Mercedes 300SL Roadster at the Josefuv Dul Car Show, Liberecky Kraj, Bohemia(CZ), 2015

This car, perhaps confusingly, is a Mercedes Benz 300SL, but NOT a gullwing. It isn't even a coupe at all, but a roadster. It mechanically is otherwise the same, meaning that it would have been one of the fastest street-legal production cars of its day. Although I wasn't able to get the year of this one, the 300SL roadster was made in the 1957-1963 model years. 1957 was the only model year in which both the roadster and the "Gullwing" coupe were produced, with coupes being produced only in the years 1954-1957. There was, of course, the 300SLR Uhlenhaut Coupe, produced in only 2 examples for the 1955 sports car racing season. However, not being a "pure" 300SL, but a special 300SLR race car, it doesn't necessarily count.

In spite of being officially the fastest street-legal production car of its day, with a 263Km/h(163 m.p.h.) top speed, the 300SL was not outrageously complicated. The engine was a 2996cc Mercedes M198 SOHC I-6, that was only high-tech in that it was fuel-injected in time when virtually no production cars were unless they were diesels. The engine produced up to 240 horsepower in the 300SL, and 0-60 times in the 7 second range (I have also read some sources giving 0-60 times in the 5-second range).