The story
The G 500 is what happens when a military truck is asked to wear a suit and refuses to take its boots off. It was the first V8 G-Class built in regular production, the first one most Americans could buy from a Mercedes dealer, and — underneath the wood and leather — the same ladder-framed, triple-locked machine that armies bought by the thousand.
A SHAH, AN ARMY AND A FACTORY IN GRAZ
The name goes back to Daimler-Benz’s six-wheeled G1 of 1926 — a Geländewagen, or cross-country vehicle — but the modern truck began in the early 1970s, when the Shah of Iran, then one of Mercedes-Benz’s largest shareholders, pre-ordered some 20,000 military vehicles. Mercedes engineered it; Austria’s Steyr-Daimler-Puch would build it in Graz. Design studies were carved in wood from 1973, and production began in 1979 — the same year the Shah fled Iran and his order evaporated.
It found other customers fast: border police, the Argentinian army and, in 1980, Pope John Paul II, who got one with a clear viewing platform. In 1983 a 280 GE driven by Jacky Ickx won the Paris–Dakar Rally, which settled any argument about whether it was a real off-roader.
THE W463 GOES UPMARKET
In 1990 the civilian G was reworked as the W463: a nicer cabin, full-time four-wheel drive and three fully locking differentials, while the utilitarian W460 and later W461 carried on separately. America still couldn’t buy one officially. New Mexico importer Europa International converted European trucks to US spec — later persuading Mercedes to build them to DOT standards — and some sold for as much as $135,000.
The G 500 arrived in 1998 as the first regular-production V8 G — the hand-picked, limited-run 500 GE of 1993 had come first — with the 5.0-litre M113, good for 292 hp. When Mercedes finally launched the G officially in the US for the 2002 model year, the G 500 and G 55 AMG were the two trucks in the showroom. The G 500 ran in America through 2008; for 2009 the same truck returned as the G 550 with a 5.5-litre V8. The seven-speed automatic had already replaced the old five-speed in US G 500s during 2007.
SIDEBAR · THE EUROPA TRUCKS
America’s G-Class before Mercedes sold one
Before 2002, the way to buy a new G in the US was Europa International of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Europa did the expensive work of federalizing European trucks, became the exclusive US importer with Small Volume Manufacturer status, and sold 300 GEs, G 320s and early G 500s, federalized and certified for US sale — 50-state legal, not gray-market. In 2002 Mercedes-Benz bought the US distribution rights and Europa turned to service, parts and the models America still never got, like the three-door Cabriolet.
A Europa G 500 looks like a 2002 truck from outside. Inside it’s simpler: a steering wheel and gauge cluster from the pre-facelift W210 E-Class (yes, the sedan), no factory radio controls on the wheel, and a 5-speed automatic without the later tip-shift gate. Some enthusiasts prefer them for exactly that: German Cars For Sale Blog quotes a seller who steers buyers away from the electrically troubled 2002–05 MB-USA trucks and towards Europa Gs.
