Above: The 1939 Mercedes-Benz W 154, a twin-supercharged, V-12 “Silver Arrow.”

An unprecedented gathering of five Mercedes-Benz Silver Arrows across two centuries of championship-winning competition will be on special display to celebrate the Silver Anniversary of the Amelia Island Concours.

The legend of the Silver Arrows began with the debut of the 1934 Mercedes-Benz W 25 Grand Prix racer and the racing rules that governed its maximum weight at 750 kilograms, or 1650 pounds — without fuel, lubricants and tires.

The new race cars, all weighed at the Mercedes-Benz factory, were in compliance with the weight limits, but the official scales at the Nurburgring for the 1934 Eifelrennen read 751 kilograms.

As Alfred Neubauer, Mercedes-Benz’s legendary racing team manager, considered his options to bring the cars into weight compliance, historic records suggest that it was mechanic Willy Zimmer who said, “The paint has to go.”

White is Germany’s official assigned racing color and has been since the days when Grand Prix cars raced for national honor rather than commercial promotion. The story goes that fine sandpaper and hours of labor removed the white paint from the silver skin of the W 25 racers until only the car’s wire wheels remained painted. The cars went to the grid in bare silver metal.

Read the full story at VintageMotorsport.com