The 6-speed swapped Mercedes-Benz CLK63 AMG Black Series is finally here, and Jason drove it! Derek’s – or rather OTS’s – OEM-grade 6-speed manual CLK63 Black Series by Kwiek Classics is done, and Jason and Derek get behind the wheel to review the car that AMG should’ve built all along. 

Enthusiasts around the world have never had a chance to interact directly with AMG’s only clean-sheet engine, the M156 – a monster 6.2L, 32-valve, DOHC, cross-plane V8 making 500 horsepower for the CLK63 Black Series. But now, thanks to Matt Kwiek at Kwiek Classics, we finally can! And it’s why Derek and his business partners at OTS bought one for Matt to manual swap using OEM Mercedes-Benz parts. The swap is done, and the car is here in the Bay Area where the Carmudgeons got to row the gears in AMG’s widebody beast of the noughties.

By junking the recalcitrant automatic transmission, the car is transformed into the athlete its flared fenders promise it to be. Combine the manual trans with the factory triple-adjustable dampers (which feel like they’re full of sand in its current track configuration, though according to Jason are magical with the settings Mercedes used at the launch event) and the CLK63 Black Series becomes a car that even the most curmudgeonly enthusiast will struggle to come up with an excuse not to buy. As familiar and confidence-inspiring as the best M cars like E36 and E46 M3, and with an engine more engaging and experiential than the likes of the E39 M5. Even better to drive than a V8 Vantage and a Lexus LFA. Unlike typical 3-pedal swaps that lend themselves to terrible throttle mapping (see: Pagani Zonda), this one is a 9 out of 10, and an easy “marry” over a plethora of Ferraris: Testarossa, 355, 550 – even a Porsche 997 GT3.

After the AMG, we dive into Jason’s recent dyno day at Chuckles Garage in NorCal, where Jason managed to take 3 spots on the dyno’s leaderboard for least horsepower (not including Jason, who can put down 500 watts). Jason got power numbers on his E31 BMW 850CSi, the Rover SD1 3500 V8, and the Honda Beat. Plus a friend brings along a Euro-spec 850CSi for comparison. Using some Turner Motorsport chips for the dual-ECU S70 850CSi motor, in conjunction with some Ferrari 599 mufflers, Jason’s CSi managed to beat the Euro car at 304 rear wheel horsepower. But even with Ferrari exhaust, the 850 still needs help in the sound department. Luckily, @czechmate_e30 is working with a fabricator to make a set of stepped headers for BMW V12s!

Then, with fresh dyno numbers in hand, Jason combines the data with the power figures from the rest of his fleet, and indexes them by percentage of peak power versus percentage of peak RPM. The resulting graph provides an excellent visualization as to where and how each of his car’s engines makes their power. Science!

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