Mercedes-Benz C111 Sacco-Studie

Extra information

This product of the brand Mercedes-Benz and type C111 Sacco-Studie in the color Silver with article number 06008 is produced in the scale 1:43, which results in a size of ± 7 cm. The manufacturer is AutoCult and the material used id Resin.

The Pioneer
 
In the mid-1960s a mid-engine sports car, internally designated with the abbreviation SL-X, was created at Mercedes-Benz. Its design based on the idea of the Italian Giorgio Battistella.

 

Giorgio Battistella and the former head of the Mercedes-Benz design department, Paul Bracq, sat down together and pondered about the design of a new sports car with the three-pointed star emblem on the hood. It can be assumed that from day one both creative minds envisioned a car that abandoned all applicable rules for a sports car at that time. In the end, after surely several discussions, sketches and drafts, Paul Bracq, who had the final say in his role as the head of the design department, gave his approval for an extremely flat design of Battistella. To facilitate the low-slung body it was scheduled to position the engine straight behind the seats. How advanced the plans regarding the realization of the sports car at Mercedes-Benz were, is not known. But at least, for a more precise consideration, it was generally agreed to build a wooden mock up without an engine and any interior. Ultimately the responsible persons concluded to shelve the SL-X project and the sports coupe never progressed beyond the mock-up stage. Perhaps Bruno Sacco got his inspiration from the SL-X later on and adopted some characteristic components of the sports coupe concept, like the gull-wing doors and the seamlessly flushed pop-up headlamps, for the scheduled long-term development project called C-111, which became popular, also outside the car scene, for its orange-colored experimental vehicles.

 

The history of the SL-X is recently cherished by Mercedes-Benz itself in the company’s own museum, where the wooden mock up is on exhibition.