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IMO POND TliFIREPVPCA

20th December 2001
Page 46
Page 46, 20th December 2001 — IMO POND TliFIREPVPCA
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Although the Stuttgart-based Classic Centre operates the transporter, it did not build the replica. MIKA, a car restoration firm based in Win near Hamburg, first approached Mercedes-Benz with the idea, and was given the go-ahead in 1993. But although the Classic Centre could help with components it could not provide blueprints—the original transporter had simply been built from scratch, without working drawings. In fact, this is one of the few Mercedes known to have been constructed without a proper build sheet. The race department was next door to the road car development department—still sited beside the Unterturkheim test track—and Neubauer's team could simply pick and choose parts which looked right.

A few dimensions and component details were known, and luckily a basic "workshop manual" was found, but everything else had to be worked out from staff reports, photographs and magazine articles. The whole job took MIKA 6,000 hours spread over seven years: much of this was spent in refining details such as the steering and gearshift mechanism, suspension geometry and—of course—those double -curved rear windows. These are specially made glass items on the replica, though the originals were Plexiglas. When the replica was completed it weighed in at just 20kg more than the original—about as much as a pair of glass windows...

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