels 2022 event, the Rolls Royce Owners club was holding their federal rally close by.   It was only a 10 minute walk to go and check out the display.

As I was in my 450SLC, I was representing 1977.    I was also joined by a friend from the NSW club who happened to be representing the next year, 1978.  I drove down to Canberra Friday evening to visit family before the event.  In the last couple of weeks, the east coast of Australia has been hit pretty hard with storms.   This weekend was no exception the the only two nights out of the year I had to park the car outside it bucketed down with rain.   I ended up with some minor leakage, presumably from the windscreen, but nothing too serious.    We were very lucky with the show itself – the rain held off all morning.

While the Mercedes-Benz display was really strong, numbers were down in the areas for the other clubs.   I suspect the rain kept them away.   A pity, it would have been good to see more of those cars.    I really liked the idea from the MBCACT for Wheels 2022.   I’ve been to a few of their events now, and I always find them well organized.    Just parking the cars together in their ‘eras’ is a great idea.

The 50’s.

The 50’s display was really strong.   There are not so many of these cars still on the road, so to get so many out was a big achievement.    As you would expect the Roundie (Ponton) models dominated this display, however there was a really nice 170Da, a 300b Adenauer and a couple of the four cylinder models.   The later one even having a full length Webasto sunroof.

• 1951: 170Da (136)
• 1952: – (1:18 scale model)
• 1953: 300b (186)
• 1954: 180D (120)
• 1955: 220a (180)
• 1956: 220S (180)
• 1957: 220S (180)
• 1958: 220S (180)
• 1959: 220S (180)
• 1960: 190b or 190Db (121)

If I had been able to pick one to take home, I think it would have been the blue 220S representing 1956.  1952 was missing, so it was a nice touch that the club provided a 1:18 scale model of a 300SL.

The 60’s.

The 1960’s display was a very nice mix of models available in that era.   1962 was missing, but was represented by a model of a W112.   The display was also a nice mix of survivors to best in show concours winners.   The W110 190 was a real barn find, delivered to its new owner on the day and still with many interesting early W110 touches.   My favorite is obviously the 220SE Cabriolet, produced earlier the same year as my car.   Excluding that, I liked the 300SEL representing 1968.

• 1961: 220S or 220b (111)
• 1962: – (1:18 scale model)
• 1963: 230SL (113)
• 1964: 220SE Cabriolet (111)
• 1965: 190 (110)
• 1966: 250SE Coupe (111)
• 1967: 200 (110)
• 1968: 300SEL 2.8 (109)
• 1969: 280SL (113)
• 1970: 300SEL 3.5 (109)

The 70’s.

The 70’s display was another really good mix of cars.  It also showed clearly how quickly the styling modernized from the earlier cars to the late.   I was part of this display representing 1977.   Given how popular they are in club circles, I was surprised there were no R107s in the lineup, but it was nice to see some of the other cars from this era.   Had I been given the opportunity to swap my car for something else in the line, was much as there were some very nice cars, I think I would have still been driving home in my SLC.      The 280SE representing 1971 was an interesting car as it appeared to be equipped with leather upholstery.   Very unusual for W108 in Australia.

• 1971: 280SE (108)
• 1972: 280SE 3.5 (108)
• 1973: 230 (114)
• 1974: 450SEL (116)
• 1975: 280E (114)
• 1976: 280CE (114)
• 1977: 450SLC (107)
• 1978: 280CE (123)
• 1979: 280SEL (116)
• 1980: 300D (123)

The 80’s.

The 1980’s display highlighted that while the top of the line models were rarest when sold new, these days they outnumber the standard models.   Especially in the early 80s, the exclusive coupe models dominated the display.    It was quite interesting to compare the two late 280CE’s with the 70’s 280CE models.   While some things had changed, quite a lot had not.

I think I would have taken the 500SL home had I the chance.

• 1981: 380SEC (126)
• 1982: 280SL (107)
• 1983: 380SEC (126)
• 1984: 280CE (123)
• 1985: 280CE (123)
• 1986: 300SE (126)
• 1987: 190E 2.6 (201)
• 1988: 500SL (107)
• 1989: 420SEL (126)
• 1990: 300CE-24 (124)

The 90’s.

The 90’s display was dominated my the high end W124 models, particular the cabriolet.   The star of this line up was the original AMG coupe, but the convertibles are pretty impressive too.   I didn’t quite catch the model numbers of some of the later cars. I would have taken the AMG coupe from this era.

After all the COVID restrictions of 2020 and 2021 it was great to go to a real car show again.   The MBCACT outdid themselves with the Wheels 2022 event.   I hope to be back again, and if they do the yearly display again, maybe representing another year.

The displays from the other marques added a lot of variety to the show, and hopefully next year numbers will be back up, if the weather holds.