17/09/2026
At this year's Ellerslie Concours De Elegance, on a bright sunny day in February, a 1969 280SL Mercedes came 3rd in the customized vehicle category. It featured a custom leather interior and modern AMG V8 engine, with custom running gear, brakes and suspension. This is the car that Stu had agreed to take on back in 2024 and it would become a dedicated effort of restoration, subtle customization and concerted project management effort to finish. Often at Stu's Trim and Sound we feel compelled to resolve problems that lurk in the projects that we undertake. We want the best result for our customers so things don't need to be revisited wherever possible. Stu had the mammoth task of sourcing all the parts required, working with companies like R3 Fabrications to restore and install other damaged parts, to not only create a sharp leather interior but to fully assemble the exterior trim, rebuild the hard top and soft top frame and make a new German canvas soft top, restoring everything from wheels to exhaust to headlights and bonnet fittings. Interior wise, the seats were subtly reduced in volume and headrests were added for support. These were modified slightly for balance. The German leather was ordered especially to align with the job. The original center console consisted of a simple timber tray and it was replaced with a custom designed piece that featured a storage bin with phone chargers and discreet park brake button. A custom billet/chromed aluminium transmission gate finished it off nicely. An Alpine audio system featured an under-seat sub woofer, image directed tweeters that were stealthily installed in the A pillars and a pair of amplified 6.5 inch Type R speakers installed in the kick panel areas with their own insulated speaker cavities. The stereo is a special reproduction model to emulate the original Becker head unit's style and provide modern Bluetooth functions and more. Details are where the time is spent. The 280 SL is a car that has been designed in such a way that correct tolerances must be achieved otherwise a compounding error will force headaches galore! All the parts that were chrome plated had to be done in copper first then filed to fit correctly before being chrome plated. Replacement parts often needed to be worked on to fit correctly. Thanks goes to our customer who had a strong vision for what he wanted to achieve and to the many businesses who worked on the car along with us to get it worthy of that vision. Thanks to Angus Fogg at Foggy's Garage, the team at Jasco Automotive & Classics, Mag & Turbo Manukau, Jason Swan at Racecar and Custom Electrical, Bumper Replacements, David Gouk Race Engines, R3 Fabrications and very special mention goes out to a man who helped make this project run as smoothly as it could: Lloyd Marx. He was Stu's guru so to speak and his knowledge, support and effort meant a lot. This is definitely one of the biggest projects undertaken at Stu's Trim and Sound and we are grateful for the experience!
