The Return Of The King

By now, many have, rightly or otherwise, decided that the new E-Class Coupe is better looking creature than its sedan siblings. But there’s is something more significant about the 2-door E-Class than just being easy on the eyes; Mercedes has built it to last a long, long time. It’s not just about the car ability to hold up but how it has been conceived to mature gracefully with the owner.

The leading evidence are the seats. Located on the side of each chair near the center console is a bank of toggle switches. Pulling one of them will bring the side bolsters close enough to accommodate a trim frame, snugging like a sports seat does. In a decade or three, the body that jumps in today will surely grow – usually laterally. The blosters can then be made to loosen their vice-like clamp to accommodate the larger body while remaining nicely supportive. Fiddling with the other toggles will inflate air pillows to support the upper and lower back, as well as the thighs.

To save you the trouble of having to reach far back for the seat belt and potentially hurting your back, there’s an arm that extends the belt automatically to bring it to within easy reach. It’s an excellent feature that is found in the CLK – which the Coupe replaces – and the current BMW 3 Series Coupe. The orthopedist will surely approve. Pulling the latch at the corner of the seat will not only tip it forward but also send it whirling toward the front, while retracting the head restraint to prevent it from getting caught by the roof. Again, it’s something inherited from the CLK and makes getting to the pair of seats in the back that much easier.

Good all-round visibility and a myriad of convenience gadgets like parking sensors and reverse camera take the stress out of manoeuvring the car. Besides helping to avoid things when backing up, the E350 Coupe also has plenty of features that are useful for the business of going forward. There’s something called “Attention Assist” which prompts the driver to take a break when it senses he’s dozing off. And he may just be tempted to zone out, since the car also has a radar –assisted cruise control that will not only maintain speed but also the distance to the vehicle ahead. Not that you should, but you can practically drive cross-legged across the length of the PIE, even during peak hour.

Of course, that’s not to say the E-Class Coupe is a car only for the elderly or terminally lazy. Far from it. There’s plenty of vivacity in the Coupe to make it appealing to the younger folks – particularly the style-conscious. The Coupe oozes it. Contrary to its name, the car is not quite an E-Class sedan with two doors missing. While broad strokes align its design with 4-door, the Coupe’s bodywork is unique. Even the four angular headlights are different from the sedan’s. The bonnet is also set lower and the valances on the bumpers are deeper. The AMG-styling package, which comes standard on the E350 and E500 models, feature even more aggressive creases on the ends and skirts.

Crucial to making the car a convincing and proper “koo-pey” are the frameless window design and missing B-pillars. With all the windows down, the arching roof looks effortlessly elegant, suspending itself like a piece of cool architecture. Crucially, it frames the occupants in the front seats as the center of attention, capturing the essence of the coupe body style. The drop-away arc over the rear wheel arch may be associated with the Mercedes S220 “Ponton” models from 1995 but it also disguises the bodywork’s bulk.

It would have been enough trouble keeping the Coupe’s exterior different but its cabin is just as distinct from the sedan’s. The warm orange lighting that softly illuminates the lower half of the cabin does not apply here. Look carefully and you’ll find that the instrument binnacle’s hood isn’t perfectly symmetrical as it leans slightly towards the center of the dashboard. Even the air-con vents are different. Most significantly, it has a gear shifter on the center console instead of the small steering-mounted one found on the V6-engines E-Class Saloon. In fact, the Coupe is more closely related to the C-Class than the E350 sedan. Not only is the center consoles housing the gear lever and storage bin identical to the C-Class’, the chassis traces the C-Class dimensions in terms of the wheelbase, although the wheel track on the Coupe is slightly narrower (17mm less in front and 11mm behind).

Dynamically, the car’s responses are also closer to the junior executive car’s than to the E-Class Sedan. It’s a little bit livelier, with the steering feeling more direct and reasonably accurate, although feedback is a little scant. All Coupe variants here come equipped with a so-called Dynamic Handling Package, which supposedly includes a lowered ride height and sportier suspension. But the car is still a plush cruiser. There’s  a certain sense of fluidity about the Coupe’s handling. The electronic nannies are at least as cautious as the rest of the car is thoughtful. They get alerted to the slightest hint of slip at any wheel, doing everything from cutting power to applying the brakes.

Driven keenly, the E350 is anything but a lumbering glasshouse (the panoramic glass roof is also an option, by the way). The 3.5-litre V6 seems to synchronize better with the 7G-tronic transmission than the 3-litre does in the E300 Sedan. In fact, the Coupe is probably as nippy as anyone will need a car to be on the public roads, and certainly more capable than the CLK before it.

But the way the electronics have been calibrated to intervene reveals the car’s approach or pitch. It is on the slightly different course from what Audi is plotting for its A5/S5 Coupe – even though the E350 Coupe’s asking price puts it in the same ballpark as the top-of-the-line Audi model. While Audi is taking a more sporting bend, Mercedes prefers to be more laid-back. You may be tempted to take the S5 to the track to prove its worth but the E350 does nothing to egg you beyond taking romantic long drives.

Tags: coupe E-Class Luxury Mercedes-Benz V6