E63 AMG W212

The Mercedes-AMG E63 (W212) was the Car of the Future race car campaigned by Erebus Motorsport — the only Mercedes-Benz ever to contest the Australian V8 / Supercars championship. Fielded from the opening Gen I season in 2013 through to 2015, it was the odd-one-out of the era among the Ford, Holden, Nissan and Volvo entries.

An AMG V8 in a control car

Erebus took over the former Stone Brothers Racing licence and entered in 2013 with three Mercedes E63 AMG sedans on the new Car of the Future control chassis — the same rear-transaxle, control-differential, E85 and Dunlop-control-tyre package as the rest of the grid. What set the car apart was under the bonnet: a naturally aspirated 5.0-litre V8 built by AMG in Germany, derived from the marque's 6.2-litre M156 / M159 engine family and reduced to the control displacement — a production-based unit, and a very different architecture from the purpose-built race V8s of Ford and Holden.

Body & aero

The race car carried the four-door W212 E-Class silhouette. Like every Gen I car the body was aero-matched to a common downforce and drag target; the aerodynamic package is set by the technical rules and no per-car figures are published here.

A short, distinctive run

Erebus persevered with the AMG package for three seasons before switching to the Holden VF Commodore for 2016, closing the only Mercedes chapter in the category's history. The car is remembered less for what it achieved than for what it was: the sole German entry, running an AMG-derived road-block V8 in a field of dedicated race engines.

Sources: verified spec catalog (COTF / Gen I control formula — Grade C; AMG M156/M159-derived engine base — Grade D) + the E63 model article.