AUCTION TRACKER MERCEDES-BENZ 280SL

The final iteration of MercedesBenz’s W113 ‘Pagoda’ is a frequent visitor to the auction block With 23,885 280SLs built between 1967 and 1971 and a reputation for strong build quality, there’s plenty of choice

The best now fetch well into six figures, Gooding & Company starting that trend back in March 2013, selling a recently restored example at Amelia Island for

$121,000 (£100,250) RM Sotheby’s raised the bar at Scottsdale in January 2014, its timewarp SL with less than 25,000 miles making $165,000 (£136,750) A significant uptick seven months later saw RM achieve $264,000 (£218,750) at Monterey for a California-delivered car – the subject of a frame-off restoration RM established the current benchmark in 2021, drawing

Car Of The Month

A very nice though not perfect example, this 507 brought an unexpectedly low price of $1,760,000 at the Mecum auction In the past, the January sales in Kissimmee, Florida, and Scottsdale, Arizona, were known as a bellwether for the coming year of auction sales With other auction sales holding up well at the time of writing, it is too early to call the entire month as being off to a slow start, but this 507 was a low price to remember

This was a real-deal working police car with Washington, DC-style graphics until it was drafted into service for the 2015 box-office smash video-game caper Pixels The full-sized ‘Crown Vics’ were seen on streets across America because, for a very long time, they were the most popular choice for police departments This one sold for just $9900

$335,000 (£277,500) for a Dark Olive over Cognac example that had been given a blank-cheque restoration at Mercedes-Benz Classic Center USA in 2010 SLs with factory-fitted ZF five-speed manuals are rare, ultra-desirable and command a premium; Bonhams’ ex-Daimler-Benz test car (pictured) sold at Monaco in 2018 for €230,000 (£202,250)

Jonathan Aucott from Avantgarde Classics explains the wider market: ‘In the UK everyone wants a right-hand-drive Pagoda; left-handdrives are seriously behind in terms of value – probably by as much as a third If it’s got overriders and US headlamps, even more so ‘There doesn’t seem to be a lot of difference in price between the cars with four-speed manuals and those with automatics, but the factory five-speed manuals are highly prized Pagodas are a little bit under-geared and feel like they need an extra ratio when you’re on the motorway, so the five-speed is in demand

‘There are a lot of colour-change cars out there and many have had their engines swapped out Some got replaced with a later 280 engine, but now the cars have risen in value people want original engines and prefer original colours