Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Adolf Hitler's limousine

1940 bulletproof Grober Mercedes-Benz 770 Series II (W150)

The limousine's supercharged 7.7-litre straight eight engine put out 230bhp@3200 rpm to a five-speed manual gearbox. The chassis has oval section tubes. Suspension has coil springs all around. The car is over 6 metres long and 2 metres wide. It weighs 4.1 tons and can top 170 km/h.

The flooring is made of 6 mm thick steel.
Other sheet metal parts were of 3 mm thick specially hardened steel for resisting small mine explosions and light machine gunfire.

The windows are made of 4 cm thick bulletproof glass. It had a 197 litre petrol tank and this gargantuan returned 3.7 km/litre.

A total of 88 of these cars were produced from 1938 to 1943.
A select few of these were sold to individuals. The vast majority was for the Nazi government. Some were allocated for the use of head of state, ministers and other authorities.

Hitler donated many to the heads of state of other nations with whom Germany wanted to strengthen relations. He himself, had seven such Mercedes limousines. One more is also in the Sinsheim museum.

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