By David Colman

For: Epic Redesign, New Sporting Tack for MB
Against: Steering Wheel Obscures Speedo, Imprecise Throttle Tip-In From Standing Start

Historically, Mercedes products have enjoyed genetic markers that distinguish the brand. Bank vault construction, sumptuous seats and Baroque trim flourishes are descriptors that come to mind. Even blindfolded, you could climb into any Mercedes and tell that you weren’t in a BMW or a Lexus. But along with the Mercedes positives tagged a number of negatives, like weightiness, complexity, and dulled reflexes that drove potential customers into competitors’ showrooms. Mercedes has answered many of those issues by redesigning their C Class Coupe for 2012.

From the outside, the new Coupe is distinguished by the deftness of its visual language. Mercedes stylists have concocted a benchmark treat, with swooping roofline and crisp flank creases emphasizing the car’s low 55.8 inch height. There’s a delicacy inherent in the new coupe’s design that has been absent from Mercedes products since the SL 230 debuted nearly half a century ago. The lighter touch is also evident once you slip inside the cabin. The standard front sports seats are less monumental than before, more cosseting than ever. Though reduced in visual mass, the driver’s seat offers 10-way power adjustment, 4 modes of lumbar support, and 3 memory settings (for seat, mirror and steering wheel position).

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By David Colman

The Carreview Window Sticker

Specs: $67k price, 302 HP, 19/26 Mileage and 0-60 in 5.5 seconds

Pros:

• The best SLK styling in years
• Slingshot Acceleration and excellent handling
• Custom Tailoring
• Slick Roof with on-the-fly adjustable tint
• A roadster that appeals to many of the buyer’s instincts

Cons:

• Lack of Storage
• No Manual Tranny
• Steep price of $67k

The SLK is the closest thing Mercedes makes to a sports car. It is small, nimble and fast, seats only two, and functions as a convertible or a closed coupe. The SLK is a stunning piece of design. You can learn more about a car’s true mettle if you wash and dry its metal. In the process of cleaning the SLK for a photo shoot, I marveled at the complexity of its shape. This roadster has more flutes than a champagne glass. In fact, you can hardly find a single flat plane on the entire body. The bodywork looks muscular and buffed, with short overhangs fore and aft, and bulging fenders to accommodate the beefy tires and AMG alloys. 7.5 inch front rims carry 225/40ZR18 Pirelli P Zero rubber, with 8.5 inch back rims equipped with 245/35ZR18 Pirellis. The simple AMG 5-spoke rims are part of a $2,500 Sport Package that includes appealing “Sport Body Styling” plus haunting interior illumination in “SOLAR red.”

What prevents the SLK from full sports car status is lack of manual transmission availability. Like so many other manufacturers, Mercedes sees no point in Federalizing a separate (manual) gearbox for a customer take rate of 5 or 10 percent. Still, those are the very customers who will buy an Audi TTS or Porsche 911 expressly because those companies offer them the choice to shift gears by depressing a cutch pedal. Not that the SLK’s 7-speed automatic is a bad piece of engineering. To the contrary, it offers the driver Efficiency, Sport and Manual modes, while providing small steering wheel-mounted paddles to control up and down changes. Even so, the SLK is less driver-involving than it could be with a slick stick shift.

Video by Driverseat.tv

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Mercedes-Benz is celebrating its 125 year anniversary this year, which not coincidentally also happens to be the 125th anniversary of the automobile. It was 1886 when Carl Benz filed a patent application for his three-wheeled motor car and the rest, as they say, is history.

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2011 Mercedes Benz E350 BlueTEC Sedan
By Ming Tan

Pros:

• Efficient fuel sipper averaged over 34 actual mpg over the course of a week, with a boasted total range of about 600 miles per tank of diesel
• A great highway cruiser with a quiet and smooth ride. It’s serene cabin made for peaceful and pleasant road trips.
• 400 lb-ft of torque made virtually any maneuver seem easy for this relatively small 210 hp 3.0 liter turbo diesel V6

Cons:

• Hint of a 1978 Mercedes 240D diesel rasp at startup
• Somewhat flat seating surfaces
• More complicated SAT NAV unit that requires a semester at DeVry before becoming fluent with the system
• Only 210 HP for a car of BBW proportions

The Evolution of the Diesel Car Has Come a Long Way
I remember as a young kid seeing and hearing those early diesel cars rattling down the road, usually closely followed by a plume of dark, smelly smoke. Diesel super duty trucks notwithstanding, the appeal for diesel cars remained slim for years. Not until recently has the clean diesel concept begun to take off. We’re now seeing even race cars like the Audi R18 TDI performing at extremely high levels in rigorous conditions. As a result, it only seems logical that the evolution of diesel performance trickles down to normal every day driving cars.

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Pros:

• Awesome list of luxury amenities like the massaging driver seat
• Silky smooth and powerful twin-turbo V8
• Advanced safety features that are perfect for long trips

Cons:

• Unique, busy styling
• Restricted head room and trunk space
• 7-speed transmission

This video is brought to you by autobytel

I took the 2012 Mercedes-Benz CLS550 from the San Francisco Bay Area down to LA with the wife and toddler in tow a couple weekends ago, and found it to be one of the best four-door coupes I’ve ever driven. The myriad safety features made the 6-hour trip (with an occasional screaming toddler) all that more reassuring, and the luxury features like the massaging driver’s seat made the trip almost enjoyable.

The underlying mechanics are from the E-class sedan and the CLS550 sports the new MB 4.7-liter, direct-injection twin-turbo V8. It’s fantastic… but more on that later. The higher-end CLS63 features a 5.5L biturbo V8 that produces 518 horsepower but will set you back almost 20 Gs more.

Driving Impressions

The new Blue Efficiency 4.7-liter twin-turbo V8 produces 402 horsepower @5,000-5,750 RPM and 443 lb.-ft. of torque @1,800-4,750 RPM, and Mercedes-Benz claims 0-60 in 5.1 seconds. The CLS550 was quick off the line and had a smooth power delivery all the way up through 7 gears in freeway driving. Adaptive logic monitors adjust the shift points to match your driving style. Those who prefer a more direct approach can manually select higher shift points or use the paddle shifters for even more control.

For such a large and heavy car (4,200 pounds), it feels light on its feet in local driving and very confident at highway speeds. The ride is superb thanks to the air suspension and active damping, which adjusts each wheel’s suspension settings continuously in response to ride height and road conditions. The CLS550 was super comfortable on the 5 all the way down to LA and back, with the wife and baby lulling to sleep in the backseat at the same time.

In addition to the comfortable ride, the combination of safety features and luxury appointments in the CLS550 seemed destined for long road trips. The tester featured the Driver Assistance package which includes a radar-equipped cruise control that automatically detects cars in front of you and slows down, active blind spot assist and lane departure warning. All of these came in handy on the monotonous freeway drive through the half-parched fields of California’s San Joaquin Valley. The tester also came equipped with a driver drowsiness warning system, which sounded an alarm a few times during the drive, but I was not dozing off. The technology must be more advanced than I can figure out.

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Mercedes-Benz CL-Class Consumer Reviews	Mercedes-Benz CL-Class Overview	2011 Mercedes-Benz CL550 Photo Gallery	2011 Mercedes-Benz CL550 4MATIC Specs

By Gary Chan

Pros:

• Turbine smooth engine
• Quiet cabin
• Clean center stack
• Seats that do everything

Cons:

• High price
• Gear change stumble between 1st and 2^nd
• Annoying squeak in driver’s door

Say you’re a C-level executive at a major company and you wanted to spend around $125,000 for a new luxury car, what would you buy? What features or qualities would you want? V8 – check. All-wheel drive – check. High tech features throughout – check. There are less expensive cars to choose from, but the Mercedes-Benz CL550 4Matic Coupe fits the bill on the spec sheet. However, is the CL550 fulfilling from the driver’s seat?

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Mercedes-Benz will launch their Driving Academy for teens, that will open in the U.S. late 2011. Joining the ranks of other car manufacturers that have their own specialized driving academies such as, Jaguar “R” Academy, Land Rover Driver Experience, BMW Teen Driving School, and the Audi Sportscar Experience to name a few, Mercedes-Benz also feels that the U.S. standard of 30 hours of in-class education and 6 hours of behind-the-wheel training does not effectively give teenagers the skills and competencies for safe and enjoyable driving.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention “motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for teens in the U.S. In fact, teens aged 16-19 are four times more likely to crash than adults”. The Mercedes-Benz Driving Academy approach to this will prepare students by going beyond basic car control skills and traffic rules by using a unique combination of interactive classroom sessions, online learning and behind-the-wheel training in the Graduated Driver Licensing (GDL) framework, that will be specifically tailored to the U.S.

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Mercedes-Benz unveiled the all new 2012 C63 AMG coupe, set to debut at the New York International Auto Show in April.

Similar to the C63 AMG sedan, the C63 AMG coupe features a 6.2-liter, V8, 451-horsepower engine, 443 lb-feet of torque, a 7-speed MCT (Multi-Clutch Transmission) with Controlled Efficiency mode, a 0-60 time of 4.4 seconds, and a limited top speed of 155 mph. An optional AMG Development Package brings the AMG coupe up to 481-horsepower, a 0-60 time of 4.3 seconds and a controlled top speed of 174 mph.

The new coupe variant benefits from all the technology updates that have been adopted on the C63 AMG sedan models. Fuel economy is improved with the AMG SPEEDSHIFT MCT (multi-clutch transmission) 7-speed sports transmission with “Controlled Efficiency” mode as standard and a new power steering pump.

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By Derek Mau

Likes:

• Zero emissions
• Fuel cell technology suitable for larger vehicles
• Does not require any special service intervals or parts

Dislikes:

• Loud electrical hum from motors
• Cost of fuel-cell cars higher than hybrid cars
• Range limited not by size of hydrogen tank, but tied to location of H₂ fueling station

As part of the ceremony to mark the 125th birthday of the invention of the motor car, Mercedes-Benz is promoting their B-Class F-CELL car with a drive across the world as means of promoting the benefits and advantages of fuel-cell technology. Three production (not concept) B-Class F-CELL cars are crossing the globe to prove that fuel-cell cars can be a good alternative to relieving our dependence upon fossil fuels and operate like any other car on the road today. I was fortunate to drive one of the B-Class F-CELL cars when the caravan stopped in San Francisco for fresh Dungeness crab and warm sourdough bread at Fisherman’s Wharf.

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Announced ahead of the Geneva Motor Show launch and due to leaked images earlier this year, Mercedes-Benz has officially announced the new 2012 C-Class Coupe with the C250 and C350 models, that will compete with the Audi A5 and BMW 3-Series Coupe. The C250 features a 1.8-liter four-cylinder, 201-horsepower engine, a 7-speed automatic transmission, a 0-60 acceleration time of 7.1 seconds, an aluminum trim, and an estimated EPA combined city/highway fuel economy of 24 mpg.

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