Test drive Mercedes Benz E-class w210 1995-1999 sedan

Four eyes, four leading

E-Class. So much has been written about him that all suitcases with the Kremlin compromise fade against the backdrop of journal and gas reviews for only the appearance of these cars. Maybe this was achieved by designers Mercedes-Benz? I will disappoint them, not a word about the appearance of the car.
 
This time, Mercedes-Benz took in Austria. Why for a press presentation the company chose this country, it became clear only on the third day.
 
In the meantime, everything was written off for united Europe, in which not only Poland, but also Austria is not a abroad, and that some Mercedes models collect it there ...
 
Here I stand in front of him, four-eyed, and I think: what is there still not enough? It seems that everything with him is quality, perfection, prestige. Then I found the word. In!
 
There is no piquancy in it. Take, for example, Hyundai. A piquant thing - neither a face nor a name came out, but the whole car. Or BMW - also made with your hands, but not Mercedes. And this one as the first was in the last century, so the first comes to mind when it comes to cars. Well, no intrigue! Boring. Ferrari, of course, will be more stupid. Ferrari is love. And Mercedes, to be expressed directly, is a marriage by calculation. The calculation is simple - the highest quality of the car. Do not complain. At the same time, Mercedes is a deal. A profitable investment of money and nothing more. The image of Mercedes-Benz implies a higher education, a successful career, a family and marital fidelity. In the absence of one from the list, the purchase of this machine loses all meaning. In any case, the European client Mercedes in eight cases out of ten is a man with a diplomat. And here you are the father of the family in a stharged white shirt, the director of the office, who regularly pays taxes. In Mercedes, such concepts as a pitch, jeans-seeker and Harley Davidson are no longer available to you. In a word - goodbye youth. Sad.
 
South!
It was necessary to go from Salzburg to the south, to the Alpine town of Bad Kleinkirchheim. About 180 km. At the classic universal E 320 Elegance with an automatic gearbox.
 
The electronic ignition key on the E -Class cars resembles a strangled enema with three buttons - two of them are remotely locked and the doors are cut off while turning on and turning off the security system, the third unlocks only the trunk. In the keys from cars with the station wagon, the third button is missing. The impact sensor is built into the key. In an accident, all doors are automatically unlocked after 9 seconds.
 
The enema to start! We are going! First on the autobahn. As usual, got lost, missed 50 kilometers. And in order not to be late for dinner, I had to tackle the pedal. By the way, it is very comfortable. Its platform turns slightly on hinges, so, no matter how you put your leg, the site is always under your foot.
 
Speed \u200b\u200b200. It is clear that this is not the limit, but in Austria there is a speed limit - 130 km/h. Soon they entered the schedule of the whole column, even bypassed several crews. During overtaking it was possible to consider the faces of colleagues from the capitalist countries. They shone with enthusiasm - as if these people first moved from Fiat 124 to e -class! From one and a half hour contemplation of the three -beam star on the hood, it became dreary. Neither the roll is in a bend, nor demolition, even the whistle of the wind is practically not heard, and even the automatic box. As if the road is shown on a color screen. Another impression. Usually, when you diverge with a closely walking long -range truck at speed, the car begins to demolish the air with a stream of air. In Mercedes-Benz E-Class, it seems that the opposite is the contrary-overtaking a truck, you are worried that it would not be blown away.
 
The velor salon of pleasant beige tones. Even in Vienna, I drew attention to the advertising shield: the velor salon allows you to make 14 million football balls. Signature - Mercedes -Benz. It is expressed so -so, but the meaning is clear: what to finish the Bun's interior, if you can put it on the manufacture of balls. In addition, Mercedes Velur is no less practical and at the same time costs much cheaper than the skin.
 
The only thing that I managed to complain is the steering wheel lever of the maximum speed limiter - Speed \u200b\u200bLimit. It acts as follows. Pressed - the limiter turned on. With each raising or lowering the lever, the maximum permissible speed of the car will increase or decrease with a step of 10 km/h. At the same time, the digital indicator on the dashboard shows the maximum you specified. So, when leaving for an autobahn, you can set 130 and not look for a meeting with the police anymore. Or when descent - if the speed increases above the given limit, the box will move one gear down and slow down the car. Comfortable. But the lever is not located in place - above the switch of the rotation indicator. And what happened: installed 130 km/h, and I’m going. Ahead of the car that can be overtaken. I pull to turn on the left turn signal. At the same time, I touch the lever, it drops one step, and the car slows down up to 120 km/h. Here you have an overtaking.
 
Perestroika
In the oldest car company perestroika. First of all, ideological. In the image of the brand there are less and less arrogance, and in press releases a new word is increasingly found - sympathy. Mercedes-Benz has become open to criticism! As an example of such openness - the case that happened to us at the airport of Salzburg, where a general collection and demonstration of the new Brake Assist emergency braking system was assigned.
 
On the flagpole, state colors of all invited publications fluttered. There was no Russian flag among them. In response to the greeting of the receiving side, we pointed to the bare flagpole, they say, tensed, but hung ours here, if there is no ours, you can redraw the Dutch, we will wait. It was very difficult to resist and not pronounce the word Stalingrad.
 
Maybe we got excited with the flag, but the Motherland is Juber Alles. In any case, our criticism was interpreted correctly, apologized and promised that in the future, no presentation would do without a Russian tricolor.
 
Brake Assist
The Brake Assist emergency braking system is not such a complex electron -playmatic thing. A crocking speed sensor and an electromagnetic valve are built into a vacuum brake amplifier.
 
With smooth movements of the Brake Assist brake pedal, it does not work and the braking occurs as usual. But if the speed of moving the rod exceeds 9 cm/s, the system considers braking emergency and opens the valve - while the pressure in the rear chamber quickly drops and the brake force increases sharply. You can not be afraid of wheels lock - for this there is an ABS.
 
Why do you need it? It turns out that even in emergency situations, not everyone is slowing down in the floor. Someone presses the pedal quite sharply, but the leg is weak and there is not enough strength for effective braking. It is difficult for others, especially drivers with experience, it is difficult to get rid of in general a good habit of slowing down smoothly, avoiding wheels lock. But at the same time, precious meters are lost.
 
Having tried several braking in various modes, I was convinced that in an emergency to trust Brake Assist, the braking distance is really reduced. And the on -board computer for several standard braking is able to determine and remember the degree of inhibition of each particular driver. If this is not all smooth with the reflexes, then the control unit will shift the phases of the system of the system by millisecond earlier.
 
What does Brake Assist give? According to Mercedes, the usual driver at a speed of 100 km/h is reduced on average from 73 to 40 meters. Is everything again for the lazy burgher - you don’t need to think, pressed - and the car stops? Perhaps not - the system is really useful. By the way, not only Mercedes introduces it - Toyota, for example, has a similar development.
 
This year, Brake Assist will be installed as standard equipment on all models of all Mercedes classes. And importantly - the price of cars will remain the same.
 
V6
Now - the engine. As one of the readers of the electronic version of our magazine, dviglo, put it. Especially for Eugene, I talk about the new dvilo e-class.
 
V6 Mercedes -Benz is already a sensation. In-line sixes, like the rear-wheel drive, have existed on Mercedes-Benz cars from the beginning of the century. And although such a motor configuration has long become an anachronism, Mercedes and BMW stubbornly continued to use in-line 6-cylinder engines. But since the spring of 1997, Mercedes-Benz launched new, more compact and lighter engines with a volume of 2.8 and 3.2 liters into the series, showing Bavarian and other competitors a chic V-shaped steaming.
 
The power of the V6 engines is 204 and 224 liters, respectively. With. For comparison, the in-line engines of the same volumes for the 1996 of the model year issued 193 and 220 forces. The characteristic of the torque is flat in the range of 3000-5000 about/min., This allows you to use higher gears more often, reducing engine speed and, accordingly, fuel consumption.
 
To reduce the vibration load of the motor to the previous level (six cylinders in a row are the optimal configuration in terms of balancing of a crooked -shaped mechanism), an additional balancing shaft is used on the V6. The cylinder block with a collapse angle of 90 is cast from an aluminum-magnesium alloy. The mass of the new engine is only 150 kg against two centners of the previous engine.
 
For each cylinder, there are three valves (two inlets and one graduation) and two candles. Candles work sequentially, with each cycle the sequence changes. This made it possible to optimize the combustion process of fuel, reduce noise and reduce the emission of carcinogens by 50%.
 
A valve is installed in the wall of the intake manifold at a certain distance from the entrance. At a high engine rotation frequency (more than 3700 rpm), the valve opens, while the length of the collector decreases. At a low frequency, the valve closes, and the length of the collector increases. This allows you to adjust the length of the collector and the inlet parameters for the operating mode of the engine.
 
The new generation of Mercedes-Benz engines is environmentally safer than the strict EURO Norms require 2. (it seems that soon the company's slogan will become something like: I and Green Peace, we were born in the fight. Mercedes-Benz). V6 engines are more economical than the previous in -line sixs of the same volume by 13%, at the same time, operating costs are reduced by a third.
 
Candles, for example, have a platinum coating of electrodes and withstand 100 thousand km, before they had to be changed after 30 thousand. Or take oil. It is known that if the machine is used mainly for short trips within the city, the oil must be changed more often. How much? The state of oil in the new engines is monitored by the microcomputer, which takes into account the load of a particular engine and in advance - for 3000 km - warns the driver about the need to call on the station.
 
Over time, the new generation of V8, which will enter the service of promising Mercedes-Benz S-class, will be unified with V6 engines.
 
Snow and spectacles!
A hundred kilometers later the mountains began. The grass is green, the sun is glittering. Only the roadsides of the road are slightly sprinkled with snow. And the further we climbed into the mountains, the more snow became ... and spectacles. The frozen waterfalls were adjacent to already blossoming shrubs, meltwater soared on heated asphalt. Then all this in a minute turned into ice. We overtake the string of cars with skiing on the roofs. Before our eyes, a little Ford with Spanish numbers went into the Yuza - to see the drove, for the first time in my life I saw so much snow. In the Mercedes mountains, he behaved as confidently as in an autobahn. We were approaching the goal.
 
Gorodok Bad Kleinkirhaim. In a free translation - Malotskovsk with a pool. I did not see the church, but the pools - to digest - private and municipal, covered and under the sky, thermal and non -fragile. Looking at the locals, you understand that they do not care about the expansion of NATO east, and that their chancellor is a man named Klim, they are probably only guessing. There is the sun, there is air, there is also water. What else is needed? The main thing is that tomorrow and the day after tomorrow they will still eat. The climate is like that. As for Mercedes, the appearance of a caravan of 25 expensive cars on the quietest streets of the town was perceived as an accident, nothing more.
 
In winter, you will pass in the Alps only with chains on wheels or on all -wheel drive. But the winter in Austria has already ended. And for a trip from Malotskiykovsk to a neighboring Gornoalpiysk with snow, a cheap front -wheel drive low -wheelbrack will also fit quite. On that they go. But they do not climb into the mountains, go around. We had to storm the peaks. Not with an alpenshtok in the hands, of course, but on an all -wheel drive E 320T 4MATIC.
 
4matic
What images arise in words an all -wheel drive Mercedes? First of all, the Mercedes -Benz G and the multi -purpose Unimog - originally army all -terrain vehicles, which took good jobs in a civilian. Well, a new M-class from Alabama, which will appear soon.
 
Not everyone knows about all -wheel drive passenger cars. Meanwhile, such a version has been produced in series since 1987, on model 300/W124. In general, it was a fairly traditional all -wheel drive transmission - checkpoint, a handout, three differentials (interdosseous and two inter -coil).
 
Its main difference is the new ASR traction force control system (Automatic Slip Regulation). When slipping, ASR first slowed down the corresponding wheel, passing the torque to another, having the best adhesion to the road. If this was not enough, the electronic brains of the throttle control circuit were connected. Already the first generation of the 4matic had several thresholds of slipping, which allowed to adapt the system to the driver’s manner to move off.
 
A funny element of the design of this car was the front suspension. In order to skip the front half axes through the suspension springs, I had to push the turns of the springs in the lower part. The last all -wheel drive Mercedes W124 was released in 1995.
 
In 1997, a second-generation 4Matic transmission debuted on E-Class cars. Two new systems appeared in the transmission control scheme - ETS (Electronic Traction System) and ESP (Electronic Stability Program).
 
The first acts on the same principles as the 1987 ASR, but the system has become much smarter and now not only eliminates the slip when touched - in essence it replaced the locking of differentials.
 
If one of the rear wheels skids, the ETS slows it with regular brakes, transmitting torque to another, that is, acts with the same effect as the self -locking inter -thick rear differential. The same thing happens when slipping one of the front wheels.
 
If both rear wheels are slipping, the ETS slows them down at the same time, and the handout with a fixed attitude forward and forth conveys the torque to the front axle - everything happens in the same way as in a transmission with a self -locking center differential.
 
The use of ETS allowed us to apply the usual free move differentials in the new 4Matic, as a result, the all -wheel drive transmission has become much easier and cheaper. In addition, electronic control provides some new opportunities.
 
So, at low speeds of the ETS car, it can individually slow down all the wheels, the main thing is to provide them with the maximum possible adhesion to the road.
 
At medium speeds, the priority is given to the control of the car - only the boxing wheels are slowed down, while the clutch as a whole can worsen slightly.
 
At high speeds, the controllability and stability of the car go out in the first place - even if only one rear wheel is slipping, both are slowed down, and the front is slowing down at all.
 
The second electronic system of the car - ESP - is designed to stabilize the exchange rate stability of the car, i.e., ensure its movement along the path of the trajectory. For this system last year, the Mercedes concern received an American award for technological development in the field of road transport. ESP automatically measures the speed of rotation of each wheel, the angle of rotation of the steering wheel, lateral acceleration and speed of rotation of the car around its vertical axis. In case of non -compliance with individual parameters to the stable progressive movement of the car, the system makes adjustments - it slows down a particular wheel, and if this is not enough, it dumps the engine speed. (We wish you to understand the ESP action in more detail to the engine 7, 9 - the system for maintaining the course stability Cadillac Stabilitrak uses the same principles).
 
Now as for the mechanics. New automatic 5-speed box. Only it can aggregate with the most powerful V6 3.2 liter engine. For 2.8 liters of the engine, in addition to the machine gun, a 5-speed manual is also provided. This is followed by a handout, which generously distributes 65% of the torque on the rear wheels and only 35% on the front. Which allows us to draw a conclusion - the age of the drive to the rear wheels for Mercedes -Benz will not pass soon. This time, to skip the front half axles at the bottom of the suspension, P-shaped racks are used.
 
The efficiency of the new 4Matic is much higher than 10 years ago. If in 1987 the mechanical losses of all -wheel drive reached 20%, now they are reduced to 15%. (For comparison: losses of classic rear -wheel drive transmission are about 12%). If in 1987 this led to an increase in fuel consumption by 1.3 l/100 km, then the second-generation 4Matic reduces this difference to 0.5-0.7 l/100 km. Let the question of saving on gasoline do not fit very much in the heads of our guys in Mercedes cars. Meanwhile, a decrease in the cost of the units led to a significant cost of the new model - if 10 years ago for all -wheel drive it was necessary to lay out the DM8000 in excess of the amount, then now this pleasure will cost DM4100.
 
A full-wheel drive modification is aggregated with V6 engines, and only on sedans and e-class universals. The volume of production of such machines does not exceed 8000 per year, which will be less than 3% of the total production of Mercedes E-class. The company considers all regions where snow lies for a long time and where there are mountains, that is, northern Europe, Alpine countries, Canada, north of the United States and almost all of Russia lies for a long time. (So, Christmas trees, what you thought about when you posted the flags at the airport!) The Mercedes-Benz press service in every possible way rejected the possibility of installing a full drive on a new E-class compartment. Also, the company's management does not see the grounds to dissolve rumors about the new all-wheel drive C-class. As we were stated, a promising C-class will also be a classic layout.
 
Passage through the Alps
From the highway we move under the indicator of the Alpine National Park. After a kilometer we rest against the barrier. The huntsman asks how about chains. No. Then how about all -wheel drive? Ja -ja, NAT JARLICH - 4MATIC, do not see something!. Ah, well, try.
 
The barrier is raised. At first it seemed that a huntsman with his children's questions would be specially hired to raise the spirit of adventure, they say, not every bird would fly to the middle of the pass. In any case, the first cascade of turns could be passed without straining to Kia Sephia. But only the first. The second was already such that he could well become the last. The test drive began to brush to the passage of Suvorov through the Alps (if you are there, remove the hat before the courage of our ancestors). It was then that it became clear that Austria was chosen for the test not for the abundance of light beer, but for icy mountain serpentines, on which 4Matic could be fully evaluated.
 
I had to switch to a reduced gear. Mercedes continued to confidently iron the slope. Without slippers and Yuza, he climbed up and buried not in the snow, but in the clouds.
 
The ears laid from pressure drops. Once managed to look around. Eklmn! Two steps - the abyss! You can go into it and the abyss can imperceptibly - once and Tyu -u. At the same time, it will be impossible to identify a person or at least the state -owned driver. No, however, it will always be possible to determine Russian: the mountain echo will carry our last word for a long time and will bring it to the ears of rescuers, whose pickets are placed every 10 km.
 
This is where you begin to realize how serious Mercedes-Benz. This is how to be confident in your technique in order to entrust 25 of your cars to strangers! Yes, on such a crazy road! And if a psycho that would be clogged, he would turn his neck, killing the car along the way. You can’t get into newspaper scandals alone! But the cars did not fail. And each of the drivers tried to go down from the mountains without incident.
 
Since 2/3 of torque is still on the rear wheels, in the turns the car showed rear-wheel drive habits. But as soon as the front end began to go with a plow out of turn, ESP instantly stopped all the attempts of the car to break the trajectory. Naturally, in such situations, the driver himself is trying to stabilize the car. And the work of ESP is spoiled with the driver’s work, and therefore they practically do not feel it.
 
The desire to deceive the system and see what would come of it, managed to suppress: all the experiments left until after climbing, reasonably deciding that it was better to fall down and at the same time steering better than a muzzle than back.
 
The top of the pass. Height 1270 m above the bad of Kleinkirheim. Total is 2370 m above sea level. Everything is filled with light. Only the black door of the hunting house is visible. There is a restaurant inside. Coffee, buns, chopping - all things. Suddenly, from nowhere, a brunette appears. Perhaps Italian. All in tightening. The fourth number, no less! (There are witnesses). Goes and does not notice us. And to what we drove here on, she has absolutely nothing to do. Sits the wheel of Range Rover and hides on it in a thundercloud. Yes, a hot decolled person in alpine snow is a class!
 
E-Class!
We are going on. The main thing is not to turn around. The descent began. In the wheels, something terribly grinds - as if dragging sleds on the stairwell. Has the pads of icing? Or what else? A little scary, but invigorates.
 
A sedan’s profile imprint appeared in the snow - someone rammed a snow dump on the side. It seems that this is the result of the experiments of our bourgeois colleagues. Traces of tires - half a meter from the cliff. It became uneasy. Spear meter look: 80 km/h. Morality - Mercedes conceals the speed and at the same time creates a sense of security for the driver. It is only important that the driver himself does not abuse this.
 
Having chosen a place, we tried their own way to feel ESP. To do this, it is necessary to artificially create opposition to the system. Since the 4matic behavior is vaguely reminds of the classics, we’ll forget for a while that the front wheels are also leading. We enter the turn as a classic rear -wheel drive car. But at the output instead of gas, we sharply press the brake. The reaction instantly follows - ESP inhibits the rear wheels, and the car becomes front -wheel drive for a second. Everything happens like on the Vazovskaya eight, when the back of the hand is grabbed, and the front wheels are rowed in the direction given by the steering wheel. The car turns around, bringing the back. Now we feel how a certain force moves the ass of Mercedes, setting the car into a path given by the steering wheel. We safely emerge from the turn. And so time after time, without the slightest mistakes.
 
I liked it, I didn’t like the car - there is no definite answer. On the one hand, Mercedes as a mechanism is the products of the highest quality, a kind of bar of technical perfection.
 
On the other hand, the Mercedes car is the same as a five -star hotel with a too intrusive service. It is unlikely that I will soon love such sophisticated cars.
 
In addition, ESR concludes the driver and acts on him lullary. And if he has to transfer to another car, and even more so not Mercedes?
 
Everything worked out. Plain. Avtoban to the airport itself, a transfer in Vienna, the Odessa Stewardess-Miss, Moscow does not accept, in Moscow a snow storm ...
 
After almost 12 hours in the parking lot in Sheremetyevo, I cleaned Kia Sephia from snow. And the first thing I did on it was not fit into the turn and flew into the snowdrift. In two days I forgot how to drive an ESP car. Like this.
 
P. S. In Mercedes -Benz - 220 thousand people.
 
 
 

Source: Magazine Motor