In search of the best place to restore the engine in my armored proto-Hammer, I ended up at a place directly connected to the legendary AMG Hammer
Before AMG became a global name, it was just a few obsessed men building engines.
This place keeps that spirit alive. This is not just another workshop. This is part of AMG history.
MKB Motorenbau, founded by one of the AMG founders(Erhard Melcher) and one of the mechanics from the original AMG days, is a place where that history still physically exists.
And yes — those famous photos of Erhard Melcher working on engines, known all over the internet… the originals are right here.
In one of the photos, you can see the first AMG-tuned legendary M117 engine, along with the date and time of its first start-up.
I also have to thank Selcuk Helmut for taking the time to show me around the workshop.
I saw one Hammer engine currently under restoration, as well as several M117 6.0 4V and 5.6 2V engines from the C126 line being rebuilt. Ive seen c126 6.0-4V car without widebody and also widebody c126 but with 5.6 2V engine being rebuild. They are also working on various M120 versions, from the 6.0 AMG all the way up to the 7.0 AMG and 7.2 AMG. They also have some E500 models in the workshop, and one E400 AMG S2 currently being sorted. Also there is original w123 500TE AMG.
My impression was that this is the right place to rebuild the engine in my car.
Along with learning more about the company’s history, we also spent quite a lot of time talking about the Hammer models, and I learned many interesting details.
In their view, every W124 that received a V8 engine together with modifications to the suspension, rear differential, exhaust, reinforcements, brakes, and the complete chassis, body kit, and interior conversion can be considered a Hammer. This is because all of these cars were modified so extensively that it is not even that important whether the engine was a 5.0, 5.2, 5.4, 5.6, or 6.0, with either 2-valve or 4-valve heads. They were all so heavily reworked that, in terms of the general concept and core engineering principles, they were almost all fundamentally identical except engine variations. The engines were being developed continuously throughout that whole period. Of course, the most famous version is the 6.0 4-valve model, which is the one that actually made the Hammer name legendary.
The really special part was meeting a man who had worked at AMG forty years ago, building those very same engines, now rebuilding an engine that he himself had originally assembled four decades earlier. He is Panagiotis Avramidis, engineer #85 and was overhouling an engine with his stamp #85.
In any case, it was a very interesting live discussion.
P.S
I’m not sure if this is the correct section, so I kindly ask the admins to move it if it isn’t.
Before AMG became a global name, it was just a few obsessed men building engines.
This place keeps that spirit alive. This is not just another workshop. This is part of AMG history.
MKB Motorenbau, founded by one of the AMG founders(Erhard Melcher) and one of the mechanics from the original AMG days, is a place where that history still physically exists.
And yes — those famous photos of Erhard Melcher working on engines, known all over the internet… the originals are right here.
In one of the photos, you can see the first AMG-tuned legendary M117 engine, along with the date and time of its first start-up.
I also have to thank Selcuk Helmut for taking the time to show me around the workshop.
I saw one Hammer engine currently under restoration, as well as several M117 6.0 4V and 5.6 2V engines from the C126 line being rebuilt. Ive seen c126 6.0-4V car without widebody and also widebody c126 but with 5.6 2V engine being rebuild. They are also working on various M120 versions, from the 6.0 AMG all the way up to the 7.0 AMG and 7.2 AMG. They also have some E500 models in the workshop, and one E400 AMG S2 currently being sorted. Also there is original w123 500TE AMG.
My impression was that this is the right place to rebuild the engine in my car.
Along with learning more about the company’s history, we also spent quite a lot of time talking about the Hammer models, and I learned many interesting details.
In their view, every W124 that received a V8 engine together with modifications to the suspension, rear differential, exhaust, reinforcements, brakes, and the complete chassis, body kit, and interior conversion can be considered a Hammer. This is because all of these cars were modified so extensively that it is not even that important whether the engine was a 5.0, 5.2, 5.4, 5.6, or 6.0, with either 2-valve or 4-valve heads. They were all so heavily reworked that, in terms of the general concept and core engineering principles, they were almost all fundamentally identical except engine variations. The engines were being developed continuously throughout that whole period. Of course, the most famous version is the 6.0 4-valve model, which is the one that actually made the Hammer name legendary.
The really special part was meeting a man who had worked at AMG forty years ago, building those very same engines, now rebuilding an engine that he himself had originally assembled four decades earlier. He is Panagiotis Avramidis, engineer #85 and was overhouling an engine with his stamp #85.
In any case, it was a very interesting live discussion.
P.S
I’m not sure if this is the correct section, so I kindly ask the admins to move it if it isn’t.
