Shed Of The Week: Mercedes 500 SEC

New S-Class Coupe out of reach? Shed found a very cheap and very tempting original

In Shedland, a car advertised by a non-car enthusiast on behalf of someone else who is either dead or ill can be the equivalent of a barn find. But only if it's genuine.

Take the ad for this week's Shed. For all the world it looks like it's been written by a Dickensian throwback who's hardly heard about cars in general, let alone Mercedes ones.

SEC's size too great even for pics

And that may well be the case. But what if it isn't? What if this is a cunning new sales psychology designed to lure the unaware onto the rocks of financial ruin?

This would certainly be the car to do it with. Back in 1991 Mercedes shocked the world with the technological superiority, double-glazed insulation and immense heft of its new W140 S-Class. A full 10 years in development, with regularly busted budgets that allegedly led to the departure of Benz's chief engineer, it was the last S-Class to be designed and built without regard to cost - which is exactly the sort of attitude you need to run a W140 now, in 2014.

It's hard to describe the wondrous feeling of separateness and invulnerability you get in these beasts. Shed remembers hustling an AMG-pimped 500 SE saloon around Germany in the early 90s and being utterly gobsmacked by the 'shrinkage factor'. It handled far better than it had any right to, thanks to a double-wishbone front end, multi-link rear suspension and autobahn-crushing weight.

A V8 Merc barge for £1K? Too good to be true?

The 500 SEC was the cruise liner of the W140 range, a boulevardier par excellence aimed at older, Hamlet-smoking men with pink trousers, platinum quiffs and a Thai bride in the boot alongside the gold-plated 3 iron. Its 2,940mm wheelbase was 100mm shorter than the 500 SE saloon's, but the coupé's massive build (it was the same overall length as the saloon, but 9mm wider) and truly plutocratic spec - just about everything, including burl wood and leather, moved across the brochure page from option to standard - made it a full 80kg heavier, at 2,080kg.

Even with all that metal to haul around, the SEC made good use of its M119 5.0-litre V8, surging creamily through a four-speed auto 'box to an electronically limited top end of 155mph. That extra weight dented the 0-62mph time a little (7.3 seconds versus 6.7 seconds for the saloon) but the sensation of unlikely speed was surreal in both behemoths.

No worries about burning through hard-to-find rubber: 235/60R16 tyres are easily available at under £70. Burning through fuel is another matter. The 22-gallon tank sounds like a recipe for decent Continental cruising, but an emissions figure on the wrong side of 300g/km means you'll be lucky to get 450 miles between fills - and brimming that tank will cost you £130 in the UK.

Two-tone blue wonderfully 90s

What about your other likely costs on this particular car? Let's speculate on those MOT advisories. 'Brake pipe slightly corroded'. Only slightly? We'll ignore that then.

'Light misting of oil' on front shocks? Light misting? That's Shed language for better than showroom, as you're getting bonus lubrication. 'Fuel pipes corroded.' With no comforting 'slightly' there, a bit of action might be required, though with average fuel consumption figures beginning with a 1 you probably won't notice much difference between perfect fuel pipes and leaky ones. 'Slight corrosion to n/s floor'. Ah, good old slight, welcome back. Another one to ignore. 'OSR brake slight binding'. Who cares about that when you've got more than 300hp under your right deck shoe? Obviously, 'slight' might become a problem later, but you'll have sold the car by then.

'ASR light on'. Hmm... this could be the dealbreaker. ASR stands for Acceleration Slip Regulation, M-B's early version of traction control. It prevented wheelspin under power. Here's a video from back in the day which sort of explains what was at that time a mystical feature.

ASR light on a slight worry

Now, you could take the Shedman's 'cup half full' view that 'ASR light on' means you don't have to replace the bulb. Or you could do the decent thing, i.e. a diagnostic check on the electronic throttle system. You might be lucky: it might just be a sensor fault illuminating the bulb. But if there's a genuine problem in the system, quite possibly with the throttle valve, that will put the car into limp mode. That wouldn't necessarily have shown up on our advertiser's brief journey from the garage to the hard-standing, but if this fault is present it will require investigation and remedy. Which won't be cheap, given the nature of the car, though there are plenty of non-dealer specialists around with the knowledge to help mitigate the costs.

The big appeal of the W140 SEC is that it appears to have been in M-B brochures for just the one year: 1993. Arguably, that takes it out of the world of mass production and into the more rarefied environment of bespoke builds. The internet, coy little teaser that she is, refuses to divulge the actual number of SECs made, but it can't be many. If you saw another one in a year's driving it would definitely be a hand-waving event, if not a flagging-down-and-let's-have-a-beer event. Production continued after that of course, renamed first as the S-Class Coupe and then as the CL.

The downside? Well, as Mrs Shed likes to say at every available opportunity, size is an issue. Before weighing in with a bid for this stately machine, you'd best weigh yourself in first, because if you intend keeping it in a standard garage you'll need the hips of a baby snake to get out once you've backed your way in there. Alternatively, you could simply keep all your life accoutrements in the car and live there instead. Makes a change from the usual garden hut.

Here's that wonderfully/deliberately vague ad (Why no link? See below...)

I'm sure this has all the usual things this model has. I am selling this car to recupe a debt owing to me from a friend who has health and therefore money problems. He has owned it for many years but now no longer needs it. It has just been MOT'd and seems to run ok although i have only driven it from the garage.There is a fair bit of history.

Even tank-like Mercs move fast in Shedland

Epilogue
Annoyingly, but not altogether surprisingly, the power of Shed has has struck once more: this SEC vanished from the PH classifieds just as we were about to publish. Luckily, the first reserve Shed was also a W140 Merc, this rather lovely low-mileage S320 saloon. All the fun of the SEC but with two extra doors and reasonable fuel consumption thrown in. Well, reasonable relative to the SEC anyway.

Here's the ad.

MERCEDES-BENZ S CLASS S320 4dr Auto DR OWNED+PX TO CLEAR

Saloon.3200 cc Petrol, Automatic. Next MOT due 12/07/2014, Electric Cream Leather Interior,ABS, Front electric windows, Side airbags, Remote central locking, Immobiliser, Steering wheel reach adjustment, Full size spare wheel, Radio/Cassette, Drivers airbag, Passenger airbag, Electric door mirrors, Heated door mirrors, Front armrest, Cruise control, Alarm, Electrically adjustable passenger seat, Steering wheel rake adjustment, Climate control, Headlight washers, Audio remote control, Central locking, Electrically adjustable drivers seat, Rear headrests, Electric sunroof, Trip computer, Heated front seat, Lumbar support, Alloy wheels, Traction control, Rear armrest, PAS, Service indicator, 3x3 point rear seat belts, Rear electric windows

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Dan Trent

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