As the flagship vehicle series for Mercedes-Benz, the S-Class was officially introduced in 1972 with the W116. Formerly known as “Sonderklasse” (German for “special class”), six generations have been produced to date.
Initially scheduled to be introduced in 1989, the W140 was delayed when BMW introduced the E32 in 1986, with the first post-war German passenger V12 engine, the M70. By delaying the announcement of the W140, Mercedes managed to develop their own V12 and upgrade their brake system.
This particular 1994 Mercedes S600 V12 (W140) has been gathering dust and spiderwebs for the past eight years. It was only driven around for about ten years, but the owner fell ill and the car was left untouched since. The bodywork had paint swirls all over the place and needed a lot of polishing to fix. With the interior reeking of mothballs and white mold everywhere – including under the hood – Larry Kosilla brought the car to his shop and went to work.
Wheels had to go so he could power wash the wheel wells, calipers, and suspension, along with the undercarriage, to remove the junk.
For the exterior paint, thorough foaming with extra attention to detail, followed by a good rinse and dry was just what the car needed. As for the wheels, no amount of product could get them in their initial state. Still, they looked a lot better after a good clean.
A sodium chloride tablet helped kill the smell inside the car, before cleaning, steaming, disinfecting, and power washing every last thing.
Outside, the paint was filled with holograms (aka “detailer’s signature”) caused by tilted rotary polishers. According to Larry, a two-step process was required to fix it.
Surprisingly, the hood had almost double the amount of paint as the rest of the car. Moreover, the passenger side had some deep scratches that couldn’t be polished, hence needing a touch-up to fix.
After polishing the entire bodywork, along with the rims, the car was finally looking better than ever, but it didn’t run – a problem that was ultimately solved with some additional professional help and some new parts.
Now the only thing remaining was to put this Mercedes in a new home.
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