If you're like me, you didn't have strong feelings for the Mercedes-Benz R-Class. Or if you did have strong feelings, they were strong in questioning why Mercedes is making a luxury wagon without calling it a wagon? Unless it's because they don't want to intrude on the E-Class wagon's territory. Which makes sense, sort of... But then why make the R-Class at all? To build a crossover that's sort of like a minivan without sliding doors? Doesn't the ML and GL pretty much cover that area?
Okay, so basically the R-Class seemed both confusing and redundant to me, and maybe you too.
Well, I put over 400 miles on the heavily-updated 2011 model...and it still seems redundant. But it's also a nice ride.
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Categories: Karl on Cars, Mercedes-Benz, Test Car Notes
As I drove the new 2011 Mercedes-Benz E550 Cabriolet yesterday, I couldn't help but think "why do I need a hardtop?"
The E Cab's multi-layer soft top lets remarkably little wind noise into the cabin even at 80 mph -- a revelation as a soft top convertible owner who must keep his car under 65 in order to keep things pleasant even with the top up.
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Categories: Mercedes-Benz, Thoughts from the Curb
I took the above picture while stuck in traffic in a 2010 Mercedes-Benz E350 V6 Coupe. Don't worry, I wasn't moving when I snapped it, though I wish I would have been since I was running late.
I called up the "Real-Time Traffic" information supplied by Sirius Traffic on the car's in-dash display. But it didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, and by then it was too late to take a detour. While some information about what's ahead and what to expect in terms of a delay is better than not knowing at all, I'm still wondering when real-time traffic will get real.
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Categories: Car Audio and Technology, Mercedes-Benz, Test Car Notes
I'd been behind the wheel of a 2011 Mercedes-Benz R350 BlueTEC for less than 10 minutes when it happened: The vehicle took off on its own as I prepared to make a right turn. And on a downtown street crowded with people, no less. I instinctively stabbed the brakes but still felt like an idiot.
I looked down once I stopped and noticed that my left hand landed on the cruise control stalk instead of the adjacent turn signal. Thinking that I was signaling for a right turn, I instead engaged cruise.
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Categories: Car Audio and Technology, Mercedes-Benz, Test Car Notes
So here we are in the Face-Off World Cup Finals. Sadly, Spyker and Seat weren't around to create a repeat of the real World Cup, but the great powers of England and Germany will certainly do. When it comes to cars, the two countries are an exercise in contrasts. While Germany presents the epitome of engineering excellence and stern efficiency, England has devoted itself to creating cars with the unquantifiable aspect of "character."
While both countries could have brought many cars into this tournament, the ones selected certainly belong here in the finals. In Germany's black, yellow and red corner is Herr Karl Brauer and the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG. In England's corner waving St. George's Cross is James Riswick and the Aston Martin DBS.
Final votes will be tallied Wednesday at 3 p.m. PST.
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Categories: Aston Martin, Face-Off, Mercedes-Benz
Round 2 of the Face-Off World Cup Tournament is a battle of the Alps. No, not Liechtenstein versus Austria (their cars are crap), but rather those two automotive powerhouses Deutschland and Italia.
Representing Germany is Karl Brauer and the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG, who'll have a tougher fight this time around than was presented by Sweden. Coming from the land that looks like a boot is John DiPietro and the Ferrari 458 Italia, who managed to dispatch what would've seemed like a tournament favorite: the Bugatti Veyron.
So it's a battle of super cars to see which country and car ends up in the World Cup finals. Cue the vuvuzelas.
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Categories: Face-Off, Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz
Most car buffs know that Mercedes-Benz has produced two gullwing-doored supercars -- the 300SL of the '50s and of course the new SLS AMG. But there were a few others...sort of. From 1969 to 1979, Mercedes built a series of concept cars dubbed the C111. Low, sleek and of course fitted with gullwing doors, the C111 was surprisingly not a design study for the 300SL's successor but rather a test bed for technologies such as rotary and diesel engines as well as turbocharging.
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Categories: Dream Car Corner, Mercedes-Benz
Here's a model we don't usually see listed on our car board, with keys hanging at the ready. And, honestly, this car wasn't on the board either. Unfortunately, it didn't pass through the office as part of a multi-week loan, including provisions for a photo shoot and track testing. But when you consider these cars start at the half-million dollar level and move up from there, depending on condition and history, it's hard to believe any modern journalist would have access to a 1956 Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Gullwing for testing.
And yet, I did.
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Categories: Mercedes-Benz, Test Car Notes
Automotive nameplates come and go, but with a select few, bloodlines have continued in the same vein for decades -- like Mustang, Corvette, Civic and Z, just to name a few. This time around we're pitting the venerable Mercedes-Benz S-Class against the revered Porsche 911 to determine which model has best perpetuated its heritage without losing sight of its core principles.
Defending the flagship Benz is Associate Editor Mark Takahashi, as he glides down the highway in zen-like comfort. Photo Editor Kurt Niebuhr will champion the Porsche as he weaves through the canyon passes in a blur. The loser of this all-German Face-Off must pay for a night of bier and brats and also sing 99 Luftballoons whenever the winner so desires.
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Categories: Face-Off, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche
"It's all too easy to get caught up in the gullwing door feature of the new 2011 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG," or so says Karl Brauer in his test drive of said car. Well, consider me caught up in those doors, because by my estimation, the world would be a much cooler place if more cars had them.
I don't really need to explain that they're cool. After all, this is a car that's likely to be referred to as the "Gullwing," making it the only car ostensibly named after its doors. This would be like buying a Lamborghini Scissor, Dodge Grand Failgate or Jeep No Doors At All. Even though the SLS' gullwing design came from the 300 SL (pictured below), it's a safe bet that most folks actually know them from the DeLorean DMC 12 ... and specifically the one with the Dr. Emmett Brown Time Machine package. Indeed, I felt like Marty McFly every time I dropped into the SLS and reached up to pull down the doors. I actually looked behind my shoulder once for the flux capacitor.
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Categories: Mercedes-Benz, Thoughts from the Curb
We recently had a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG "Gullwing" in the office and I was given the enviable task of driving it for the photo shoot. We did most of the shoot in the middle of nowhere near Palmdale, but I had an idea for something special.
I knew the Marconi Automotive Museum in Tustin, California, was the owner of a perfect 1954 Mercedes-Benz 300SL -- also known as the original Gullwing. This is one of the most iconic cars every made. I rang up Marconi and set up a date between the SLS and its grandfather.
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Categories: Mercedes-Benz, Retro Revivals, Test Car Notes
"Do we have to go back to work? Can't we just roam around aimlessly for the rest of the day?"
I uttered these words as Chris Walton and I sat in the lavish back seat of the 2010 Mercedes-Benz S-Class as we returned to the office after lunch. I've been treated to the back seat of a Rolls-Royce Phantom before, and outside of some lambswool carpet and a few more cows worth of leather, the old Roller's got nothing on this Benz.
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Categories: Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz was the first automaker to offer smartphone apps to control aspects of its newly launched mbrace telematics system, but others are close behind. At its press conference on Wednesday, Chevy showed a prototype app that will allow remote charging of the Volt. And if I was a betting man I'd wager that Ford will roll out apps for its Sync system at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January. The company is already crowd-sourcing college students to that end.
At the Mercedes stand at the LA show, Hughes Telematics president Erik Goldman said that the company, which provides the mbrace system, plans to introduce new apps approximately every six months. And he showed us apps in development that will notify the owner when the car needs an oil change or a taillight bulb burns out, for example.
What type of automotive apps will we see in the future? As Goldman pointed out -- and anyone with an iPhone, an iPod touch or even a pulse should know by now -- it's limited only by the imagination of app developers and automaker's willingness to embrace (no pun intended) an open-architecture approach.
Categories: Chevrolet, Mercedes-Benz
Automotive history is littered with good intentions gone bad. Automatic seatbelts. Vocal warning systems. Ralph Nader.
One of the more vivid automotive tragedies of the last 50 years centered on the desire to save car owners money by creating bumpers that wouldn't be damaged in low-speed accidents. The idea seemed simple enough: If a car's bumper could withstand, say, a 7 mph impact without damage it would mean no repair bills for the thousands of minor accidents that happen every year.
Sounds good in theory, but the reality is that few manufacturers could blend this type of impact absorbption into a car's bumper when the regulation went into effect in 1973. Instead of integrating the impact protection into a vehicle's front and rear styling most manufacturers simply did what corporate resources dictated -- they slapped 6-10 inches of rubber onto each end of the vehicle. And in case you haven't ever seen cars from this era (1973-1977), the answer to the question "Didn't that look odd while upsetting the car's overall lines and proportions?" is an unconditional "YES!"
Thirty-five years later I see the latest attempt to make cars safer, and the resulting impact (sorry) on vehicle styling feels like 1973 all over again.
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Categories: Acura, Mercedes-Benz
The first Mercedes-Benz SL
I ever drove was a 1981 380SL, with the woefully underperforming 3.8-liter, 155 horsepower V8. Even then I knew enough about the model to know that "SL" stood for "Sport Light," so I remember being highly disappointed. "This thing feels neither sporty nor light" I grumbled out loud as I drove the car to fill it with gas (this was my first post-driver's-license job, as a lot boy at a used Mercedes-Benz dealership in Denver). But in 1986 this generation SL remained, despite its questionable performance, an 'it" car by most folks' standards, so cruising around in the slow, lumbering "sports car" was still a great way for a 16-year-old to get attention.
Thankfully, this dealership had plenty of older M-B models, including several "pagoda" era SLs (1963-1971). It didn't take long to figure out that, if you really wanted to experience the "SL" aspect of Mercedes' SL model line, you had to go for one of the older SLs, preferably one of the 280 models with a manual transmission (this remains the last SL to offer a manual transmission in this country).
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Categories: Cars that Jumped the Shark, Mercedes-Benz
