Originality of carpet in 230SL

[Garry]

Yesterday I visited the KHM carpet manufactured in Stuttgart Germany to have a look at their carpets and get samples for fitting to my 230SL.

I got two samples but there appears to be some confusion on which one is the correct original. One carpet sample, the 401 is a loop carpet with 5 loops to the inch, the second one, 409 is a 7 loop to the inch.

What I am trying to find out is which one is correct or are both correct with the 7 Loop carpet as an option on the car.

The only way to know is to have someone with a genuine, and I mean known, provable and genuine original 230SL and have provide a photo of their carpet with either the 401 sample or the 409 sample.

KHM thought that the 401 was the correct one for both 190SL and 230SL.

Garry

[Jonny B]

Garry,

Hope all is going well with the rest of your travels.

I just took a look at the carpet in my car. It is NOT original, but Pete L did a good job with these kind of details. It is 7 loops to the inch.

I will be most curious to hear from the others.

The 280 SL is away from home right now, at the storage garage. Not much help for a 230 SL, but it is original.

[114015]

It is NOT original, but Pete L did a good job with these kind of details. It is 7 loops to the inch

Hello you both carpet admirers,

IMHO: take the 7 loops to the inch. That looks (to me) more accurate.

Square weave carpet is a bit of a difficult question since only so few 230ies and 250ies have totally factory original carpet.

Most of them have had it replaced some time during the last 44 - 49 years since the (wool, goat hair-containing) square weave carpet deteriorates much faster than the mainly fully synthetic multi loop material of the 280 SLs.
That's why many (especially US-based) 280 interiors survived (here with view to the carpet), more than the earlier 230/250ies.

So, how was the correct color, how was the correct weave on 230/250ies carpet?

I have only got one good pic showing the detail of the carpet, and that is John "TheLews" 250 carpet. Without (inch) ruler though but indicating pretty well its "loop size".

Furthermore I have some left over pieces from my 1964 carpet collection and I take out the ruler (well, it's in centimeter, not inchs) and look what I can find out this weekend.

Eventually, the carpet sources that the shops (like GAAH, Worldupholstery, K&K, KHM, SLS, etc.) have are some sort of a "company secret" to them. That means that not all of them  have the same suppliers like with the Sonnenland softtop fabric, but their own ones.
As a result sand-coloured square weave from supplier A and supplier B are not necessarily the same, both, color and weave.

See and enjoy John's carpet. That gives you a good direction to a good and adequate replacement for your carpet.

IMHO: take the 7 loops to the inch. That looks (to me) more accurate.


Achim
(pepper&salt square weave carpet collector)

[Jkalplus1]

Very interesting!
Do you think KHM "Charcoal" is the the equivalent to the original "Anthracite" found in '64 230SLs?  Based on my color combination (Papyrus White on Dark Blue), I believe the "Anthracite" color is what I should have for my carpets, instead of the fine -but incorrect- Dark Blue wool fabric.  It seems to me KHM's Charcoal /406 fine weave is the way to go...can anyone confirm?

Thanks for the advice,

J

[Garry]

Alfred Esser and I have been discussing carpet for some time as I try to establish the correct carpet for my new car.

He pointed me to KHM and hence my visit, but when they commented that the carpet should be 5 loop carpet it threw me a bit.  Since then I have had a statement from Alfred that pretty well leaves me in no doubt that it should be the 7 loop carpet installed and not the 5 as KHM stated.

Alfreds Quote

My 230SL carpet from the factory was "Fein Boucle". I spent a significant amount of time in Germany 8 years ago trying to find the exact color again but came only close. You can see it in the attached photo, it is the one on the right upon which all the other samples are lying. It has 7-loops/inch along the weft (X-axis) and 6.75 loops/inch along the warp (Y-axis).
We had a long discussion several years ago about these carpets and one of the most knowledgeable members back then, Vince Canepa {his 250SL is now owned by John L}, did a similar search. His statement is still correct:
"Since square weave was used in nearly everything German of the era, many folks make the mistake of assuming it is all the same.  However, M-B specified the finer weave.  When you put the two side-by-side the difference is quite noticable." The spec was a 7-loop carpet - period!

So my order to KHM will be the 7 loop, J, 7 loop it is.  I have attached a copy of Alfreds samples for you to see also

Garry

[66andBlue]

My photo that Garry posted and the quote from Vince C. are in this thread:
http://www.sl113.org/forums/index.php?topic=4824
where this issue was thoroughly discussed before.

[114015]

(Of course it is not necessary anymore to comment Alfred's fully correct answer & statement here, but for what it's worth...)
... I found the same on my two leftover original 1964 carpet samples, a black&whitegrey one and a blue one.

Both have clearly 7 by 7 loops per inch (or almost, I would not want to argue here about 7 x 6.75 or 7 x7 or anything now).

I try to upload pictures later but sadly they're not too good.


BTW, Jerome, you could also see from ... my ... carpets that the 1964 230 had _blue_ carpet, not charcoal black or grey.
The latter colors were used from 012467 (August 1964) on, not earlier...

For the VIN aficionados ....


Achim

[thelews]

BTW, Alfred.  I have that replacement carpet that Vince refers to in the old thread.  He did use it on the door sills of the car, but there is plenty more.  Not a great picture, but you can see the replacement carpet on the sill compared to the original on the tunnel.

[Harry]

Glad to see this thread.  Is Ed Cave still on the forum?  The 230SL in his pictures has interior color very much like mine.  I'd love to bend his ear some and learn the coor code in his car that he used to match the upholstery.  It looks like leather -is it?  If the seats were leather, were the door panels also leather?  Bee-yoo-ti-ful restoration.  My carpet, which I believe to be original, is a light tan with maybe some brown threads included.
Harry

[Garry]

Harry,

After all the studying and discussion with Alfred and seeing pictures and then visiting the factory in Germany, I finally ordered my carpet, which I believe is the correct one for a 230SL from KHM who were tho only ones that were doing the correct fine weave for the earlier Pagodas  http://www.cabrio.de/khm/index.php?lang=en  in the Boucle fine tan #409, which if you look on their site is probably your carpet also.

As for the leather doors cards, the answer is yes they were.

[bogeyman]

Garry:
Did you look at the leather and soft top samples when you were there?
What was your overall impression?

Thanks

[Garry]

They appeared to be a good operation and had many variety of both tops and interiors for most classics. There was also several levels of quality and of course prices.  All depends how much you want to pay for correctness I guess.  I have not heard a bad word about them and was certainly confident enough to order from there.

They however had thought the 230SL had the lower number of loops (5 vs 7) of carpet but a lot of research by Alfred (66andblue) and others has shown that the fine boucle was the correct carpet that Mercedes used for our cars as can be seen by comments below..

[Harry]

Garry - thanks very much.  I also noted in a photo on that car that the fabric top had a headliner?  My top, which I thought to be original, does not have the headliner material.  I do recall that the German convertibles of that era, MB and VW, did have the headliner, as well as a sound deadening material.  Great information!
Harry

[Garry]

Search on the forum re soft top material as there is also some discussion here on them and the thickness they should be.  I think a lot of the new ones are different to the old material and as a result cause the hood to not fit properly well the soft top hutch.

[Jonny B]

Harry, not sure what car you are typing about regarding the headling and the soft top. The 113 cars never had a liner, there is barely enough room for the top. The 111/112 cars did, and they are beautiful to behold (when done like the factory).

[Harry]

Jonny and Garry - on closer observation, I see that I was mistaken about there being a headliner.  The new top in the photos does display a fabric on the inside/underside that somewhat hides the canvas. I mistook that for a headliner.  It's the same material that wraps around the bows of the top and secure it.  Thanks for your help!
Harry