Did One of Our Forum Members Inherit a Lost HWA Racecar?
In 1967, Hans Werner Aufrecht established, in conjunction with Mercedes AMG, a racing team that was factory supported. In fact, it was the original Mercedes AMG factory team. The HWA team absolutely dominated any race it entered. So much so, that in 1971, after destroying a car and replacing a driver a mere six hours before the race, HWA AG finished in 2nd place at the 24 hours of Spa.
They were the team to beat. However, in 1998, Aufrecht sold a majority interest to AMG, although due to the history behind the team and out of respect for Aufrecht, AMG kept the name and continues to race under the HWA banner with its DTM racecars. Now, it just so happens that one of our MBWorld forum members might just have gotten their hands on one of these HWA DTM cars.
In a thread titled, “Recieved a rotisserie and CLK shell with HWA Team markings, need more info!” Forum member Yodamaster posted the following:
“So I was given a car rotisserie with a 1999 CLK attached to it via jacking points, the rotisserie has HWA Team markings on it, and the car is a brand new body in white (never registered). It came with a hand laid carbon fiber DTM front bumper, and an FRP DTM rear bumper. Brand new doors and fenders from Mercedes were included too. The car has a full cage installed, and the previous owner was an ‘older race car driver’. The front strut towers are heavily modified to be wider than factory. I’m wondering what I’ve inherited.”
And so were we, so I did a bit of research. In 1996, DTM racing had been abolished due to financial issues and some asinine FIA regulations. HWA had nothing to race and nowhere to go. That said, when DTM went away, the original organizers never gave up on the historic series. And in the middle of 1998 a plan was enacted to bring the series back.
DTM came back to Germany in May of 2000, but there was a stricter set of rules. Racecars must be two doors, and must be based off production cars. In 1999 HWA grabbed a few CLKs and went racing with them the following year. Using a race version of the 5.5L supercharged V8, the HWA CLK DTM made roughly 582 horsepower and accelerated to 62mph in around 3.5 seconds.
Now I couldn’t find any information on how many they built, or where most of them are, but from the pictures, I’d say Yodamaster has an original racecar, possibly one of the prototypes from the 2000 season.
If I were you, I’d find the vin, call up HWA here, and see what you really have there. It could be a piece of racing history.
