How Uhlenhaut demonstrated fabulous times with the Mercedes Benz 300 SEL 6.3
In 1968, Automobil Revue received a Mercedes Benz 300 SEL 6.3 for testing. The editors of the Swiss magazine failed in their attempt to equalize the factory specifications for acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h.
Rudolf Uhlenhaut, Member of the Board of Management at Mercedes Benz, did not want to let this happen to him or the Mercedes brand and personally traveled to Bern to show the boys how it could be done. However, there was a bang at the rapid start and the transmission broke down.
Uhlenhaut immediately requested a second car. This arrived by truck the next day. Now Uhlenhaut managed the sprint from 0 to 100 km/h in a fabulous time. He used a special technique for the lightning start: The 6.3-litre also drove off in second gear during the lightning start, but when accelerating it was possible to shift into first gear and thus achieve a miracle time.
The damaged first car was then loaded onto the transporter and transported to Stuttgart, while the test work could be completed with the second vehicle.