MAD MOD: Merc apprentices shoved V8 into B-Class, call it B55

This is the sort of thing that car companies should encourage their apprentices to do, well not just shove really big engines under the bonnet but washing machine motors into the wheel hubs, locomotive motors, small nuclear reactor, steam engine...anything really

ARMED with a bit of free time and an encouraging supervisors, a group of apprentice at Mercedes Benz in Stuttgart found themselves marrying  a long suffering B-Class shell to an enthusiastic 5.5-litre V8 motor.

It was a really tight fit but in the end it was quite the marriage.

In fact the guys found that apart from the space constraint, the parts mated beautifully, the engines found the existing mounting plates and bolted on with a bit of modifications, they even let it keep the 7G-tronic transmission.

The rear axle was converted to an old E_Class unit and by that they mean the W211 multi-link arrangement and the whole thing now sits beautifully as if nothing had happened.

No horrible weld scars were to be seen and the B55 can now hit the ton in 5.2 seconds and achieve an electronically regulated top speed of 260km.h, that will be proven once they find someone brave enough to take the B555 all the way to take-off speed.

The entire transplant was done by the apprentices with no help from AMG or the mother company...cool