If you’ve £50k to spend on a quick AMG these days, your access to the new stuff is restricted to the base-level model. Granted, the A45 S is a terrific super hatch with 421hp from its 2.0-litre engine, but turn your attention to the classifieds and you can add 30 per cent to that peak output and eight more cylinders into the equation. Today’s Spotted, a ten-year-old SL 65, is up for a fiver short of fifty grand, which according to the seller, makes it a third of its original price.
It felt like a lot of car for the money when new, let alone with £100k cast adrift. Using Mercedes’s Affalterbach-tuned twin-turbo V12 of 6.0-litres, codenamed M275, it produces 612hp and a frankly insane 738lb ft of torque. That’s a lot by 2020 standards, in 2004 the plush drop-top was only 47hp short of Ferrari’s then halo model, the Enzo. Madness.
Using Mercedes’s classy SL base, the AMG adds 19-inch wheels, thicker bumpers and quad exhausts, while inside the cabin has carbon trim to go with the leather and aluminium. As a high-end Merc, you got luxuries like sat nav and air scarves, while the folding metal roof is so well insulated that road and wind noise really are kept to a minimum when closed. The ride’s presentable enough, too, with air suspension doing the business underneath.
Turn things up, and the SL 65 goes from luxury to lunacy, hauling 2.1 tonnes of comfort from 0-62mph in 3.9 seconds and onto a limited top speed of 155mph. Or it can destroy a set of rears in a few minutes. You decide. It’s no Porsche 911 through the bends (it'll destroy front tyres, too) thanks to all that mass, but the air springs and enormous mechanical grip combine to enable monstrous cross-country pace. And with so much muscle at the rear wheels, you’re never more than a throttle squeeze away from altering the balance.
When the SL was facelifted in 2008, it arguably lost some of the earlier car’s elegance at the nose, but the AMG changes quickly put that right. The new face was more aggressive – and today, it’s arguably the one to have aged least. Certainly, the car in the classifieds has lost absolutely no purposefulness in its ten years and 43,000 miles of life. It wears that Indigolight Blue and those black/silver alloys with real intent. And there's always an ocean of engine to stare at when still.
Thanks to that enormous original power output, it means an SL 65 in 2020 is a compelling throwback to yesteryear that’s still tremendously fast by modern standards. It’s got 27hp more than the AMG GT R Roadster and is barely three tenths slower to 62mph. Obviously you don’t buy and run an SL 65 on the cheap; note the CO2 figure... It's probably not done depreciating just yet, either. But a V12 AMG convertible for A45 S money doesn’t sound too shabby, does it?
SPECIFICATION | MERCEDES-BENZ SL 65 AMG
Engine: 5,980cc, V12, twin-turbo
Transmission: 5-speed automatic, rear-wheel drive
Power (hp): 612@4,800-5,100rpm
Torque (lb ft): 738@2,000-4,000rpm
MPG: 18.6
CO2: 362g/km
First registered: 2010
Recorded mileage: 43,000
Price new: c. £150,000
Yours for: £49,995
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