Post by johnc on Apr 4, 2018 8:48:12 GMT
I had my trip to Mercedes World at the weekend and got to drive the E63 (not the S) and the C43 both in saloon version.
I was really looking forward to the E63 because of its 4WD ability and off the line it didn't disappoint. The setup is very rear biased but when the rear loses traction it pushes drive to the front meaning that when you plant the throttle there is still some rear wheel scrabble before the front wheels get involved and then it just takes off. This is a really fast car. On the track though it felt a bit heavy and I had difficulty in slowing it down for the corners and in Sports+ setting I found it hard to modulate the throttle smoothly through the corners. With more time I am sure I would get the mid corner transition feeling smoother. Part of the difficulty though is that this car is so eager to go: it needs no excuses at all to disappear down the road faster than 99.9% of scalded cats with no lag, no delay, just massive shove. Really really quick.
Cornering was pretty impressive too once you got the thing slowed down and it had very high grip levels and could be coaxed from slight understeer to slight oversteer with a satisfying tightening line and the roar of the V8.
The skid circle wasn't really the E63's strong point due to its tech. It was easy to induce a skid but as soon as you started to drift with opposite lock on, the torque vectoring sends the power to the front wheels which then pulls you back out of the skid and out towards the outside of the circle. Apparently the E63s has a drift mode which turns off the power to the front but it's difficult to see much use for that in a luxury rocket ship like this.
The non Sport mode turned the car into a very quick luxury car with a fair amount of body roll but it still handled the circuit well. On the road this setting felt as though it would have been very comfortable and the throttle mapping was a bit more friendly to my slightly heavy right foot.
For me, I think it is perhaps a bit too big but there is no denying its capabilities and bar the odd supercar owner it is hard to see how anyone could fail to be impressed by the power and the power delivery of this car.
The C43 was a surprising package and even without flared arches and a V8 it is very impressive - I reckon it is putting out more than its quoted 360HP because it was also very quick and more nimble. The sound was also very impressive when the Sport valve was operated although your neighbours may not thank you if you used it every morning.
The C43 uses a simpler 4WD system and on the skid circle it wasn't as intrusive as the E63's more sophisticated system. It is a bit more like the 4WD on my car where it gives you the extra grip but doesn't get as involved if things are getting a bit out of hand. It felt a bit more natural to me.
The C Class is beginning to feel older now (compared to the E Class) but it is still a nice place to sit and with less mass to haul about and stop, I preferred driving it on the fairly narrow track even though it couldn't compete with the rabid animal E63 on the straight. I believe that the C43 is due an official power upgrade to nearer 390HP with the facelift but I reckon that it probably has that power already. Slow it is not! Looking at the discounted prices on the C43 it is also something of a performance bargain.
