by Robert Lewis (27 Jun 02)

Given what's been happening in the American, and other, financial markets, the world première of the production version of the colossally expensive Maybach 62, scheduled for July 2, would have been better happening almost anywhere else but Wall Street.

However, there's a long lead time for these affairs. Despite Enron, WorldCom and Xerox, the Maybach is already on the high seas, heading for New York in a glass-walled crate aboard the QE2 (pictured above). But there's no doubt whatever that this car, the most super-luxurious saloon in the world - and the 62 model is the long-wheelbase chauffeur-driven affair - is a sign of extremely conspicuous consumption. It's an open question as to just how it jells with the spirit of the times.

The car was unveiled in concept form at the Tokyo Show in 1997. World-wide road trials of the first batch of prototypes began in December 2000.

In August of the following year the decision was taken to scrap the idea of marketing the Maybach as a model in the Mercedes-Benz range. At considerable extra cost, the probably more sensible route was taken to re-establish Maybach as a marque in its own right.

That made Maybach the sixth make in the DaimlerChrysler portfolio after Mercedes-Benz, smart, Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge, and it certainly made sense from a heritage point of view. Wilhelm Maybach was technical director of the original Daimler company, and designed the first Mercedes before leaving in 1907 to establish his own business, which built engines for Graf Zeppelin's airships. In 1921 his son Karl began producing luxury cars, most famous of which was the Maybach Zeppelin DS 8 of the 1930s, Germany's largest and most lavish luxury car of the decade.

Like its Rolls-Royce counterparts, the Zeppelin DS 8 came out of the factory in chassis form. Individual coachbuilders designed and mounted the bodywork.

Reviving The Badge

The modern cars have a restyled version of the original MM badge. In its previous manifestation, the double-M logo stood for Maybach Motorenbau. Now it represents Maybach Manufaktur, the name given to the operation at Sindelfingen, where the twin-turbo V12-engined 62, and the shorter-wheelbase 57, are being built to customers' individual requirements.

Although deliveries won't start till the autumn, Maybach Manufaktur has been taking orders since May 27. The company has no sales force, so called. Each customer is allocated a "personal liaison manager" - let's face it, a superior sales person.

Plans are to build a maximum of seven cars per day, and the expectation was that the best markets, in order, would be the USA, Western Europe and Japan. Some observers reckoned from the start that the seven-per-day projection was wildly over-optimistic, or at least couldn't possibly be sustained over any reasonably long period.

On the other hand, if the current situation in America means that production falls below the hoped-for level, now that it's a separate self-contained make, any mayhem at Maybach will be no skin off the Mercedes-Benz nose.

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