Test driving the all-new Mercedes-Benz C-class

It may not snap heads or raise skirts like an AMG SLS, but as far as Mercedes Benz is concerned, it is the most important vehicle in the world. Not only because it is meant to pay most of the bills, including those two expensive toys that Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg get to play with every other weekend, it is essentially the developmental platform for the future of Mercedes-Benz road vehicles. Basically, it is, as Mercedes like to say, the mechanical expression of everything they know.

Meet the all-new C-class. As their volume seller, Mercedes have been able to justify pouring in nauseating amounts of money into developing technology that will eventually become cost-efficient enough to find its way into the entire line up. And judging by what they stuffed into it, as well as the 600 strong media contingent that they flew in to Marseille last March to preview it, it looks like they really emptied their pockets on this one. It would have probably been cheaper to develop a small country.

Bearing a much closer resemblance to the S-class, with elegant curves and remarkable LED lights that give it a more intimidating presence on the road, the new C-Class comes with a dizzying array of innovations that you could hurt yourself trying to pronounce, and is now arguably the safest vehicle planet Earth has ever seen. Standard equipment includes seven airbags, a driver drowsiness monitor, stability control and tire-pressure warnings, while the optional Driver Assistance Pack tacks on lane-keeping assist, blind-spot monitoring and adaptive cruise control, plus a head-up display and an adaptive cornering function for the LED headlamps, earning it a full five-star crash-test rating by Euro NCAP.

The technology also spills heavily into the cabin, with an iPad-type display that controls everything from suspension settings, entertainment and possibly the launch codes in Washington. It uses gestures as well as a wheel and a little touchpad that you can swipe, pinch, rotate or write on with your fingertips, making it intuitive enough for everyone except people who still play music on cassettes and carry around a Nokia 5110 as their only mobile communication tool.

It also uses technology like radar, stereo cameras and ultrasound that feature a 360-degree view capable of reading the road situations and take action to avoid colliding with other vehicles, people and other obstacles coming from almost every direction.

In fact, the car is so advanced, it can literally drive itself, and is only prevented from doing so by legislation.

Naturally I had to try this out. So I popped on the adaptive cruise control and let go of the wheel. It allowed me to get my kicks for about 30 seconds before reminding me to take control. Yes, I know we’ve seen this technology on other models, like Lexus, Volvo, BMW etc., but Mercedes have taken it to the next level by using advanced radar-based cruise control that can steer around bends at speeds of up to 200km/h, come to a full stop, then get going again.

Currently, the law only allows very limited amounts of steering angle (somewhere around five degrees) that can be controlled by the computer, but Mercedes-Benz engineers assure me that if they weren’t throttled by legislation, the car could drive better than 99.9 percent of drivers out there. And to think they’re talking about European drivers. Wait till they meet our drivers.

They demonstrated this to us in a controlled environment, where foam cars being towed by real ones were used as target practice. It seemed that no matter how hard we tried, there was really no outsmarting the systems. The C-Class now has the spatial awareness and reaction time of a race car driver—although only time will tell if it can react to a jeepney driver.

Compared to the previous C-Class, which I had the pleasure of getting reacquainted with immediately after I test drove the all-new one in France, this feels more responsive; it is significantly tighter, more sure-footed, brakes better, steers better and is generally just a more confident vehicle that is so solid, it feels like it was carved from a single chunk of aluminum.

Speaking of which, most of these driving dynamics are due to extensive use of aluminum (around 50 percent or so) which shaves around 70kg from the body and another 30kg from the oily bits. It is also the first car to be built using Mercedes’ new rear-wheel drive architecture, which while not quite as sporty as the 3-series, still does wonders to improve the driving experience.

Partly because it is much lighter, and also because it’s exceptionally aerodynamic. One model features a grille with external shutters that close off at speed, which is said to save 0.01 cd, taking it down to 0.27, which loosely translated equates to a real-world fuel saving of removing another 100kg in weight when compared to a 0.30 cd model.

What makes it all the more impressive is that all of this weight reduction and aerodynamic improvements have been achieved despite the fact that the new C-Class is 95mm longer and 40mm wider than before, with an 80mm increase in wheelbase, making it larger than the 2002 E-Class.

Another huge leap for the C class is in the war against fossil fuels. Mercedes claims a 20 percent improvement across the entire range, with the C220 Bluetec 168bhp 2.1-liter diesel delivering over 70 miles per gallon. While we were not able to conduct a proper test, judging by the E-Class rental that I drove down from Barcelona that sipped just a liter of fuel for every 17 kilometers, I’d say it would not be far off.