Period Perfect

Resurrecting an iconic 1936 500K from World War II wreckage

Article Craig Hopkins

Images Craig Hopkins, Gary Anderson

The year 2019 finally brought me the  great pleasure of sharing with other Mercedes-Benz enthusiasts my  stunning 1936 Mercedes-Benz 500K, with its unmatched Spezial Roadster bodywork and impressive 1930s interior detailing. It has been very gratifying to receive several Best-in-Show, People’s- and Judges’-Choice awards in concours and club car shows held at Amelia Island, La Jolla, Hilton Head, Houston, Fort Worth, Carmel and Monterey.

My particular example of prewar Mercedes-Benz engineering and coach-building artistry was all but completely destroyed in World War II, and it required seven years to resurrect it to factory-correct specifications.

An unlikely vision

For more than 40 years, I have loved the spectacular coach-built designs that Mercedes-Benz created in the 1930s, but with their rarity and ethereal price tags, I never imagined being able to own one. However, in 2011 I began looking for something close, but much better than the atrocious kit cars.

It was then that I saw an ad for a 540K chassis with iconic “long-tail” Spezial Roadster coachwork. As with many of the classic automobiles we see on concours fields, the bodywork was not original, but this was no kit or “replica” as that term is misused in the automotive hobby.

Instead, the body had been created by world-renowned fabricator, Cass Nawrocki, a Polish immigrant who escaped communism by crossing the Adriatic Sea in a raft. Nawrocki spent decades restoring original 500Ks and 540Ks and created the bucks, templates and forms to fabricate the entire body and dozens of trim pieces that give the Spezial Roadsters a jewel-like quality.

At the time I found him, Nawrocki had started an ash-wood frame for a client who was slow to pay, so it was offered to me. In February 2012, I engaged him to finish the wood frame (a work of art in itself) and body, even though I had no chassis on which to place it. With no prior restoration experience, I had jumped into the deep end not knowing whether I would sink or swim.

My first thought was to find an unrestored cabriolet and replace it with the Spezial Roadster body. However, that plan had a huge moral downside because it would require the removal of an original body, even though owners once thought nothing of having a car rebodied when styles changed. If I could not find an original chassis, the alternate plan was to place the Spezial Roadster body on a modern chassis – a visual gem with the benefits of new technology.

A reasonable solution

Six months later, an original 500K chassis and engine came up for auction. The original body was completely destroyed in World War II; the barely surviving chassis was twisted and there was a hole through the engine block. It is a miracle the wreckage was saved by a U.S. soldier. Twenty years later, a Danish baron acquired the wreckage, had slightly better-than-mediocre postwar coachwork fabricated (without fixing the twisted chassis) and placed it in the museum on his castle grounds.

Winning the auction would solve my dilemma. I would have a Spezial Roadster with the heart of an original Mercedes-Benz 500K without molesting a surviving cabriolet – a heart with a body transplant! It would transform the project from being a very expensive toy to an investment in a real 500K, albeit with new coachwork.

Auction day came with great anticipation, and not just for me. For decades, the car had been a museum star, and thousands descended on the auction site hoping to score in the no-reserve liquidation. I watched nervously online as car after car sold for many times their presale estimates. When the phone rang as the 500K neared the dock, time suddenly seemed to race by. As a veteran of hundreds of auctions in another hobby, I was prepared to lose if the bidding went beyond my comfort level.

The frenzied initial bidding eliminated all but two bidders. I felt the pressure of responding quickly so as not to lose the car to a quick gavel 5,000 miles away. The bid advancements had increased to 50,000 units of the local currency. As I neared my maximum bid, I went for a knockout punch to the next big, round number – an advance of 150,000. The auctioneer exclaimed, "Yes, that's it," recognizing the strategy. If the other bidder responded, the price would exceed my self-imposed maximum.

From a racing start, time then stood still as the auctioneer tried to coax another bid from the other player. I was thinking, "Hammer it, hammer it, hammer it." And then … it was over. The auctioneer said, “Sold! Your car. Well done.” It took a moment to understand that it was in fact my car.

Was it really “well done” or had I paid too much? Three years later, the sale of another car with Nawrocki coachwork fortunately showed that I was above water, though still in the deep end.

From plan to reality

The virtual theft of the 500K after the auction is a tale in itself, but four eventful months later, the car was finally safely in my hands. Thrilled as I was to obtain an original 500K chassis and engine, there was a lot of damage and missing parts. But the moral issue had been eliminated.

If you went to the Mercedes-Benz dealer in the 1930s, you bought a chassis. Then you would have many options for body style and for coachwork, either by the factory or an independent coachbuilder. With no part of the original body surviving, I was in the same position as the original buyer of this 500K. He picked cabriolet; I picked roadster. Only the most minor adjustments had to be made to the chassis.

For the next six years I scoured the internet for original parts. Given the uniqueness and rarity of the supercharged Mercedes-Benz of the period, success was intermittent. I put the car into the capable hands of marque specialist Jim Friswold and his network of craftsmen, who have few peers and many concours awards on their mantels.

In addition to Friswold's bottomless knowledge of arcane parts and matchless skill in restoration, Ken Dickman is one of the best at interior trim. Even though original parts were borrowed for specifications when necessary, including the top from the famous von Krieger Special Roadster, no two of these hand-made cars were identical, so templates had to be customized. But perhaps the most amazing work is the most overlooked – the glorious radiator with its 10,000 individual tubes precisely cut and welded.

I only had to make a few decisions, the most difficult being colors. The paint is correct Mercedes-Benz Dunklebordeaux (Dark Burgundy) with rich tan leather and burgundy welting. Scores of concours attendees have complimented my decisions (Whew!).

Friswold predicted four to five years to restore the car, but it took seven to resurrect it. After treading water in the deep end since 2012, I finally drove the 500K for the first time in late 2018, and began showing the car – starting to swim, so to speak – in 2019. Given the bias against new coachwork in some concours judging, I was surprised the car took Best-in-Show four times in 11 outings. Mercedes-Benz Club of America bestowed Awards of Excellence for the Most Historically Significant Mercedes-Benz at two major concours.

I displayed the 500K for Jay Leno's Pebble Beach Classic Car Forum last summer. During the talk, he reaffirmed that “It’s not a ‘re-creation.’ It’s a real [500K] with a different body on it. I’m guessing it’s probably better than the real one. You have new wiring, new everything, but all done to original specs. I thank God there are people in the hobby who have the resources to save these and to bring them back for another generation, because to see a picture of it is one thing, but when you see it parked outside, you say, ‘Wow!’ I mean, it’s genuinely striking and makes an impression on you; especially on kids or people who have never seen the cars from this era.”

Inevitably, my 500K will be passed along to the care of a new steward – this will be my personal contribution to the classic-car hobby. There were only two 500Ks originally created with the elegant covered spare, and neither are known to have survived the years. After my sink-or-swim leap into the deep end, there is now a period-perfect example.

Specifications: 1936 Mercedes-Benz 500K Spezial Roadster (new coachwork)

TYPE: Two-door, two-passenger (plus rumble seat), disappearing soft-top roadster
ENGINE: 5,018cc supercharged I-8
HORSEPOWER: 160
TRANSMISSION: 4-speed manual
DIMENSIONS: Length: 206.5 in   Width: 75 in
Height: 62.2 in   Wheelbase: 129.5 in
CURB WEIGHT: Approximately 5,200 lb
PERFORMANCE: Zero-60 mph 16.5 sec   
TOP SPEED: 100 mph

Looking today at the gleaming, jewel-like quality of the 500K’s engine and mechanical components, it is very difficult to believe that there once was a hole through the engine block.

Internationally renowned metal fabricator Cass Nawrocki hand-shaped the 1936 Mercedes-Benz 500K’s elegant bodywork over a beautiful ash wood frame of his own construction.