Specialty File
Consider this the inevitable result of childhood in the modern age. The schedule of a 10th grader gunning for a prestige university with a full agenda of activities would give seizures to the White House appointments secretary.
Well, if the 420 horsepower and 464 pound-feet of torque in the RENNtech E60 4Matic can't deliver your child to the euphonium teacher on time, call Ferrari. No, call Sikorsky, because you'll need something big to duplicate this 155-mph wunderwagen's cargo space and seven-passenger seating capacity.
This is the first wagon built by Hartmut Feyhl since he defected from the AMG skunkworks in 1989 to start RENNtech in Lake Park, Florida. So far, it's a one-off, the successful outcome of a request by one of RENNtech's ballistic-missile owners for an all-weather family car that can frolic with an M5.
Feyhl will happily build a copy for you at his Florida shop in exchange for $87,120. Of course, you must first supply him with an E320 4Matic wagon (current base price, $52,711). With its factory options, including sunroof, CD changer, and navigation system, and its RENNtech goodies, including $3660 in burled-wood accents, the example pictured here pared a trust fund by $151,942. At least the fit and finish of RENNtech's cosmetic work is as good as or better than that of the factory kit.
Built into the price is a Mercedes M113 SOHC three-valve V-8 from the S500, heavily modified by RENNtech's skilled surgeons. Mercedes' new pressure-cast aluminum blocks can crack if juiced to more than 400 horsepower, says Feyhl, so RENNtech first installs reinforcing brackets to shore up the casting's free-standing cylinder bores.
The bores widen by three millimeters to 100mm to swallow special Mahle pistons; a custom forged crankshaft from Germany strokes the AMG E55 connecting rods through an additional 11mm, to 95mm. The dimensional increases bump the S500's 4966cc V-8 to an atmosphere-inhaling 5969cc.
