Nice-looking surplus G Wagen - Page 2 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

DUTCH · #16 09-30-2008, 08:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fulcrum525

If you think about it the G is probably one of the worlds rarest productions cars outside of things like Ferrari and rolls royce. Sure they've made what 185,000? but its taken them 30 years to do it. Ford or VW make that many cars every month. In the US the situation is even crazier since the higher volume G500/G55 has been here for less then 7 years. I've only ever seen 4 grey market G's in CT and one of them was sold in MA a few weeks after I saw it.

It's also probably the last completely hand assembled production vehicle in the world. A few shots taken in September 2005 can be seen here:

http://www.pbase.com/flydutch/gclass_assemby

Having visited both the plant in Graz, Austria, where the G is made, and the plant in Vance, AL where the ML, GL & R classes are made; the difference is striking. Humans (they're called "Puchians" after the original name of the factory) in Graz and robots in Vance. Both are most impressive to watch.

panZZer · #17 12-30-2008, 05:04 PM

I went down and looked at a LWB maroon 79 That a guy in Austin got in a bad ebay deal or something, a NA 5 cyl, 4 speed. and every door and rocker was ate up at the bottom, He apparantly bought it with out seeing it taking the guys word in good faith, If some seller tried to put that off on me--Theres no way I would honer the deal. This truck would have taken a small fortune to replace all the panels. Benz apparantly did not start getting serious about rust preventitives until around 81 or so.