Mercedes has a wolf in executive clothing
Neil Lyndon put the C63 AMG Saloon through its paces and encountered an explosive drive which looks like it's come along at precisely the wrong time
LIFE IN THE FAST LANE: The Mercedes Benz C63 is like a dragster's dream. Its twin domes bulge from its bonnet like a weightlifter's triceps
Sunday July 27 2008
THE MERCEDES-BENZ C63 AMG Saloon has been taken away from my house and along with it went, possibly, my driving licence.
A vacancy may shortly arise in the world of motoring journalism, because a motoring correspondent without a licence would be like a painter without a brush: somebody might eventually notice that a degree of finish was missing.
I was driving home in the C63 AMG on a country road. A line of cars was following some stooger who was maintaining a resolute 45mph. (Why do people do this? Don't they glance at their mirrors? Don't they care how much frustration they cause? Are they not aware that all the authorities and advanced instructors agree that, if it is safe to do so, you should drive at, not under, the prescribed speed limit?) A long, empty straight opened out ahead of us. None of the cars ahead of me signalled to overtake. I checked my mirrors, signalled, moved out and sank the accelerator pedal of the C63 AMG deep into the carpet.
The seven-speed gearbox kicked down three gears. The 6.3 litre V8 engine roared and howled. Time shrank. Within about five seconds, I had overtaken the entire line. Looking down at the speedometer, however, I saw that the Mercedes had rocketed me far beyond that bourn whence no licence returns. If a speed camera clocked me on that straight, I might as well chop up my licence and sprinkle it on toast.
Oh well: it was good while it lasted, and the C63 AMG makes a fitting end. Very few cars that are more extraordinary have passed through my hands in the past 15 years.
This is M-B's answer to BMW's M3, Audi's RS4 and Lexus's IS-F. The basic C63 AMG comes in at €99,505, and extras such as leather seats, DVD video system, and navigation pack can push the price up to €116,412.
It is another one of those compact executive cars that look as if they could occupy an innocuous place in the corporate car-park but have the performance to run in the Mille Miglia. The C63 AMG, however, takes the subterfuge to a previously unexplored level of excess. A 6.3 litre engine that develops more than 450 bhp in a car this size is like a dragster's dream. In terms of output, performance, acceleration and top speed, the C63 AMG is the direct equivalent of the Chrysler Viper, which had extreme enthusiasts and racers in a tizz in the late 1990s. The Viper's engine capacity was eight litres. The C63 AMG conceals its powers about as effectively as Arnold Schwarzenegger's politician suits disguise his body-builder past. Twin domes bulge from its bonnet like a weightlifter's triceps. Vented and flared wheel arches, side skirts and, at the rear, a finned black diffuser and two pairs of twinned chrome tailpipes all announce powerful purpose. In case the driver should forget what might happen if he floored the accelerator pedal, the rev-counter displays an AMG logo and the message '6.3 V8'. It doesn't tell you and you probably ought not to find out that the engine will rev to 7,200 rpm.
Mercedes claims average fuel consumption of just over 20 mpg, but I doubt it achieved that figure during my week with the car except when tootling down our drive. If you were going to drive this car every day, it might be as well to install your own petrol pump with a direct link to a refinery. It might also be advisable to have a long-term live-in relationship with a masseur capable of deep-tissue healing. Even in its Comfort setting, the ride of the C63 AMG is as harsh as a bobsleigh's.
In these days of lay-offs for city slickers and fuel price protests, it is not easy to imagine the kind of person who might be so indifferent to expense, to public opinion and to the threat to his licence as to buy the C63 AMG. It feels to me like a car that has come a year too late for its own good.
Campbell Spray is currently on holidays and test-driving the C63 AMG. This article is published as a warning to him.
- neil lyndon
