I’ve had a couple VW’s over the years as well. I just donated the most recent one to NPR because it was still very road-worthy and will probably serve someone well for another few years to come.
It was a 2000 VW Jetta GLX (VR6) with 5 speed manual. Leather. Fully loaded. I bought it new in 1999 and drove it happily for 20 years. Regular maintenance and a few unnecessary upgrades was all it took to keep that thing running. Still the original factory clutch and exhaust. Taught both my kids to drive on it. The youngest drove it almost exclusively for the past year. Never a dull drive in that thing. Such a lovely car in all conditions. Sometimes I still wish I had it to take out for a spirited dash through the twisties.
That said, soon as my ass hits the seat of the MB, I forget about all the other cars.
The best part of my Golf TDI?
if I drive like an old man, I get 38-40 on country backroads, 35 in town/city, 42-45 on the highway.
If I have fun, 35 on backroads, 30 City, 39-40 Highway.
and the handling is always brilliant, twisty, serpentine back roads at the speed limit, roaring down the highway, or hopping between stoplights, it’s never boring!
with 236 TQ on tap right off the bat, stoplight-to-stoplight is always fun, and surprises many a driver thinking that it’s a “slow, stinky diesel”
no, it’s not, it’s a car that gets great mileage, AND is amazingly fun to drive, you don’t have to sell your soul/love of driving to get great mileage, you don’t have to be saddled with a soulless, gutless hybrid.
I’m forced to listen to Chopin on the stereo at 85 mph because it’s too quiet for rock n’ roll.
I’ve been forced to buy a set of tires and wiper blades this past 5 years. These maintenance costs are gonna break me for sure.
I had to pay $1600 for it. Damn, that’s $1600 I’m never going to see again. Depreciation on this thing is killing me, man.
I wish it had some rattles and squeaks so I could figure out what might be wrong with it.
I’ve never owned one, but I’ve heard that older Mercedes, particularly ones from after the early-1990s or so, often develop electrical problems. Is this anything you’ve experienced with yours?
The reason you can’t tell a difference from the outside is they are, very often, the trendsetters. Often other companies take design cues, sometimes with blatant ripoffs. It is not really an incredible technical feat to make a car that looks like another car.
I know you were being sarcastic, but I have seriously heard of decorators treating books simply as decorations, just something to sick on a shelf to complete the “look” of the room, and thus they buy them purely based on their size and color. And now I wonder if there would be a market for purely decorative fake books, like a cardboard box with a fancy leather bound cover.
If you don’t think aesthetics matter in a vehicle, you need to explain why all the major automakers maintain large and lavishly funded design centers and spend many millions on the exterior and interior appearance of every new model. The alternative would be to churn out cars that evoke the Soviet era of automotive design, where every car looks like a Yugo. Aesthetic design complements engineering and both are things in which Mercedes excels, which is why some of their cars look like works of art.
For most of us, appearance in a car is not the most important feature by any means, as long as it isn’t blatantly ugly, but it’s definitely a factor in decision-making. I care about appearance as a matter of aesthetics in an expensive piece of property, even though I personally couldn’t care less about the “image” factor – but many people care a great deal about image, even if they would never admit it.
There is. You can get wallpaper that looks like books (including in sizes intended to fake a single row/shelf), you can get boxes (both strong and not) which look like books… I’ve seen a folding bed (the kind that looks like a closet when it’s put up) whose cover was wallpapered in book-wallpaper; somehow that little bit of trompe l’oeil managed to make it draw a lot less attention than if it had been a large “closet door” in between two columns of bookshelves.
And while I didn’t choose my last car based on “ok, who makes them in red?” I did have a very clear notion of “I’m not taking anything in grey, black, white or light blue - it’s got to be visible”.
Independent shop checking in here. We don’t work on Mercedes because:
Specialized training is required, and nearly impossible to get. None of our
techs are trained to work on them.
Parts are difficult to get, and expensive when available.
Specialized tools are required. These are usually rather expensive.
BTW, as an aside, I’ve noticed that all the new cars look almost exactly alike, at least from the outside. I drove by a Rolls-Royce dealer the other day, and the only way I could tell that it wasn’t a garden variety Honda was by a minute inspection of the grill.
What’s the point in driving a ridiculously expensive car if nobody knows you’re doing it?
I’ve always assumed this is the reason the newest Mercedes models have a ridiculously huge emblem in the middle of the grille. Not only is it huge, on some cars at least the emblem actually lights up when the headlights are on. The only conceivable reason for it to light up is to make sure everyone knows this car is a Mercedes, even at night.
As long as by “all the new cars look almost exactly alike” you mean “not alike at all”! Sure, there are superficial similarities, in the sense that cars of every decade have similar high-level styling themes, but come on! Mercedes is particularly adept at having distinctive styling themes that tend to be common to particular model lines. It’s not hard to be different, but the styling knack that Mercedes has mastered is to be different and aesthetically appealing at the same time. As for Rolls Royce, I think they were once very elegant but I don’t much like their modern look. Still, they’re definitely unique. If you think this looks like a Honda, may I suggest an eye exam.
I think MB has missed the boat when it comes to the US market. Why spend that kinda money on a tight cramped sedan that handles like a sports car, when u can buy a Chevy Tahoe that’s much more comfortable, much bigger, and can tolerate crappy potholed roads. Americans value size/ at an acceptable quality level. Instead of quality/ at reduced size.
No, I’m just using the old saying to mock the OP for ignoring the performance, quality and whatnot and focusing solely on the exterior. Never said it wasn’t important, you read that into it.
My friend is an attorney and spent a lot of money getting hard cover law books for his conference room despite doing all of his research electronically. He said it made it look more “professional.” I have no idea if that is the case or not.
…maybe that’s one reason Europeans aren’t as big as Americans despite suffering from the same food industry: we have smaller houses, smaller cars and smaller roads and we’d like to continue being able to use them. For us, that sedan isn’t cramped, and it can drive on our narrower roads and park in our smaller spaces comfortably. Most of the roads my GPS takes me on when I let it avoid traffic lights (which it hates for some reason) wouldn’t be wide enough for that Chevy.
I have a 1977 Mercedes Benz 300D. Know what they stuffed the seats with in 1977? Rubberized horse hair! HORSE HAIR! The stuff all ends up under the seats leaving one to sit on vinyl-covered springs. My dad’s 1973 Pinto wagon’s seats were made with a good grade of synthetic foam rubber, ferfuxsake!! Were things still that bad in Germany in '77?
Yes. I agree the euro and US market/culture is different on average, US buyers value size/$ for the most part. Why? Probably just the way US companies have always competed, who knows.
That’s funny my VW Ghia uses horsehair too. Gives a unique smell that I always associate with old air-cooled vw’s, didn’t know MB did the same. Makes sense I guess VW and MB both use the same suppliers.
