When it first appeared, it seemed odd-looking to some observers (me, anyway) due to its detachable roof. Non- soft-top automobile roofs before the 230 SL had shapes ranging from flat in the early days to various degrees of convex. The same can be said regarding post-W113 cars roofs. Given all this context, the 230 SL's concave, dished-in roofline didn't seem quite right.
This Web page by Mercedes offers the following items regarding 230SL design: "Under the direction of the designer Friedrich Geiger, a modern vehicle was designed which had clear and distinctive lines" and cites "Béla Barényi’s knowledge of passive safety in vehicle bodies". The Coupé roof, was designed by Paul Bracq. "The characteristic form of the removable Coupé roof with its inwardly pointing curvature additionally improves passive safety: the concave form ensures greater stability at a lesser weight."
I am not sure what is meant by "passive safety." One guess is that, since the roof attachments might fail, positive aerodynamic pressure might help hold it in place. This assumes convex shaping would create an airfoil effect of lessened pressure that would tend to generate lift, and an opposite shape would not. Whether or not this conjecture is valid would depend upon wind tunnel testing. For what little it's worth, I cannot think of any other potential major reason for the "passive safety" claim. The "greater stability" claim might also be aerodynamics-related.
The Wikipedia entry states that 230 SLs began rolling off production lines in 1963, some 55 years ago. Perhaps time, the presence of some 49,000 W113s on the world's streets and highways, and all the other sometimes odd designs appearing since then, have served to make the "Pagoda" roof (as it's often called) less jarring.
1 comment:
All these old model Mercedes is just my love. My Grandfather has this Mercedes and I regularly tell him to modify this car from mercedes service center but he doesn't want to do this. He always say to me you'll never understand the magic of this car.
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