Merc’s (oh fine, and McLaren’s, I suppose) SLR supercar is going to be phased out to pave the way for the next uber Merc car (supposedly called SLC, by the way, and it’s gonna have those gullwing doors), but being the classy guys they are, Mercedes has released a bunch of special editions, 722 S Roadster (full gallery here) and Stirling Moss among them, to phase it out in loud, obnoxious, and deliciously exotic style.

Well, the top tuner (oh that is suuch a degrading term, let’s try “aftermarket modifying”) companies are lining up to pay their respects as well, by unleashing their very own take on what the SLR McLaren could be. Hamann’s version is called the “Volcano”, and you can view the video after the jump. We’ll hit you with the specs, pics, and general info on the car in a later post. Continue Reading…

In the words of Lando Calrissian, “What have we here?!”

What we have is Mercedes going a little crazy time with the SLR again. This is what, the 3rd? 4th?, something like that, time that Merc has rolled out a custom version of their (and McLaren’s) uber-car, the SLR. In this instance it’s the SLR Stirling Moss, which will have a limited production run of only 75 copies.

There are a number of reasons why this is an interesting car, to find out why, see more pretty pictures and read the press release, join me after the jump.

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Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren 722 S Roadster

The latest (and probably last) iteration of the SLR McLaren called the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren 722 S Roadster gets a ridiculously powerful 5.5 liter supercharged V8 boasting 650 horsepower, 605 lb/feet of torque, a 0-62 mph time of 3.7 seconds, and a top speed of 220 mph, making it the fastest convertible ever made. Check out the photo gallery below: Continue Reading…

The run of the Mercedes SLR McLaren supercar will soon come to an end, but that doesn’t mean that Mercedes is going to let it die quietly. Oh no.

This is Mercedes’ idea of refocusing attention back onto the SLR McLaren, and it works. Brilliantly.

Not only is this quite possibly the last iteration of the supercar (depending on whether the “SLR Speedster” will be built), it also has impressive statistics going for it, lest you think that this is just another overpriced, rebadged Merc. Due to the beastliness of its AMG hand built 5.5 liter supercharged V8, the 722 S Roadster boasts 650 horsepower, 605 pound-feet of torque, a 0-62 mph time of 3.7 seconds, and a top speed of 220 mph. That last little tidbit makes it the fastest production convertible in history.

Damn.

Of course, such insanity is never without a catch. In this case the catch consists mainly of a price tag so astronomical Mercedes hasn’t even released it. It is confirmed that the 722 S Roadster will be limited to 150 examples, which will be made starting January 1st of 2009.

Not for the first time, I wish I was so rich I sweat droplets of gold (like Bill Gates. Not. But did you know he makes over $4 million every night when he sleeps?)

More pictures and a spec sheet to follow… Continue Reading…

Well, looks like Mercedes is going at it again.

The SLR McLaren is a fantastic supercar, combining the luxury, quality, and technical precision of Mercedes with the performance prowess of McLaren. The car can hit 208 mph, accelerates from 0-60 in 3.6 seconds, has 617 horses and 575 pound-feet of torque. That all sounds good, until you hit the price tag of around $500,000. Sales never matched expectations, and have been steadly dropping off.

To remedy that, Merc has been releasing several variants of the SLR (e.g. 722 Edition and the Roadster), but sales haven’t started the climb up. It looks like they are going to give it one last try, in the most hardcore version yet.

What you see above is artist Jon Sibal’s impression of what the SLR “Speedster” (not official name) looks like. This was the result of his prodigious artistic talent when applied to deciphering a series of camouflaged spy shots. I can’t vouch for the accuracy, but it looks pretty darn good to me. No official specs yet, but if Sibal’s picture is any indication, it’ll be just beastly (check out the wider and more aggressive bodywork, the roof (or lack of) and those extreme side exhaust vents).

At one point in my life I worked with three guys who all worked in The Middle East for American oil companies.

They were about as different individuals as you could get in America: One was jogger/partier, the other was a Rush Limbaugh/angry whit guy sort, and the third was about as flamboyant a queen as I’ve ever seen, and they all agreed, strenuously, about one thing:

Seemingly no one in The Middle East drives like they care about life and limb, theirs or anyone else’s.

I thought about those three guys and their take on driving in Saudi and The Emirates et al when I saw the picture above.

That, believe it or not, is what remains of a Mercedes McLaren SLR when you get it unstuck at “say hello to Allah speeds”. An SLR is a very very capable car, which, to my mind, is good since there’s so few of them, and they’re so expensive. This is a Bill Gate’s level of wealth sort of ride, so it’s not all that surprising that a bunch of them would end up in the capital storage capital of the world.

So, you get one of those grand concordances: way too much disposable cash + too young/inexperienced a driver + a driving environment where there is a cavalier attitude towards safety = pieces.

“The massive debris field scattered across the Qatari desert suggests the car was traveling at very high speed, rendering any amount of carbon-fiber protection useless.”

Gee, ya think?!

Kul-wahad … More photos post jump & thanks to Los Jalops for the original post.

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