RESURRECTED WRITE-OFF
Rich & Mary Nohr turn a junked 450SLC into the mighty rally car of their dreams
Article and photograph Rich and Mary Nohr
You could say that Mercedes-Benz is in my blood. In the late 1930s, my father owned a 1929 Mercedes-Benz Mannheim. Growing up in car-crazy Sacramento, California, in the 1960s, I found a lot of rallies to enter. Back in those days, my weapon of choice was a souped-up Porsche 356A. Fast forward to the late 1980s and my wife Mary and I bought an existing independent Mercedes-Benz repair business in Santa Ynez, California. Because we are both complete rally nerds, we often participated in the long-distance “Starlite” event held in Southern California. We ran a 300SEL 3.5 for a number of years, but I always wanted one of the factory 450SLCs that were such an underground success in the late 1970s.
Three years ago, a 1978 450SLC was towed to the shop with catastrophic timing chain failure. My first thought was, “rally car,” I struck a deal for the carcass and my dream project finally began. These days, it’s rare to find a 5.6-liter engine in good shape, but by chance we heard about a 560SEL with massive body damage but an intact drive train. Remembering the old American axiom, “there is no replacement for displacement,” I decided to build a 560SLC. I’d always thought that this was the car the company should have built to begin with anyway.
We tucked our big project up on a spare hoist, where work progressed slowly over the course of a year between working on customer cars for a living. The chassis was cleaned, correct European bumpers sourced from a junkyard and side trim pieces removed. A complete rebuild of the front suspension added all-new ball joints, bushings, tie rods and upper control arms from a 560SL to achieve an improved caster setup (8-10 degrees). I kept the 450 brakes, replacing the rotors and pads, and added heavy-duty Bilstein shocks.
Next came a rebuilt steering box and full dual exhaust flowing into a high flow cat. I reused the 4-speed automatic transmission that came with the engine, installed a European 2.24 limited-slip differential out of an early 500SEC, pulled the heads, did a valve job and added a 560 aluminum radiator. I then did a complete wiring upgrade, including electronics pulled from the 560 to manage the advanced 560 engine.
Using the aluminum 560 engine removed about 170 pounds of dead weight from the front axle. As a result, the handling is incredible and almost neutral. In fact, I’d taken so much weight out of the SLC that when I set the car on the ground for the first time, I discovered I’d have to cut a whole coil out of the front springs to drop my new rally car to proper ride height. I painted the SLC Astral Silver and added a set of 15x7 Ronal wheels we’d stumbled on at the local tire shop and painted them to match. To complete the exterior look, I then just had to find a second hood and paint it flat black.
The interior was a mess. Besides general clean up, I built an aluminum console and new under-dash panel, as well as a special mounting panel to secure the custom Monaco timer made for me by Paul McGaffey of Southern California. The back seat came out and was replaced by a storage compartment for rally gear, and a cool leather-wrapped Nardi steering wheel I found on eBay helped complete the interior’s period competition look.
The front-mounted get-out-of-my-way lights are Hella 5000s that I originally purchased in 1970 and have mounted on four different rally vehicles though the years. For an authentic appearance, I also fabricated wire headlight covers out of stainless screens.
By November 2009, the car was finally complete and ready for its maiden rally, the Stellar Luminescence, a 14-hour drive from Santa Barbara to Las Vegas. We didn’t win, but we had a great time with zero mechanical issues.
Since then, our 560SLC has been in a few car shows, including the 2012 Legends of the Autobahn, and we continue to compete in West Coast rallies. The car always looks the part, works perfectly and handles like a dream. In fact, every time I get behind the wheel and fire up that mighty engine, I’m reminded once again that a Mercedes-Benz is truly meant to be driven.
Last year at Legends of the Autobahn, Mary and Rich Nohr showed off their rally-rugged car on the clipped lawns of the showfield
Specifications | 1978 Mercedes-Benz 450/560 SLC (C107)
TYPE: Two-door two-seat (rear removed) rally-modified coupe
ENGINE: 560SEL overhead cam 5.6-wliter V-8
TRANSMISSION: 4-speed automatic, gated console selector
HORSEPOWER: 238 at 5,200 rpm TORQUE: 287 lb-ft at 3,500 rpm
WHEELBASE: 111.0 in LENGTH: 196.4 in CURB WEIGHT: 3,400 lb (est)
ACCELERATION: Zero-60 mph: 9 sec (est)
FUEL ECONOMY: 18 mpg (est)