Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé: the first of seven

By Mick Walsh

| 17 Apr 2026

Classic & Sports Car – Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé: the first of seven

Mercedes-Benz designed and built a group of showstopping coupés to promote its famed 500 series, starting with the sensational 500K Autobahn-Kurier at the 1934 Berlin motor show.

The debut of this fastback beauty even inspired Jean Bugatti to race home to Molshiem to start work on the Type 57 Aérolithe.

Mercedes’ directors selected the 1936 Paris Salon to launch the 540K, with its bigger, 5.4-litre engine to improve the performance of the 2½-ton flagship.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé has two spare wheels; the top one pops out of the short boot

The Sindelfingen works coachbuilder excelled with a rakish coupé to grace the more powerful 180bhp chassis.

Imagine an early October morning and the convoy of Mercedes trucks heading down the Avenue des Champs-Élysées en route to the Grand Palais, where this gorgeous maroon two/three-seater was unloaded for display.

And what a venue for the debut of the Teutonic masterpiece! The dramatic exhibition hall had been transformed with a mock Art Deco-style ceiling that looked more like a Busby Berkeley movie set than a motor show.

Streamlining was all the rage with exhibitors, so the new 540K had strong competition for attention.

Nearby, Spohn displayed an aerodynamic Maybach Zeppelin based on a Paul Jaray design, while French visitors got the chance to see a Cord 810 for the first time and Peugeot unveiled its befinned, windcheating Andreau Aérodynamique saloon.

Taking centre stage was a dazzling Figoni et Falaschi-bodied Delahaye 135 Speedster, while Bugatti presented a Grand Sport Type 57S roadster with fully encased front wings seemingly borrowed from a Dewoitine aircraft.

The lap of luxury inside this Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé

Compared with the Autobahn-Kurier, the new 540K Coupé had closer links to the factory-bodied 500K Spezial Roadster that had made its debut at Paris two years earlier.

With the V-shaped radiator set well back in the chassis, the one-piece wings had a remarkable rhythmic flow, sweeping down to narrow running boards and stylish rear spats.

The low, sleek roof with raked, flat ’screen also gave the heavy car a leaner look than the later roadsters.

Long, twin horns and flat-fronted Bosch headlights with a smaller centre spotlight sat deep between the beautifully formed front wings, while the signature pair of flexi exhaust pipes sprouting from the side declared its power.

From the rear, the exposed twin spares were sunk into a neat, stubby tail that accentuated this stunning machine’s long bonnet and short top.

Its embellishments included a chrome side flash just above the bonnet’s horizontal louvres, while hubcaps were fitted outside the spats to match the front wheels.

The curved quarter-bumpers are split at the back and front, again to underscore the Coupé’s lines.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé is the rarest of the factory-bodied cars

Had you been allowed to open a door and sit inside the luxurious machine, you would have noted the plaid covers of the deeply cushioned seats, the handsome carpentry of the dash and the central white pearlescent instrument panel with elegant VDO gauges.

Most of the 409 540Ks made from 1936-’40 were open, with just 42 closed bodies.

Of these, seven were Spezial Coupés and the Paris Salon car, chassis 130944, was the very first built at Sindelfingen, an ex-aircraft plant near Stuttgart that was reorganised to build car, truck and bus bodies.

Here a shell for a modest 170H was stamped out on the latest press, while handbuilt parade cars were equipped with armour in another facility.

Key to the design of the three-pointed star’s range-topping Coupé was the appointment of Hermann Ahrens, who joined from Horch in ’32.

It was never Mercedes policy to credit individuals, but the artistic Ahrens – who headed the Sonderwagen, or special vehicle, division and was closely involved with the 500 – must take the plaudits.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé has a bold front, with low radiator, big headlamps and a flat windscreen

The 540K’s exclusivity was reflected in the choice of gold printing for the sales catalogues, while factory artist Walter Gotschke produced wonderful drawings that included a fantasy scene of a 540K coupé storming up a snowy winter pass at night with skis strapped to the back.

Mysteriously, the car featured carries Dutch registration plates.

Of the 540K Spezial Coupés, one example was built with right-hand drive and registered DBL 167; the grey car, sporting a distinctive cover for its twin spare wheels, was the star attraction at British concours events when driven by Italian Mercedes reserve works driver Freddie Zehender.

The 540K Coupé’s styling was revised for 1938, with more conventional pontoon-style wings and twin, side-mounted spares that liberated extra boot space.

The model, christened the Innenlenker after its divided rear window, was also first shown in Paris.

Critics of the 500 series say the cars are as bloated as an overdecorated general, with heavy, flamboyant coachwork making them stodgy and sluggish to drive.

Rarely seen on the road, they have a reputation as crown jewels of major American collections.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé’s engine is not a fancy twin-cam, but the supercharger boosts the straight-eight’s power to 180bhp

The speedometer reads to an optimistic 140mph, but, even with blower engaged, it would have taken a long section of the freshly built autobahn to push the new 180bhp 540K past 100mph.

Performance figures list 0-60mph in 17 secs for a weighty cabriolet, so you couldn’t class it a sports car by any stretch.

The range certainly doesn’t have the competition pedigree of the S-type sports cars of the late ’20s, but it rates as a beautifully engineered cruiser against grand-touring rivals such as Delahayes or Derby Bentleys.

The 500 series is the legacy of Hans Nibel, who pioneered the use of coil-sprung double-wishbone independent front suspension for Mercedes road cars with the 380 in 1933.

Nibel died in 1934 and didn’t see the model develop into the 500K, which evolved into the 540K for 1936.

Underneath the exotic exterior are massive but relatively basic mechanicals.

Looking like a truck when stripped, the deep, ladder-type chassis has six crossmembers, and its huge straight-eight matches the substantial frame.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé’s stylish doorhandle

The tall, clean unit is a simple design with two overhead valves per cylinder operated by a single, block-mounted camshaft, pushrods and rockers.

When engaged, the crank-driven supercharger boosts power from 115bhp to 180bhp but, unlike most blowers, only works on full depression of the throttle, when a clutch on the end of the crank is engaged.

Simultaneously, a lever and butterfly in the air tract are operated to enrich the fuel/air mixture and the high pressure in the inlet manifold is used to increase fuel-tank pressure and speed up flow.

The carburettor location between the blower and inlet also breaks with regular supercharger practice in that the mixture is blown into the carburettor rather than sucked through it.

The 3.08:1 final drive and direct fourth gear allowed refined touring, with the engine turning over at just 2170rpm for 60mph.

The engine pulls smoothly and produces strong torque, but its refined bass note is drowned out when the blower kicks in for overtaking.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé’s flowing wings enhance the long bonnet and short roof

The four-speed gearbox has synchromesh on third gear and a dog clutch on fourth, which enables a shift into top without depressing the clutch.

The gearlever is a long wand and its gate an unusual affair with wide movements.

To select fourth, you push the lever sideways away from third before moving it up, with the throttle down.

For top to click home you simply lift off, which makes for a slow change.

It takes a while to adjust to the semi-automatic design, particularly when disengaging downwards.

The 540K’s weight affects the worm-and-nut steering, which is heavy and dead when manoeuvring.

The low-geared action lightens at speed, but always needs a firm hold.

With body roll and a touch of understeer, the 540K is hard work in tight bends yet feels steady and solid through fast sweepers.

Room for one in the back: Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé owners had the choice of a special set of fitted luggage or a sideways seat behind the driver

The swing-axle independent rear suspension might not be ideal for roadholding, but the Mercedes 540K scores for its ride, which is exceptional for the period: the impressive suspension steamrollers most bumps.

The hydraulically operated drum brakes are powerful up to a point, but fade when stopping from autobahn speeds and no doubt induced a few scares when new.

By the time Mercedes-Benz focused on war production in 1939, 447 540Ks had been produced, the majority bodied at the Sindelfingen works.

Costing twice as much as a Cadillac in the USA, they were owned by film moguls and industry magnates.

After its Paris debut, 130944 was returned to the factory and prepared for delivery to Belgian industrialist Jean-Claude Solvay.

Like many 500 and 540K exotics, the Coupé ended up in America after WW2.

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé’s elegant trafficator

From the 1960s, it was the star of various US collections such as that of Connie Bouchard, who commissioned a fastidious rebuild before selling it to John Mozart.

Later it joined the legendary Mercedes collection at the Imperial Palace before it was acquired by the Lyon family in the late 1990s.

The Coupé was displayed in a superb private museum with a remarkable set of pre-war coachbuilt Mercs including a 540K Spezial Roadster, unique Grosser W150 Cabrio B and an ex-Hitler G4 Offener Tourenwagen.

William Lyon was born in LA in 1923, and recalled various extravagant Cadillacs, Duesenbergs and Packards driving around town.

“Once I saw a beautiful Cadillac make an illegal U-turn and double-park outside a pharmacy, then an actress jumped out,” he remembered before his death in 2020, aged 97.

“Even aged 10, I thought these coachbuilt classics were much more special than the humdrum Fords and Chevys.”

Lyon bought his first car, a ’22 Model T, for $8 in ’39 when he was 16 and drove it for two years before selling it to a scrapyard for $5.

German racing driver Rudolf Caracciola in Tripoli with one of the Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupés

After a distinguished flying career, with combat missions in the Pacific and Korea, Lyon made his fortune building residential homes while also chairing AirCal in the early 1980s.

American classic cars were his major automotive fascination prior to buying a 1953 Mercedes-Benz 300S Cabriolet in 1969.

“We restored that car and I drove it regularly,” he recalled. “It was soon joined by a 1962 300D, one of the last of the four-door Mercedes-Benz convertibles.

“Both of those cars increased my appreciation for the marque.”

Lyon’s interest broadened into the pre-war era, and in the early ’80s he acquired a 1939 540K Spezial Cabriolet that had won Best of Show at Pebble Beach in ’73 when it was owned by Otis Chandler.

From then on, he gathered one of the finest stables of pre-war Mercedes models in Santa Ana: “My all-time favourites are the 1937 540K Spezial Roadsters, with high doors and long tails.

“We had the pleasure of owning two and still have the second one. From a design perspective, they just can’t be beat.”

The Mercedes-Benz 540K Spezial Coupé’s elegant side profile

Lyons was also fond of his ’41 770 Cabriolet B: “It was ordered by the Shah of Iran, but was never delivered to him due to WW2.

“The car was eventually captured and taken to Russia, where it remained until we acquired it in 1990.

“It’s the pinnacle of luxury and detailed with a mammoth amount of engine turning.”

He loved historic warbirds, too: the Boeing B-17 Fuddy Duddy takes pride of place in the museum he founded.

Lyon’s supercharged German beauties are occasionally displayed among the gleaming US bombers, looking like the ultimate spoils of war, though he later decided to scale down his collection.

Like Duesenbergs, it’s rare to see 540Ks being driven further than from trailer to fairway for concours shows.

But just picture it bowling up Highway 1 from LA into the twilight hours, with those Bosch headlights flooding the coastal route and the supercharger shrieking for bursts down the straights.

Images: Darin Schnabel

Thanks to: RM Sotheby’s and the Lyon family (lyonairmuseum.org)

This was first in our October 2011 magazine; all information was correct at the date of original publication

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