We've seen the Mercedes G-Class do all sorts of crazy things the past few years. When the 6x6 came out, Top Gear took it through a swimming pool to prove its fording capabilities, while the crazy Russians have not missed the opportunity to use it for drag races. However, the guys at Mercedes are no strangers to hooliganism in 2.5 ton luxury trucks.
Case in point, this undiscovered video from 2012. It shows the pre-facelift version of the G-Wagon undergoing some pretty crazy testing at Daimler's test track in Stuttgart.
There, a famous banked corner puts enormous strain on the cars as they are being pushed to their limit. Hitting the section at 180 km/h (111.8 lb-ft), the centrifugal force pushed the SUV down with 4.4 G of force, which means the suspension actually has to deal with over 11 tons.
The footage was shot during the 25th anniversary of the G-Class club in Germany. From the roar of those V8 engines, we're guessing a few of these 4x4s are the G55 AMG, which had a naturally aspirated 5.5-liter pumping out 507 hp and 700 Nm of torque (516 lb-ft) for a 0 to 100 km/h sprint of 5.5 seconds. Top speed? 210 km/h or 130 mph, way faster than anybody should go in a brick-like ex army vehicle.
If you think these men are brave pushing the G-Wagon to the limit on a banked track, think again. Brave racers in the 1920 reached the same sorts of speeds at the Brooklands track. The cars weighed just as much, but didn't have all-wheel drive, extra-wide sticky tires or a windshield for that matter.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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