Found a Replica Pagoda for sale!

[Sirasila]

http://produto.mercadolivre.com.br/MLB-174655469-mercedes-phoenix-replica-james-bond-conversivel-1987-pagoda-_JM

The exterior looks convincing from a distant but the interior leaves much to be desired.  Our Pagoda has a fairly simple looking dash, I wonder why they made it look so cheap here.   

[Ulf]

Interesting - it seems like a lot of the panels are original, but that interior....

[al_lieffring]

The difference in almot any repli-car is in the details. (also the difference in a good or bad restoration) The interior looks like a fairly accurate duplication wth the omission of the chrome details.
Also the fit of the head light doors, they are much smaller than the opening in the fenders, my guess, the body is fiberglass.

[Shvegel]

48,000 Brazilian Real is 29,000USD. They are not shy are they.

[joelj]

Pitty the person who buys it

[Sirasila]

If it's that expensive who would buy one? Well.. I suppose somebody already did.  This would be such an easy car to make look original inside.  It's a pity they would go through the trouble of making it and fall short on the details.

[Ulf]

Just out of curiosity - would it be possible to assemble a brand new Pagoda from new parts? (It would probably be really expensive, but...)

Ulf

[knockmacool]

Just out of curiosity - would it be possible to assemble a brand new Pagoda from new parts? (It would probably be really expensive, but...)

Ulf

As a young man I was told replacement parts sold for 3 times the price of the original component in the car. I now doubt it is just 3X, and can't imagine what the multiple would be in the case of our cars.

However, it would be interesting if we could see the current figure. Would it serve to moderate the  increase in part prices, perhaps attracting more suppliers to the sector?

[Shvegel]

You could almost build a bare body(no hood decklid, doors or tonneau cover) from parts that are currently available. The exceptions being the cowl top on the exterior and some of the inner structure and brackets etc.

If prices of our cars continue to climb someday someone will offer a complete body assembly. Probably in the $25,000USD range.

I hope someone from Mercedes reads this because they could use un-primed sheet metal, weld it up and e-coat the entire shell.

[Peter van Es]

Mercedes-Benz actually did that. At the Technoclassica in Essen in 2003 they showed this 280SL that was put together from still available parts (and when bits were missing, from other parts in the parts bin). When I saw the car it first looked familiar, then weird, and finally I found the sign explaining what they did. I did not take a photograph of that sign regrettably.

I sort of think the total value of the parts (not including labour) alone was edging close to EUR 90,000.

In the interior shot you can see it is not original: look at the wood on the doors, and the door panels. The dash wood is also too shiny. I'm sure there'd be other things under the hood, but they did not open it up...

Sorry for the old (and therefore fairly low quality) digital photographs.

Peter