the "S" in SD

[angst]

I need some education on the different models. I understand that the TD does not stand for "turbo diesel" but signifies the station wagon models. I have a 79 300SD. What does the "S" mean? How is my car different from a 300D. I thought that it was the same except for the turbo but I saw a 300D driving the other day that had a turbo label on the back?
Most people in this group refer to thier body number (123 etc). What is my body style number? I am clueless when the discussion refers to this.
feelin dorky,
Eric Z

[leathermang]

Bill, Why would you give a German car a Spanish name ? I have two wagons, both TD but only one is a Turbo.. That messes with a lot of people.....

[leathermang]

Bill, That is an excellant answer... , Greg

[rickjordan]

Just some FYI, the W116 "300SD" was the first sedan to have a turbo diesel engine. It was made just for the U.S. and was brought here for model year 1978, with production stopping in 1980. The W123 sedan got this turbo engine in model year 1982. The W123 wagon got it in 1981.

As i understand it, the T in TD for estate cars stands for "Touring" and does not in any way pertain to the turbo part of turbo diesel.

My personal 300TD does not have a turbo on it.

S = s-class (best car mb makes)
D = diesel
E = gasoline, fuel injected
L = long wheelbase
T = "tourisk" wagon

300SD = 3.0L s-class diesel
300TD = 3.0L diesel wagon
300D = 3.0L diesel sedan, could be turbo or non turbo
560SEL = 5.6L gasoline s-class, long wheelbase

Hope this helps.

Wish I had this education before I bought my 300d turbo, don't get me wrong, I love my car but would be much happier in the larger and more stylish SD.
So I'm saving for one as we speak.

For such a smart group of guys, you still havn't answered the question... So, S=S-class, but what does the S mean? It means "Super." Thought I would clerify the situation... Now, the question, what does "E" mean? And don't tell me E-class... I know the answer, and for those of you who don't, look at the back of a 56 300SC. You will find the answer...

[JimSmith]

Randall and others,

Until Mercedes-Benz bowed to marketing pressure to make its model nomenclature more understandable by the non auto enthusiast type, the numbers referred to the engine displacement and the letters were modifiers to distinguish features of the engines ("E" stood for "Einspritzen" or injection, meaning fuel injection vs. carburetor, and "D" meant Diesel vs. gasoline fuel) or the chassis ("S" means "Sonder" which is German for "special," "SL" means "Sport Leicht" which is German for "sport light," "C" means "Coupe" (two door vs. four door), "T" means "Touring" which has been tagged as the station wagon (likely because it used to be that Germans did their touring of Italy and Spain in their cars every summer when the plants shut down and wagons were the car of choice for that activity), "G" for "Gelaendewagen, which we all know is the heavy duty off road vehicle, and the "L" that comes after a non-chassis modifying letter, like "E" or "D", means "Lang" for long, referring to the wheel base which is 3.9 inches or so longer on cars so designated.

All this was pretty straightforward until the number of product lines got too complicated to fully describe that way. When there were only "SL's", "S's", "T's" and the mid size vehicles with no letter designator, you could dope out the exact model using the code above. When the 190 series showed up, it had no letter, and the designator plan was to have the original engine displacement listed with the "D," "E" or not, depending on what you had followed by a correction scheme on the passenger side of the trunk, listing the actual displacement. Thus all 190's were called 190, followed by a letter to say if the engine had fuel injection ("E") or was a Diesel ("D"), and a number, like "2.3" or 2.6" or "2.2" or "2.5" to reveal the true engine description. Turbochargers were always noted with the word "Turbo" or "Turbocharged" on the passenger side of the trunk.

When the 190 started being the 190 class, and then came to the end of its production run the model nomenclature was changed across the board. Each chassis was given a letter designator and it was moved to the front of the nomenclature sequence. So, "SL's' became "SL500" or "S's" became S500" with the letters still indicating the engine displacement in liters (500 equals 5.0 liters, not 500 liters). At this point the "E" designator for fuel injection became superfluous as there were only fuel injected autos being built for all Mercedes markets. So, since all W124 models except the Diesels in most markets were some kind of "E" (200E, 230E, 260E, 280E, 300E, 320E, 420E, 430E, 500E) someone made the decision to call all the middle cars "E's" which meant the little cars were "C" (for compact?), and so on. With that use of the letter "E" the other use was dropped (it is no longer used to describe fuel injection as this is the baseline now). With the latest "S" class I also think the long wheel base designator has been dropped. And for a car to be a coupe, it now has to have a series of letters, "CL" to say it is a coupe, and, if it is a coupe off the "S" class chassis, it is CL500. If it is off the smaller body, it is a "CLK" where the "K" means "kurtz" for a shortened wheel base. The same is true for the newer small sporty car, the "SLK" as its designation means sports, light and shortened wheel base.

I think that covers most of the cars, except the ML sport utility vehicle. I can not remember the story behind that car/truck at the moment, except the "L" in that designator means long wheelbase. Which means there is apparently a standard, shorter wheelbase version somewhere. Hope that helps, Jim

[kerry]

When it comes to the vans and trucks, such as 206, 307. 407. 508, 608 etc the first number is the capacity of the truck in tons ( 2 tons, 3 tons etc) and middle 0 has no meaning as far as I know and the last number is the tens figure of the horsepower. So that 206 is a two ton truck with approximately 60 horsepower and a 508 is a five ton truck with approximately 80 horsepower etc.

[leathermang]

Thanks Jim, You saved me the trouble of having to drive one of my Gullwings over to my storage facility to look at the trunk lid on one of my 56 300 sc's.... Greg

"I says super, Is means super," at leat that is what I've read... S=super, but the people writing the books could be wrong... Oh, and leathermang, don't jinx yourself... For all the more nice cars for me...

[JimSmith]

Randall,

The word "sonder" in German is difficult to translate directly, and "super" might be an acceptable word. "Special" is not exactly it either, as the word is intended to imply the chassis and all its details are superior, set apart from the norm, in terms of quality, luxury and performance.

I am fairly certain the "S" designator for the top of the line car chassis stands for "sonder" and the difficulty in translating this into a word in English that also begins with the letter "s" has lead to the acceptance of this letter meaning "super."

In the sporty cars, the "S" in "SL" definitely stands for "sport", and the "L" for "leicht" to designate a separate chassis that is intended to be a sporty, high performance car.

Jim

Agreed Jim, however, the SL used to be a "leicht" car... As of the W107, they should have chaged the SL nomenclature to "sports lead." Remember the old "lead sled" nickname?

[JimSmith]

Randall,

The evolution of the "SL" does make the "lead" version you propose for the nomenclature more meaningful than the "leicht" version. In the beginning many of the parts for an "SL" chassis came from the sedan bins, and things were lightened by drilling holes and sometimes substituting lighter metals to make them lighter. I never noted a real lightness to any of those cars, even the pagoda roofed 60's "SL" as it was a pretty stout chunk of structural steel.

The head of the design department, I believe it was Rudolf Uhlenhaut, started an investigation into suspension dynamics in the 50's and 60's that led to the stiffening of Mercedes-Benz chassis structures. "SL's" suffered a serious handicap for the designers due to the discontinuity that forms the removable top, and had to have excess steel added to the rest of the chassis to make up and achieve an acceptable stiffness. While those old cars achieved a pretty remarkable stiffness, they still showed signs of cowl shake.

The use of new computer design codes allowed the designers to achieve really remarkable torsional stiffness starting on the W124 cars, without adding unacceptable weight. The last (or currently available model, in the US, actually) "SL" chassis was the first to benefit from these techniques, and the latest one seems to have made some additional strides. But today's "SL" is also a luxury vehicle and most of the chassis weight reductions are taken up by ventilated seats that are electrically adjustable in 9 directions, the folding hardtop, etc., so it still seems a bit heavy compared to other sports car makes. But it seems to be keeping up with them on the track, which is remarkable.

Have a great day, Jim