More Car Museums - Merc & Porsche

Today I'm back on the road and doing a quick sprint across the German countryside to Stuttgart in the south. The main reason for this quick visit is the two car companies headquartered here; Porsche & Mercedes Benz.


First stop the Mercedes Museum, I'm told I did these in reverse order - I should have started with the smaller Porsche museum.

The Merc Museum covers 8 levels beginnings of Daimler AG (owner of the Mercedes Benz Brand) to current models & concepts.


The beginning (floor 8) starts with the first engine produced by the Gottlieb Daimler, who with the help of this friend Wilhelm Maybach built a 1 horsepower engine, the "grandfather clock"

They then proceeded to put it in EVERYTHING they could get their hands on!

One horsepower was sadly not enough and so as the engines grew so did the vehicles they could mount them to. Historically an automobile company would sell a chassis with engine and steering (ie all the metalwork) and leave the bodywork to a couch builder (wood & textiles). This meant that many early model vehicles were effectively one of a kind; the underlying vehicle was built to a specification but the end product was based entirely on the customers desires.
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One floor down were have a series of the gorgeous 1900's vehicles including the first Mercedes.

The first Mercedes was designed as a production race car requested by a local car salesman; he named his racing cars after his daughter and had strict requirements as to the specifications of the car. The first car was delivered in 1900 and went on to win many races and be the first car to hit 60km/h.

Down another level we skip ahead 30 years (1930s) when the centre of gravity lowered and engine sizes grew producing some amazing vehicles. WW1 had been the first mechanized war and quickly pushed engine and vehicle development forwards from what had been prior a niche, expensive hobby to a national priority. ​

Apparently the museum had more of these however sold some a few years back!

One of these would set you back approximately 100,000 Euro in today's terms ($155k AUD).

In the time between WW1 & WW2 Germany saw an enormous uplift in production; labour was cheap and materials were too. However the newly created Weimar Republic sought to repay its war debt by simply printing additional money leading to hyperinflation.

A new currency was created and the economic policy of quantitative easing (...just print more money...) was canned. However the 1929 stock market crash in the US further damaged the economy potentially adding to the factors leading to WW2. However Daimler AG did particularly well turning their factories to producing aircraft, tank & submarine engines.


Skipping forward to the 1950s they have original models of their first 300SL 'gullwing' coupes, these were built as road legal race cars and to reduce weight the body was made from scaffolding, unfortunately there wasn't room for doors in the model and the only solution was the now iconic gullwing doors.

The final model never entered production and the only one created became the personal car of the test department's head.

They also have a collection of Mercedes racing cars from over the years!

Finally they showcase their current debut technology - a series of hybrid and pure electric cars and additionally a collection of previous concepts that never made it to production.

And the concept cars:

All caught up its time for an Aldi dinner and to recharge everything!

Next morning its time for the Porsche Museum, built on top of the Porsche showroom!

Porsche's history is intertwined with that of Audi & Mercedes; Ferdinand Porsche worked for Daimler up until 1926 when his ideas for a small lightweight car were opposite to the board. He also worked on small wheel mounted electric engines which were dropped in favour of the more powerful petrol engines.

By the early 1930s Porsche had begun his consulting service for engines and vehicles with his son and in the late 1930's founded the Volkwagen "People's Automobile" company to produce the Beetle.


Skipping past WW2 Porsche moved to France and began building cars in his own name; his son returning to Germany in the 1950s he crafted the aerodynamic body which continues to this day.

Not all their cars were silver however; they also have some of their prior sponsored race cars to match those shoes I didnt get!

Last stop was of course the gift shop!

Sadly I don't think I can take the bike with me! Until next time...