On Wheels by Brooks Peterson

Saturday, May 5, 2001

A package of surprises

Say what you will about Mercedes-Benz - and car freaks have been babbling about M-B as long as there have been car freaks - there is one point that is not now and never has been in dispute:
   There's no false modesty about these guys.
   So: When Stuttgart added a new, hot-rodded version of its Bismarck-class S-Series and almost offhandedly described it as a "supersedan," you knew that something epochal, something transcendently monumental, was about to be unleashed on the unsuspecting autobahns and superhighways of the Western world (and a few oil-rich sultanates).
   What it is, is the S55 - a top-of-the-line M-B luxo-sedan that has been lovingly, and wickedly, tweaked, massaged and stroked into something that is not merely impressive (name me a big Merc that isn't impressive) but . . . well . . . fearsome. Any S-class will cruise with supreme arrogance through the teeming proletariat. Ah, but the S55, now - the S55 will sow panic in the ranks.
   You don't pick up on this immediately. Our black S55 tester was impressive, but not knock-your-socks-off obtrusive. Only after strolling around it for a while - or living with it for a week, should you be so fortunate - do you begin to tune in to the subtle menace this supersedan projects.
   There are, for instance, those huge, meaty tires, and the shimmering alloy wheels, the inevitable three-pointed star (that enables the driver to draw a better bead on errant pedestrians?), the whole menacingly hunched-forward look of the thing . . .
   But you know what just blew my mind? It was a small thing, easily missed, but it spoke volumes: the two chrome-tipped, oval-cross-section tailpipes emerging from the derriere. I studied them, transfixed. These things could've been nabbed from a sterling silver tea service, for cryin' out loud.
   Attention to detail
   There's more: Etched with excruciating precision atop of each pipe was "AMG" - the logo of the in-house Mercedes-Benz outfit that transforms solid-citizen sedans into take-no-prisoners road warriors. That's the kind of attention to detail that makes the difference between impressive and.. . awesome.
   I could go on, but space constraints being what they are, I suppose it's time to get down to cases.
   Unquestionably, the most important element setting the S55 apart from its less yeasty brethren, the S430 and the S500, is the 5.5-liter, 354-horsepower hand-assembled V-8.
   I wouldn't want to go overboard here, but I'd suggest that one of those hands must have been grasping the hammer of Thor. Mercedes-Benz calmly informs us that the S55 will hurtle from a standstill to 60 mph in 5.7 seconds. That, children, was exoticar territory not all that long ago.
   Authoritative
   Just as impressive as the results is the fashion in which they are attained: Even as it catapults you up to warp speed, this many-splendored power plant conveys an impression of utter effortlessness. "You like 80? You would like 100? Ja. So. You would like 120, perhaps . . . ?"
   Any high-powered vehicle will give you a boot in the back. Few, however, can do it in so silky - yet utterly authoritative - a fashion.
   But can the S55 handle all that power without embarrassing itself in the curvy bits? What do you think? Haven't you been paying attention?
   While I am not an uncritical admirer of all things Mercedes, I have been struck from time immemorial to the uncanny poise each and every vehicle bearing the three-pointed star brings to its work.
   Trimming roll
   The S55 is very much in this tradition - but the technology is anything but traditional. Largely responsible for this huge car's ability to whip through the chicanes is the magic of ABC (Active Body Control) suspension. This hydraulic-electronic-mechanical system cuts body roll by 68 percent right out of the box - and if you want the car snubbed down even more tightly, a switch on the dash trims roll by 95 percent.
   Uncanny.
   Brakes? With huge discs at each corner (anti-lock, needless to say), the hilarity can be called to a halt every bit as precipitately as it began.
   There is a term that used to crop up with some frequency in the car mags of my youth, introduced, perhaps, by the late, still-lamented Henry N. Manney III: "safe as houses." It applies, I suppose, to any Mercedes, but with a real vengeance to the S-Class panzers.
   As for the rest, well . . . One thing is unmistakably apparent: Having been roughed up in the early '90s by such Japanese parvenus as Lexus and Infiniti, Stuttgart has made sure that no-one, but NO-one, will ever out-gadget a top-of-the-line Mercedes-Benz.
   Seat comfort
   Thus, on our S55 we behold an array of goodies that all but defies comprehension. Of course you've got heated leather front seats - but you've also got cooled front seats as well: There's some sort of fan arrangement down there that sends slightly chilled air wafting up through the perforated leather.
   Like some other marques, Mercedes offers on the S55 (and the other S sedans, I suspect) a proximity-alert radar-type arrangement that shrills when you back too close to another car (or wall, or tree). Ah, but wait: It also alerts when you're getting too close to someone (or thing) to the left or right. Touche!
   I'm not through: Your trunk lid powers itself up - and down. Too much sun in back? Hit a button and a sunscreen will majestically rise up to shade the rear window.
   Standard GPS navigation? But of course. (Didn't use it. I'd rather read a map.) A standard Tele Aid system gets you in touch with the mother ship should you encounter unpleasantness in the boonies.
   Understand, I wasn't completely swept off my feet. I still find the controls for the climate control and sound systems maddeningly obscure and counter-intuitive. They work just fine, understand, but I shouldn't have to work so hard to figure 'em out.
   Guzzler tax
   Oh, and you'll have to pay a $1,000 guzzler tax, thanks to the S55's drinking habits - but compared to your average hulking SUV, this vehicle is a rolling temperance movement.
   So why did I feel a little . . . well . . . relieved when the repo man arrived to forward the S55 to the next slavering journalist?
   I couldn't tell you, exactly, but it's a phenomenon I've experienced in other hi-line Mercs: a nagging sense of, well, responsibility for living up to all this magnificence . . . and, perhaps, a sense that not only was I assessing the car; the car was assessing me. Was I worthy? Is anyone worthy of such a ride? Forward your thoughts on the matter to Thor . . . if you can find his Web site.
  

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