A picture of Mercedes-Benz E350 GCI We don't know about you, but Mercedes-Benz's decision to phase out the CLK after just two generations seems perplexing to us here at AutoWeek. This is a car that, in a little more than a decade, racked up almost half a million sales--a good deal of them in pre-recession North America. Reason enough, you would think, to keep the badge in circulation and carry it over to a third-generation model, if for nothing else but continuity.
But the CLK--even mention of it--was nowhere to be found at a presentation of its replacement, the E-class coupe, in Florence, Italy. When asked why one of its most instantly recognizable model designations was being jettisoned, all we got was some talk about wanting to ratchet up the image of the E-class by reintroducing a coupe to the lineup.
Our underlying suspicion is that Mercedes-Benz is seeking to distance its new two-door from the likes of the Audi A5 and the BMW 3-series, and by giving its latest coupe an E-class name, Mercedes can move it further upmarket and charge more for it.
Whatever the real reason for the resurrection of the E-class coupe name, nothing can overshadow the fact that this is one distinctive looking car. Out on the road, it exudes the kind of visual aggressiveness that was spuriously lacking in the CLK. Flaunting the same design cues as its recently introduced four-door 2010 E-class sedan sibling, its steel-bodied exterior is an alluring combination of sharp creases, bold tapering, intersecting shutlines and taut surfaces.
That said, the detailing is a bit heavy-handed. There is something about the conflicting shapes of the four individual headlamps that bookmark the broad grille and the clumsy quarter window integrated at the rear of the side glass leaves us wondering whether--when freed of some of the more rigid E-class sedan elements--the new coupe would have ended up being a much more elegant-looking car. One thing's for certain: This is one of those cars that looks better in motion than it does standing still.
Along with the coupe driven here for the first time, a new E-class cabriolet also is in the works. Although the convertible was slated to appear at the Frankfurt motor show in September, officials now say that the cloth soft-top likely will bow at the Detroit show in January 2010--or perhaps even later, owing to the difficult conditions facing the automotive industry right now.
The E-class coupe has been conceived to occupy a larger and more lucrative section of the coupe market than the CLK. As such, it comes as no surprise to discover that it has grown in size. It's longer and wider, but with shallower side glass that drops the overall height. It is an overall bigger car with a longer wheelbase, underpinned by a brand-new chassis that borrows heavily from the E-class rather than from the C-class, as the CLK did.
Inside, it is a familiar Mercedes-Benz theme with an angular dashboard (complete with a high-mounted monitor), various switchgear and associated trims mirroring that of the recently introduced E-class sedan. The thinly padded front seats, with integrated headrests, are unique to the E-class coupe. They're also mounted a touch lower, providing a more sporting driving position along with a enclosed feeling, owing to the comparatively high waistline. The overall attention to detail is very impressive, including the retention of the seat-belt feeder, which motors out when the driver's door is closed.
Entry to the rear two seats is aided by the B-pillarless design--a cue from the first-generation CLK launched in 1997--along with front seats that can be pushed well forward. The curvature of the roof and the sharply sloped rear window restrict the amount of headroom, but legroom is improved over the CLK. The trunk is huge by coupe standards.
Mercedes-Benz has made big efforts in recent times to once again assume a leading role in safety. This is fully reflected in the E-class coupe, which not only gets seven airbags--including a knee device for the driver--but also a new drowsiness detector called Attention Assist.
The engines are a combination of old and new, all of them mated with various BlueEfficiency measures such as brake-energy regeneration, a water pump that only operates when required, rather than being primed permanently, and low rolling resistance tires.
Don't bother attempting to match respective capacity to the badges adorning the trunk lids. Among the gasoline units is Mercedes-Benz's first-ever four-cylinder with direct injection, a turbocharged 1.8-liter with 204 hp in the E250 CGI. In addition, European engine options include the new gasoline direct-injection 3.5-liter, 292-hp V6, and the 5.5-liter 388-hp V8. Diesels for Europe include a 2.2-liter four-cylinder packing 204 hp in the E250 CDI and a 3.0-liter V6 with 231 hp in the E350 CDI. (Don't get too excited though: U.S. models soldier on with existing engine technology in the form of a 3.5-liter, 268-hp V6 in the E350 and the 5.5-liter 382-hp V8 in the E550).
The dash of the new Mercedes-Benz E-class coupe comes from the new E-class sedan. |
While Mercedes-Benz is readying four-wheel drive for the E-class coupe, all models headed to North America will retain traditional rear-wheel drive. The gearbox choices depend largely on the engine sitting up front--in our case, the midrange 3.5-liter V6 gasoline engine mated to Mercedes-Benz's seven-speed 7G-tronic automatic, which gets remote paddles behind the steering wheel. Other engines get a six-speed manual or a five-speed automatic.
Fire up the V6, the same direct-injection unit offered exclusively in the European-model CLS350 CGI up until now, and it is wonderfully isolated from the cabin at idle. Depending on your priorities, this is either a blessing or a major disappointment for a car with such an intrinsically sporty outlook.
Whatever the case, it is terrifically responsive and extremely smooth across a wide range of revs. Peak torque of 269 lb-ft doesn't arrive until 3,000 rpm, which means you need to work it to unleash the full potential. Still, there's sufficient low-end shove to fire the E350 CGI off the line with a good deal of gusto; Mercedes-Benz claims 0 to 62 mph in 6.5 seconds. Its best work, however, is achieved on the motorway, where it cruises on part throttle loads in a quiet, calm and unflustered manner. The problem is that, even higher up in the rev range, this engine doesn't possess much character, either aurally or mechanically. And compared with the diesel engines, it is not exactly frugal; the official combined-cycle consumption figure of 27.6 mpg (U.S.) gives a theoretical range of 349 miles.
While the new engine is lacking in charisma, the chassis is superbly sorted. Regular AutoWeek readers will know that we rate the new E-class sedan highly in terms of overall dynamics. The E-class coupe, which shares the same basic underpinnings, makes for an even more committed drive, with unique spring and damper rates adding a further degree of body control without upsetting the maturity of ride. All models come standard with Agility Control, where the shock absorbers are automatically optimized to the road conditions via a bypass valve that prevents the oil in each unit from surging when faced with larger bumps and surfaces irregularities. There also is Advanced Agility Control, which adds faster and more-intuitive electronic damping and the choice of two setups, Comfort and Sport, as well as a variable steering rack boasting a quicker ratio as optional equipment.
Being a Mercedes-Benz, there's no lack of standard electronic driver aids to which potential owners can add a further array of high-end features, including a system that automatically detects speed-limit signs and shows them, in digitized form, in a display within the instrument panel and a radar-based active-cruise-control system.
It might be bigger and correspondingly heavier than the CLK, but the E-class coupe is every bit as nimble and agile its predecessor. The rack-and-pinion steering--highly assisted at lower speeds to aid maneuverability around town--gains weight with speed to provide the basis for responsive and fluid progress over winding back roads. It is backed up by excellent body control and a front end that--even on the standard 235/45-R17 rubber of the E350 CGI--resists understeer well when pushed to its limits. But once again, it is on the highway where this car really excels. Straight-line stability, even at seriously high speeds, is superb, and with the lowest Cd of any current production car at 0.24, overall refinement is well into the upper-luxury league, particularly the lack of wind noise.
What Mercedes-Benz has done with the E-class coupe is lift it beyond the main perceived competition--namely the Audi A5 and the BMW 3-series coupe--in terms of positioning. It is a bigger, more mature and higher quality car than the one it replaces, the CLK. And with all of this comes a heftier price tag, too. But the E-class coupe's unruffled nature should set it apart from the two-door competition. Few cars at any price manage to offer such a desirable combination of smoothness, quietness and overall ease of operation. Put simply, it's the consummate mile-eater.
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