Performance cars need lots of air to make big horsepower. This fundamental truth has seen automakers adopt all kinds of fancy grilles and hood scoops to get more oxygen into their engines. When it came to building the Mercedes-Benz SLR, though, the German automaker came up with an altogether more innovative solution. What if a massive hood ornament could also be an air intake?
Think about it for a minute, and it kind of makes sense. Ideally, you want to get the coolest, freshest air into the engine, particularly when using forced induction. This helps make the most power while keeping temperatures in check. It would be great to stick a round pipe right out the front of the hood to suck air into the throttle body with as straight a path as possible.
In most vehicles, that would be impractical from a styling standpoint. When it came to the Mercedes-Benz SLR, though, it was no trouble at all. The engineers were able to pull it off just by punching some holes in the badge! All thanks to that instantly recognizable three-pointed star.
The Perfect Logo
The root of the famous Mercedes-Benz logo stretches all the way back to 1909. It came from nascent automaker Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft (DMG). As the company tells it, the Daimler brothers chose a logo that was inspired by a postcard sent by their father many years before. It denoted the family home, marked by a three-pointed star. The company would merge with Benz. & Cie to become Daimler-Benz, with the new outfit adopting the three-pointed star as a part of its badging.
The logo developed over time into the simplified form we know today. The three-pointed star, sitting in a thin-rimmed circle, which came to emblazon all of the company’s automobiles. For a long time, the logo existed as a stand-up emblem on the end of the hood, in the luxury car tradition. However, as the 21st century took over and pedestrians grew wary of getting impaled on fancy ornaments, Mercedes-Benz began to switch things up. It took the simple three-pointed star and enlarged it, giving it pride of place in the grille on more models, front and center.
It was the 2003 Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren that perhaps showed off this design feature to the fullest. The supercar was the result of a collaboration between the British and the Germans with legendary designer Gordon Murray at the helm.
The SLR was an outrageous project from the outset. In Murray’s own words, it was intended to take on the big guns at Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Aston Martin. The British designer had to wrestle the project into shape, taking the original clumsy plans for a front-engined car and developing it into a front-midengine beast that could actually take the fight to the competition. The final car boasted an advanced bonded carbon fiber chassis, and a mighty supercharged V8 good for 617 horsepower. But how to get all the air into that engine?
Thanks to the SLR’s engine configuration and placement, the solution was simple. The 5.4-liter V8 sat in the traditional longitudinal layout driving the rear wheels. The engine also used the conventional “cold-vee” design, with the intake manifolds in the center of the “V.” With Murray’s influence, the engine was mounted well behind the front wheels, which put the throttle body pretty much right in the center of the engine bay. Thus, it made perfect sense to throw an air filter and intake directly in front of the engine, fed from the front grille.
Now, Mercedes-Benz could have given the SLR a more conventional front-end design. A regular badge on a regular grille, with a scoop behind the grille feeding the airbox. Instead, the engineers realized the badge itself could directly feed the air intake—they just had to punch segments out of the three-pointed star.
In the final design, the badge was integrated into a phallic sort of hump running down the center of the hood. The badge was big enough that it didn’t act as a restriction for the engine, and the simple circular design made it easy to adapt for this purpose.
It’s kind of funny to think that a logo designed in 1909 would have performance benefits almost 100 years later. You couldn’t easily pull off the same feat with a Peugeot, Ferrari, or Porsche without seriously hacking up the visual design.
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Panorama of two Mercedes SLR McLarens alongside the two TVR Cerberas used as test mules during development
byu/Mega_Dunsparce incarporn
You can see evidence of the unique setup in the test mules, too. Grainy photos show a pair of TVR Cerberas that were hacked up to host the SLR drivetrain. One of them quite obviously hosts the badge intake poking out of the bulbous hood.
However, as below, the badge intake does not appear on the earlier Vision SLR concept that preceded the actual production model. It appears to have come about later in development, perhaps also as a result of Murray’s insistence on moving the engine rearward for better weight distribution.
The badge intake is just one of many unique features on a very unique car. The SLR was also prized as a more usable supercar—fitted with the very best Mercedes-Benz switchgear, it eclipsed many rivals in the quality stakes. It also notably used the humble 5G-Tronic automatic gearbox, as seen in the regular old E-Class and even the Porsche 911. It’s seldom talked about, but that meant the SLR also hit the streets with two reverse gears.
Regardless of how tidy the idea was, it didn’t stick around. The SLR never really got a direct sequel, but later supercars like the AMG SLS went with more conventional grille designs. As easy as it was to plumb the mighty M155 V8 with a straight shot intake right to the badge, it didn’t prove so practical or useful for the rest of the company’s lineup.
Still, if you find yourself engineering a high-performance car for a brand with a circular logo, consider adopting this nifty trick from the Germans. You’d probably have to resurrect Holden, or convince Volkswagen to produce a front-engined, rear-wheel-drive roadster, but the hard work will be worth it. Drop me a line when you’re done.
Image credits: McLaren, Mercedes-Benz, Broken-Sphere CC BY-SA 3.0
“However, as the 21st century took over and pedestrians grew wary of getting impaled on fancy ornaments…”
Owners got tired of the ornaments being stolen.
Maybe! But there are literally pedestrian impact regulations that played a role here.
It sounds weird to call any car at this level underrated, but SLRs are underrated. One of the best things Mercedes ever designed, wonderful use of little details, retro without being obnoxious about it, and Gordon Murray was partially responsible.
That panorama of SLRs and TVR Cerberas side by side on the high banked curve is pretty cool! And then there’s this iconic photograph from 1984 taken at what is presumably indeed the same test track showing a 190E sedan, a W126 sedan, and a 0303 *bus* which rather takes the cake: https://www.thedrive.com/wp-content/uploads/images-by-url-td/content/2017/04/84f17.jpg?quality=85&w=1920
Daytona Speedway is banked at 31 degrees, and I think I remember that you have to do 90 mph to even stay on the bank. I wonder how fast that W126 is going? Or the bus?
The front end always reminded me of a Probiscis Monkey.
Or you could even hang some “truck accessories” under the intake, too.
I also love the way the SLR exhaust is routed, with each side having a muffler hidden in the fender and exiting out the sides in front of the doors. Like a more elegant Dodge Viper.
That is very clever, I never knew! Kinda surprised it’s the only application of this.
It’s not. Chevy used it on certain Camaro variants not too long ago. The “Flow-Tie” I think it was called.
didn’t the hellcats use a headlight for that too, leaving only the halo?
I mean, the Ford Fairlane Thunderbolt did this in 1964.
I very well may be wrong, but I thought the flow-tie was just to increase airflow to the radiator, not to the engine intake.
I’ve always loved this car. The proportions, the details, the SOUND. Sure it wasn’t as fast as the Lambo or Ferrari, but this car just oozed sex appeal. This is John Bonham to the Enzo’s Neal Peart. They both make it to the end, they just get there wildly differently.
“The engineers were able to pull it off just by punching some holes in the badge!”
With the exception of recent cars with Distronic/Active Cruise Control (ACC) and the EQ lineup – the stars on the grilles of MB automobiles have always been open.
“integrated into a phallic sort of hump running down the center of the hood.”
That hump, along with the similar hump on that concurrent SLK, was meant to evoke stylistic imagery from MB F1 cars.
I love the SLR McLaren for purely emotional reasons
This must have been the inspiration for the Flow-Tie
Many years ago when I was looking at Camaros one that I was going to try to buy had a light up purple flow tie. Necessary? Absolutely not. Worth it? Hell yeah brother.
It was a nice spec too. V6 with the active exhaust. It sold the day before I was going to go test drive it, which was weird because 6th gen Camaros usually sat for months. I wound up test driving a different one and liked it, but not enough to buy one.
I’ll always have a 6th gen sized hole in my heart but the compromises they force you to make are just too much for me to want to daily in DC.
The tragedy of the 6th gen Camaro is it’s one of, if not the, top example of a corporation actually doing what we always beg them to and listening to enthusiasts when designing it.
The problem is, enthusiasts don’t buy new (except me lol), and the car rots away until it’s discontinued.
A Camaro that’s 10% less sharp and 10% more livable might have survived to a 7th generation.
IIRC the biggest issue is that the enthusiasts they listened to were 5th gen Camaro owners. They should have scouted and surveyed Mustang and 4 series owners and gone from there. I will fully argue that without the usability issues the Camaro would be entering its 7th generation
It’s hard to overstate the usability issues as well. I’ve had them as rentals a few times and by the end of the week or whatever I’m always thrilled to give them back. The biggest issue is they’re like trying to see out of a tank. I had one as a rental in Asheville last year and when you’re navigating urban streets the blind spots are borderline dangerous…and for god knows what reason there’s basically 0 safety suite standard in them.
There were multiple times when I just straight up couldn’t see people and they didn’t appear until a split second before trouble. I’m going to knock on wood, but it’s not like I’m a troublesome driver either. I’ve had my license since 2008 and I’ve only been in one accident and only gotten three tickets during the last 17 years. I can’t imagine how dangerous they are for the average inattentive driver.
On top of that the packaging is absurdly bad. The doors are so big that you can’t open them fully in a normal parking space. As a result they weigh an inordinate amount as well. The back seats are also unusable and the trunk opening is so small that you can barely get carry on through it.
And you know what? It’s dumb and frustrating because they’re some of the best drivers cars there are. I legitimately think the 6th gen Camaro is still my favorite car I’ve ever driven…but I could never live with one. They were so close to sheer brilliance but in typical GM fashion they found a catastrophic way to fuck up at the finish line.
I remember being blown away the first time I got into an S550 Mustang after driving a few Camaros. I was like “wait….you can actually LIVE with a pony car?!”….and it’s not even like Mustangs are the livability kings of that class either, the Challenger is even better on that front.
I was thinking of getting a 6th gen as a cruiser to drive out the 1200 miles form Ohio to Colorado a few times a year but there’s just so many more useable options. The Cadillac sedans share the platform but you can actually see out of them!
A CT4V BW is definitely an attainable dream car for me. I wish it had the LT1 V8 and the turbo V6 honestly confuses me because it’s somehow less efficient and less reliable than just putting the V8 they put in everything in it but it’s an exceedingly minor quibble/apparently it’s the only way they could sell them in Europe. My thermonuclear take is that I’d probably get the 10 speed too since GM knows how to tune it and it would be a cruiser/daily for me.
But anyway, yeah. The alpha platform rules. Get something on it while you can because its days are numbered.
I was never a fan of the 5th gen Camaro. Too flat sided, half assed retro thing. But tightening up and modernizing the 6th gen made it look (to me, at least) 100x better. Once the 6th gen 1LE was announced I was sold, and plunked down for one in 2018. Fantastic car, and I knew the ‘drawbacks’ going in. I didn’t go into the purchase looking for a daily driver, it’s a sports car so of course there will be some compromises made for styling and such.
I have a nearly identical story to this!
I recently used a reciprocating trim saw to cut out the plastic grille insert in our 2015 Odyssey to create a ram air intake.
Since you’re wondering, I’ll just say “+5hp and better throttle response”
Having finally seen one of these in person, they are such an achingly pretty car.
Definitely better in person than in pics, but IMO too close to the SLK’s design (and not in a good way). Thankfully they have the chops to shut everyone up!