First Drive Review
Crossover vehicles are like opinions-every carmaker has one (or three or four), either in production or on the drawing board. At DaimlerChrysler, the PT Cruiser sold well enough to encourage production of the jumbo Chrysler Pacifica, but the Mercedes division must wait until 2005 to get its own multiuse, M-class-based, S-class-sized automotive platypus. So, although this new E-class admittedly looks for all the world like yesterday's completely conventional station wagon, it has been thoroughly refitted to serve Mr. and Ms. Do-It-All until that more ungainly, less categorizable "grand sport tourer" hits the bricks.
Check it out, starting back at the active end of this quasicrossover: At the push of a button-just like on a Chrysler minivan or a Lincoln SUV-the rear hatch elevates. Push another button, and the rear load floor rises and slides out almost 16 inches so that an armload of mountain-climbing ropes, camming devices, and carabiners can easily be stowed.
These features are optional, but even the standard tailgate and floor do tricks. The manual gate will hold itself open anywhere within its top third of travel to clear low-hanging garage doors or to remain within reach of shorter users. Under the base load floor is your choice of a handy cargo-organizing tray or an optional third row of seating appropriate for a pair of kids sized under four feet seven and 110 pounds. Another neat trick: The standard window-shade-style cargo cover automatically rides up and down the D-pillar when the tailgate (manual or power) opens and closes to facilitate loading.
For those who tend toward anal retention when hauling their parasailing paraphernalia, Mercedes now offers some handy cargo-organizing gear. There's a stowage box that hooks to the forward edge of the cargo floor and fills the wedge of space behind the middle-row seatbacks. Inside it are Velcro straps to secure retaining gear such as a set of telescoping aluminum tubes that can be fastened to a pair of aluminum rails along either side of the load floor to corral the cargo. There's a wide retractable belt that mounts to these rails to secure smaller items, and there are four tie-down rings that latch onto the rails. A ski sack holds three sets of skis, and there's a cargo net for the American Kennel Club set.
The middle-row seat cushions flip forward, and the rake-adjustable seatbacks fold down flat as in most wagons and utes, but these have headrests that retract when the seatback is released, and the ultra-light seat bottoms are easily removed. The front passenger seat also folds flat for easy hauling of nine-foot surfboards.
A more stylishly arched rear roofline rakes the rear window three degrees steeper than on the previous model, but our tape measure suggests the maximum SAE volume has increased slightly in this wider, longer wagon to about 85 cubic feet. That would make it more capacious than 45 of the 75 sport-utes mentioned in our 2003 Truck Buyers Guide (including the Mercedes G- and M-class utes) and bigger than every wagon in our New-Car Guide. Clearly, the argument for buying a crossover or SUV over this wagon doesn't hold much water if the issue is utility.
Nor does the E-class wagon give up anything to SUVs in the sport realm, especially for those who go for the top-of-the-line E500, Mercedes' first V-8 E-wagon. With 302 horsepower and 339 pound-feet of torque underfoot and a choice of rear-wheel or 4MATIC all-wheel drive channeling that thrust through meaty 17- or 18-inch rubber, the E-wagon should easily dispatch most utes and uncategorizables on the drag strip and the road course. Even the 221-hp, V-6-powered E320s that we flogged up and down the granite bluffs above Cassis on France's Côte d'Azur felt far more athletic than all but the beefiest BMW X5s and Infiniti FX45s.
Much of the credit for the wagon's responsive chassis dynamics goes to the optional Airmatic DC suspension, which maintains an even keel in the hardest running. The optional 18-inch tires are worth going for, too, as they turn in much more crisply and corner harder with less squealing than the 17s we sampled.
The electrohydraulic brakes felt firm and confidence-inspiring at speed, but their robotic artificiality became evident at slow speeds. Those brakes have learned some new tricks, though. Come to a stop on a hill, and with a brief jab of the pedal, the system will hold itself until you depress the accelerator. And in traffic slowdowns (less than 35 mph), a touch of the cruise-control lever activates a mode wherein the car will gently brake to a stop whenever the driver lifts off the accelerator. Beware, though, this is not integrated with the radar cruise control, so if the car isn't braking quickly enough to avoid an accident, you must use the brake pedal.
Other new features that will spread across the E-class line include active lighting that aims the xenon headlamps up to 15 degrees in the direction the steering wheel is turned and an automatic sunroof-closing feature that is activated by the wiper system's rain sensor. The new wagons will bow this fall, priced at about $49,000 for an E320 wagon and roughly $58,000 for an E500.
So, what basically separates this Benz from those nouveau multiuse, high-fashion rides is a bunch of ground clearance and some body-side cladding. Can't we all get along without that stuff?
