A British billionaire has reportedly forked out the equivalent of 400 Mercedes-Benz AMG GT sports cars to secure a 66-year-old “Uhlenhaut” coupe.
The record price paid for a car may have nearly tripled this week, with a historic Mercedes-Benz reportedly selling for €135 million ($AU204m).
According to Hagerty UK, one of just two 1956 Silver Arrows 300 SLR “Uhlenhaut” coupes ever built has been off-loaded from the German car giant’s private collection.
The outlet claims 10 wealthy collectors were quietly flown into Stuttgart for the auction under strict conditions, including a guarantee the successful bidder would not resell the car.
The buyer hasn’t been revealed, however is reportedly a “well-known figure from Britain’s automotive industry and a long-standing collector of specialist cars.”
If the claims prove to be accurate, this would comfortably make it most expensive car of all time – the previous record holder was a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO sold in 2018 for $US48.5 million ($AU70 million).
Multiple other vehicles – including a several Ferraris and a Bugatti – have been rumoured to sell for more, however these claims have not been substantiated.
The 1956 Silver Arrows 300 SLR “Uhlenhaut” coupes were modified road-legal variants of the 300 SLR race car – best known for a catastrophic accident at Le Mans that left 83 spectators dead.
While several examples were set to be built for customer sale, the project was cancelled following the accident and Mercedes-Benz’s subsequent exit from motorsport.
A 3.0-litre straight-eight petrol engine sent 228kW/317Nm to the rear wheels via a five-speed manual transmission, allowing the 0-100km/h sprint to be completed in a claimed 7.7 seconds.
Top speed came at 290km/h, making it comfortably the fastest road-going vehicle to have ever been built at the time.
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