M21

The Typ 200 of 1933 was an enlarged Typ 170, and it retired the aging Stuttgart 200 and Stuttgart 260. Underneath it was thoroughly modern for its price: independent suspension all round, transverse leaf springs at the front, a swing axle on coil springs at the rear, hydraulic drums on all four wheels. Above that sat a side-valve six of just under two liters, good for 98 km/h. Against the four-cylinder cars it competed with, Mercedes-Benz was still selling refinement — but it was selling a simpler-trimmed car for much the same money as before, and buyers noticed.

The long-wheelbase version did the real work. As a six-seat Pullman saloon the 200 lang became a fixture of the German taxi trade, 6,341 of them alongside 9,281 short-chassis cars, until Opel arrived in August 1934 with a Pullman on the identical 3,050 mm wheelbase for 5,000 Reichsmark against the Mercedes-Benz price of 6,550. In 1936 the six was opened out to 2.2 liters for the Typ 230, and that same long chassis took the 260 D — the first series-production diesel passenger car in the world.