MERCEDES W108 280SE

Classic Mercs have always been good value, especially considering their price when new, and they don’t come any better than a stack headlight 280SE. Report: Will Holman.

It’s hard to define class, but we like ours with an S and a Mercedes badge – even better if you throw in some stack headlights. An S Class Mercedes is part of the motoring lexicon nowadays, and the W108 (Mercedes’ in-house designation) was the car that kicked off the illustrious lineage.

The Mercedes W108/W109 series was launched in 1965 and remained in production for the next seven years. An update of the much-loved W111 and W112 Fintail saloons, almost 400,000 rolled off the production lines by the time it expired. The W108 had a standard wheelbase, while the W109 had the longer version. The suspension was different too, with the short-wheelbase cars having conventional steel springs while the long-wheelbase ones had self-levelling air suspension. Its design was created by the then Mercedes-benz stylist Paul Bracq, a talent for sure who also came up with the iconic Pagoda SL.

In terms of comfort and spaciousness, a W108 still sets standards. Offered with a range of engines from the 2.5-litre, 128bhp inlinesix with a top speed of 113mph all the way up to the thumping 6.3-litre V8 with 247bhp and a top speed of 137mph, both manual and automatic gearbox options were offered. Both gearboxes had four forward ratios, although the vast majority of cars had the automatic option and the manual isn’t exactly known for its slick changes.

The original range included the 250S, 250SE and 300SEB, plus the LWB 300SEL. S models have carbs, while E stands for Einspritzung – German for fuel injection. The second series arrived in 1967 and a new 2.8-litre 280 S and SE joined the fun. And there was a range-topper version with the 3.5 V8, which was, obviously, called the, er, 280SE 3.5. No idea. Who says the Germans lack a sense of humour?

The interiors are typical Mercedes of the era, which is to say understated, elegant and crafted from high quality materials like solid wood, chrome and leather. Build quality is supreme. There’s a story, which may or may not be apocryphal, that says during this period Mercedes engineers would design and build a car, then tell the accountants how much it had cost. The accountants would then decide how much to charge the public for it. But at some point the accountants were given the lead, and from this point on they told the engineers how much they had with which to build a car.

It’s hard to tell whether there’s any truth in this, but what is glaringly obvious is that Mercedes quality took a nosedive some time after the W108 was built. Still, that doesn’t matter in this case, as these cars are bullet proof. I bought one from South Africa 25 years ago, and despite having been round the clock at least once, it ran faultlessly as my everyday driver for three years. I wish I still had it.

The 280SE is the sweet spot of the range really. It’s powerful enough to get you through modern traffic without a problem, but not so wallet-shiveringly juicy as to make it unusable unless you’ve won the lottery – something the 6.3-litre V8 definitely is. It’s also far simpler, with mechanical fuel injection that employs an exquisitely engineered pump mounted on the side of the engine that looks just like a mini version of the single overhead cam straight-six it feeds. Change the oil and filter regularly and 300,000 miles isn’t out of the question before any major mechanical work is required.

Four-speed autoboxes are set up to pull away from rest in second, unless you nail the throttle and activate the kickdown switch under the accelerator pedal, at which point the transmission will select first gear and the 108 will pick up its elegant skirts and lurch forward with uncanny haste. People who’ve never driven one will tell you the rear swing axle can catch you out when pushing the car to its limit, but why on earth would you push a W108 to its limit? It’s just not that sort of car, so ignore them and revel in the feeling you get once sat behind the wheel, which is that if on-road refuelling was possible, you could drive round the world several times before the need for any pesky maintenance. The S really is in a class of its own.