Flachkühler (pronounced flak-koo-ler)
In
German, (literally "wide cooling device" (radiator)), a name adopted by
Daimler-Benz to describe the W111 Mercedes-Benz coupés and cabriolets built
(1969-1971) with a lower, wider radiator grill than the earlier W111 (and W112)
coupés and cabriolets (1961-1969).
Circa 1860s: The construct was Flach + kühler. The adjective flach (the singular flacher, the comparative flacher and the superlative flachsten) (shallow (wide and not deep)) was from the Middle High German vlach, from the Old High German flah, from the Proto-Germanic flakaz of uncertain origin. The construct of the noun Kühler ((1) cooler (anything device which cools) or (2) radiator (of an ICE (internal combustion engine)) was kühlen + -er. Kühlen was from the Middle High German küelen, from the Old High German kuolōn & chuolen, from the Proto-Germanic kōlōną & kōlēną and related to kalaną (to be cold). It was cognate with the Hunsrik kiele, the Luxembourgish killen, the Dutch koelen, the Saterland Frisian köile, the English cool (verb) and the Swedish kyla. The German suffix -er (used to forms agent nouns etc from verbs (suffixed to the verb stem)) was from the Middle High German -ære & -er, from the Old High German -āri, from the Proto-West Germanic -ārī, from the Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, from the Latin -ārius. When used as an adjective, kühler was a comparative degree of kühl ((1) cool (of temperature), (2) calm, restrained, passionless and (3) cool, frigid (particularly of the emotions)), from the Middle High German küele, from the Old High German kuoli, from the Proto-West Germanic kōl & kōlī, from the Proto-Germanic kōluz & kōlaz, from the primitive Indo-European gel-. It was cognate with the Dutch koel and the English cool. Flachkühler is a noun; the noun plural is Flachkühlers.
The dimensions of the grill used on the Mercedes-Benz W111 coupé & cabriolet were dictated by the height of the 3.0 litre (183 cubic inch) straight six (M189; 1957-1967) engine used in the more exclusive W112 (300 SE) versions. The M189 was one of several de-tuned variants of the M198 used in the 300SL Gullwing & roadster (W198; 1954-1963) which had started life as the M186 in the big 300 (W186 & W189, “Adenauer” 1950-1963, (the nickname referencing Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; chancellor of the FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany) 1949-1990) 1949-1963) before revealing its competition potential by gaining victories at the Nürburgring, the Carrera Panamericana in Mexico and, most famously, the Le Mans 24 Hours endurance classic. In the sports cars, the long-stroke six had been installed at an angle of 50o and fitted with a dry sump which permitted a low hood (bonnet) line but in the W111 & W112 the unit was mounted in a conventional perpendicular arrangement and used a wet sump, further adding to the height, thus the relatively tall grill. The smaller sixes used in the car (2.2 litre (M127); 2.5 (M129) & 2.8 (M130)) were of a more modern, short-stroke design and didn’t demand such a capacious engine bay but production line rationalization meant maintaining two different sets of coachwork for what were low volume models was not viable.
By the mid 1960s however, Mercedes-Benz was well aware the gusty, high-revving sixes with which the brand’s reputation had in the post-war years been re-built were technologically bankrupt for an attempt to compete in the vital US market where, for more than a decade, Detroit had been building the world’s finest engine-transmission combinations. What was needed was a mass-market V8 and because the big-block 6.3 litre V8 (M100 (1963-1981), introduced in 1963 in the 600 Grosser (W100)) wasn’t suitable for down-sizing, two physically smaller V8 ranges were developed, the first of which was designated M116; released in 1969 and in displacements of 3.5, 3.8 & 4.2 litres, it would serve the line until 1991 (confusingly, there were two iterations of the 3.8, the bore/stroke relationship altered for markets with lower speed limits and more onerous emission regulations). The 3.5 came first and in 1969 it debuted in the W111 coupé & cabriolet, designated 280 SE 3.5. By then, the old 3.0 litre six had been discontinued so the tall grill, which had come to look rather baroque, was no longer required and shortly after production commenced, the factory took the opportunity to modernize things with the new, lower & wider grill coming to be known as the Flachkühler (literally “flat cooler” and best translated as “flat radiator grill”, the engineers deciding the earlier design should be referred to as the Hōchkühler (high radiator). Hōch (high, tall; great; immense; grand; of great importance) was from the Middle High German hōch, from the Old High German hōh, from the Proto-West Germanic hauh, from the Proto-Germanic hauhaz, from the primitive Indo-European kewk-, a suffixed form of kew-; it may be compared to the Dutch hoog, the English high and the Swedish hög.
1955 Chrysler C-300 (top left and dubbed retrospectively the 300A), 1970 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE 3.5 Coupé (Flachkühler, top right), Rover 3.5 Coupé (bottom left) and Rover 3.5 Saloon (bottom right).
Although it's the 280 SE 3.5 Cabriolets which now command the highest price, what they miss is the coupe's lovely roofline, a style the factory reprised for the C215 coupés (1998-2006) but in fairness to Chrysler's stylists, the look was borrowed from them. For a brief, shining moment in 1955-1956, Chrysler offered their elegant “Forward Look”, the flirtation with restraint not lasting long as "irrational exuberance" washed over Detroit's studios but the influence endured longer in Europe, both the Mercedes-Benz W111 & W112 Coupés and the Rover P5 (1958-1967) & P5B (1967-1973) interpreting the shape. The Rover was a tale of two rooflines: the “Establishment” Saloon and the rakish Coupé, the latter the sort of thing described in barristers' slang as a "co-respondent's car" (ie the type driven by the sort of chap inclined to sleep with other men's wives and thus be cited in divorce proceedings while the man with the unfaithful wife would have driven a 3.5 Saloon).
Testing a 280 SE 3.5 Coupé in 1970, the US magazine Road & Track greeted the revised model with much the same feeling the press would a year later display when Jaguar’s new V12 made its debut in the Series 3 (1971-1974) E-Type (XKE, 1961-1974), writing of the German car: “The vintage coupe gets a lovely new engine”. The testers came away most impressed with the new power-train, the sheer quality of the build and the performance, the ability to achieve 125 mph (200 km/h) and cruise at high speed for hours not of great relevance in most of the US but anyway something to note of a large and heavy machine of (by US standards) relatively small displacement. Criticisms were limited mostly to the air-conditioning (it took European manufacturers decades to match what Detroit perfected early in the 1960s) and the swing-axle rear suspension (admittedly a state-of-the-art implementation but still antiquated). In a sigh of the times, the fuel consumption of 15.8 mpg (18.9 mpg calculated in imperial gallons) was deemed “impressive” but that needs to be assessed in the context of the performance and what other cars in the era achieved. What Road & Track didn’t foresee what was to come for the things as used cars. Noting the hefty premium charged for the two-door coachwork and that new engine was also available in the four-door 300 SEL 3.5 (W109), the editors commented: “We wouldn’t give you two cents extra for that hardtop [coupé] body (or the even more expensive convertible [cabriolet] but right now you have to take either that or the also expensive air-suspension on the 4-door sedan to get the V8 engine. And that is nice.” By the mid 2020s, all else being equal, the 3.5 coupé sells for 4-5 times what’s achieved by the sedans, the cabriolet at least ten-fold more valuable but in 1970, who would have predicted that?
Produced only between 1969-1971, the two-door 280 SE 3.5s were always expensive and only 3,270 coupés and 1,232 cabriolets were built. On the US West Coast, in 1970 a 3.5 Cabriolet listed at more than US$13,500 and that was at a time when a Cadillac De Ville Convertible had a base price of US$6,068 (although buyers typically would tick a few boxes on the option list so usually paid around US$7,000; a 1970 Coupe de Ville two-door hardtop listed at US$5,884). Of course, the Cadillacs included a 472 cubic inch (7.7 litre) V8 and in terms of “dollars per pound” they offered a lot more metal for the money but the customer profile probably not often overlapped. Being another age, the Mercedes-Benz was available with a four-speed manual gearbox (an option Cadillac withdrew after 1953) which was rather clunky thing which few choose but such is the rarity value, they have a following. The whole ecosystem of 280 SE 3.5 coupés and cabriolets actually became a cult in itself, perfectly restored cabriolets commanding prices in excess of US$500,000 and some German tuning houses will charge more for examples modernized with attributes like ABS (anti-lock brakes and literally "anti-bloc-system"), later V8 engines, transmissions and suspension. Even now, although in essence the structure dates from the late 1950s and the mechanicals a decade later, the appeal remains because the things are remarkably usable in modern conditions and aesthetically, nothing Mercedes-Benz has made since has anything like the elegance but then, nor have many.
1953 Morgan Plus 4 ("flat radiator", top left), 1955 Morgan Plus 4 (top right), 1969 Morgan Plus 8 (bottom left) and 2024 Morgan Plus 6 (bottom right). Thematically, since 1954 not much has changed although, under the skin, there is much is the modern Morgan that is "most modern".
Strangely, the idea of the “flat radiator” had been around for a while in the vernacular of collector car circles but it referred to another aspect of geometry. In 1952, Morgan of Malvern Link, Worcestershire, was (as it is now sort of still is) an English cottage industry manufacturing pre-war sports cars with more modern engines and they received advice from Lucas that because MG’s new TF (due for release in 1953) would have its headlamps integrated with the bodywork, production of the housing assemblies was ending. There being no alternative supplier, Morgan were compelled to follow MG’s lead and restyle things so the headlamps were faired in. Concurrent with this, the Morgan factory took the opportunity to do one of their rare styling changes, abandoning their long-establish upright radiator grill for one mounted in a cowl that blended into the hood (bonnet). It wasn’t exactly the onset of modernity but there presumably was some aerodynamic gain and just to assure buyers change wasn’t being made for the sake of change, disc brakes would have to wait another few years. The change to the grill was made in 1953 although, because of the way Morgan operated, some of the older style cars were actually assembled later than the new. The cars with the traditional Morgan look which features the upright grill are known among aficionados as the “flat radiator Morgans”. In a quirk of industry economics, when the 1961 Imperial range was released, Chrysler began manufacturing its own old-style “freestanding” headlamp nacelles, four of which were mounted on short stalks within deeply scalloped front fenders, a motif recalling (vaguely) the 1930s which the designer dubbed “neo-classical” which may have been a bit of a leap from the term's origin in revivalist architecture. Imperial retained the look for three seasons although the tailfins were pruned for 1962 after in their final year setting the mark for verticality, peaking at their highest point just a fraction of an inch higher than the famous “twin bullet” installations on the 1959 Cadillac.
Impromptu Flachkühler.
In October 2005, Lindsay Lohan went for a drive in her Mercedes-Benz SL 65 AMG roadster. It didn’t end well, a low-speed unpleasantness with a van resulting in her roadster suffering a Flachkühler. Based on the R230 (2001-2011) platform, the SL 65 AMG was produced between 2004-2012, all versions rated in excess of 600 horsepower, something perhaps not a wise choice for someone with no background handling such machinery though it could have been worse, the factory building 400 (175 for the US market, 225 for the RoW (rest of the world)) of the even more powerful SL 65 Black Series, the third occasion an SL was offered without a soft-top and the second time one had been configured with a permanent fixed-roof. A production number of 350 is sometimes quoted but those maintaining registers insist it was 400. Ms Lohan's SL 65 was later repaired and sold so all's well that ends well.
The best-known owner of a Mercedes-Benz 190 SL (W121; 1955-1962) was Fraulein Rosemarie Nitribitt (1933-1957) who, by 1957, was Frankfurt’s most illustrious (and reputedly most expensive) prostitute, a profession to which she seems to have been drawn by necessity but at which she proved more than proficient and, as the reports of the time attest, there was nothing furtive in the way she plied her trade. Something of a celebrity in Frankfurt (the republic's financial centre), her black roadster became so associated with her business model that the 190 SL was by some referred to as the “Nitribitt-Mercedes” (and, less charitably, the Hurentaxi (whore's cab)), her car seen frequently, if briefly, parked in the forecourts of the city’s better hotels. The lives of prostitutes, even the more highly priced, can descend to their conclusion along a Hobbesian path and in 1957, aged 24, she was murdered in her smart apartment, strangled with a silk stocking, the body not found for several days. Given Fraulein Nitribitt operated at the upper end of the market, her clients tended variously to be rich, famous & powerful and that attracted the raft of inevitable conspiracy theories there had been a cover-up to protect their interests, a rather botched police investigation encouraging such rumors. The murder remains unsolved.
