MERCEDES SL RANGE
ALWAYS GOOD TO BE LEICHT (2005-02-21)
Mercedes Show How To Balance Retro Styling With Cutting Edge Modernity With Devastating Effect In Their Latest SL. Andy Enright Reports
David Coulthard throws back the curtains of his Monaco penthouse, pauses to recall the name of the blonde struggling into her Jimmy Choo kitten heels and then makes for the lift. Fresh baguettes and amaretto biscuits from the boulangerie could be phoned in but our man wants to blow away the cobwebs. As the garage door whirrs open revealing the glint of sunlight on the harbour and the cool tang of morning air before the humidity goes through the roof, Coulthard fires the car into life. The car in question? A
Mercedes-Benz SL.
Does life get any sweeter?
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With the Sport Leicht it was ever thus. Granted, Coulthards bolide is a vintage pagoda-roofed model, the later model probably proving rather too Bobby Ewing/Stephanie Powers for our lantern-jawed hero. Given that the last iteration of the SL had been extant for twelve years, it still looked remarkably fresh even when the good burghers of Stuttgart were plastering it in cheese as limited edition models. Theres a cleanliness to the cars line that defies the ageing process beautifully a quality which many more senior owners hoped would reflect upon themselves.
Whereas big Mercedes SEC coupes from the early eighties now look a bit blousy, the SL retained a classical purity of line. Replacing such a car was never going to be easy, Mercedes designers precariously perched beneath the historical baggage of Damocles. First impressions were disappointing. Advance press pictures from the 2001 Frankfurt Motor Show gave the impression that the car was little more than a mild reskinning of the old model with some fussy detailing.
The reality could hardly be more different.
"Every curve melds into the next, flop lines and swages teasing, pouring and sweeping light from one plane to the next."
Designers have a particularly clumsy term for describing a car that just works in the metal front to rear cohesiveness. The SL has this quality in spades. Every curve melds into the next, flop lines and swages teasing, pouring and sweeping light from one plane to the next. The balance between slavishly unimaginative retro styling and the preservation of traditional; design cues explains some of the more contrived punctuations but the overall effect is supremely elegant.
The roof mechanism has stepped forward a generation from that of the SLK, lifting or lowering in a mere 16 seconds with a panel fit only bettered by the ALVIN deep sea submersible. Mercedes has gone to great lengths not only to make the car safer, cleverer, quicker and cleaner than its predecessor but also to improve the dynamics of the car. The SL was never a car that would look upon a corner with any great relish but the latest model has not only shed weight due in no small part to extensive usage of aluminium body panels but the V8 models also features the astonishing automatic body control (ABC) system used to such devastating effect in the behemoth Mercedes CL coupe. Thus equipped, the Mercedes SL doesnt roll through corners yet does without the attendant bone shaking ride quality youd expect from such a taut handling car.
This is due to a set of electro hydraulics that lower the ride height when the Sport button is jabbed. Combined with the ESP stability control system it gives the Mercedes a strangely artificial feel when cornering hard, the driver unsure of the limit, feedback suppressed by several white-coated Stuttgart boffins. Turn the ESP off and the SL will happily display its lairy side. If you can overcome the initial unease, the SL is extremely capable and, dare we say, fun.
Most sporting Mercedes models seemed to wilfully introduce impediments to the process of enjoyment, either lazy automatic gearboxes, laughably poor manual gearchanges, vague steering via steering wheels that resembled something from the Cutty Sark or woolly chassis. It appears the killjoys never got their hands on the SLs design. The SL500 features a five-speed automatic gearbox that you can bully through manually, but the software beneath it is sufficiently sweet and intuitive to render changing gear yourself redundant. The interior quality is back to what weve come to expect from Mercedes premium price rather than Fisher Price, although the car looks far better specified with aluminium cabin detailing than optional lumber.
The conjoined twin front headlamp theme continues in the cabin with neat wheel-mounted controls whilst the main fascia dials excise neat arcs from the minor gauges. At present the SL range consists of the 3.7-litre 245bhp SL350, the 306bhp five-litre SL500, the 476bhp SL55 AMG, the 493bhp SL600 and the SL65 AMG. The latter is a car which covers the sprint to 60mph in just 4.
2 seconds on the way to a limited top speed of 155mph. With an astonishing power output of 612bhp, the SL65 is something quite special. In keeping with the SLs high-tech outlook, Mercedes has developed Sensotronic (the first brake-by-wire technology for a road car) for the SL. Hydraulics have been replaced by electronics which can prime the braking system by lightly applying the pads to the discs when the accelerator pedal is suddenly released, reducing stopping distances by some 3%.
In wet conditions the pads can skim the discs of friction-reducing water. Any car that can make a
Porsche 911 Cabrio look a touch dated has to be very special indeed, but the Mercedes SL manages it easily. Shedding its image as the weapon of choice for the chunky-chained leather-complexioned boulevardier has been surprisingly easy. The SL plays the sports coupe and premium convertible cards with remorseless conviction, without aspiring to be a
Ferrari or a Porsche.
It just does Mercedes SL very, very well indeed.
FACTS AT A GLANCE
CAR: Mercedes SL range
PRICES: £60,630-£146,040 on the road
INSURANCE GROUP: 20
CO2 EMISSIONS: 276-362g/km
PERFORMANCE: [SL500] Max Speed 155mph / 0-60mph 6.1s
FUEL CONSUMPTION: [SL500] (average) 22.4mpg
STANDARD SAFETY FEATURES: Twin front, side and head airbags, ESP, ABS
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