Maybe for average, middle class Americans. Except Mercedes isn’t trying to sell to average middle class Americans. They’re going after the premium market. That’s not as big as the market for big Tahoes, but it’s a niche that does exist in the US and that’s the one they fill.
I would think that if they’re using MB’s as taxis in Europe, they would go after the middle class market in the US. Especially since large SUV’s are not cheap at all. You’d think a car company would want to sell cars. Sorry, I just think MB’s aren’t that great
Overwhelming majority of the MB taxis in the EU are smaller displacement diesel engines. What’s your understanding of the desirability for more expensive, often slower, diesel cars in the US market, given the higher average costs of diesel fuel?
Diesel cars have never really caught on in the US. Probably for the reasons you mention. A diesel SUV might do ok, as long as it was priced similar to a gas version, but that might be difficult to accomplish.
Mercedes has produced and sold diesel cars and SUVs in the US market for years. 300D being one of most iconic models. More recent models include the ML350/GLE350 BlueTec midsize SUV models available for about 10 production years. But here again, they are aimed at the luxury market with lots of extras not included in the very different Chevy Tahoe SUV target market. So I’m not sure what specifically makes MB “not so great” when considering they are not aiming at the same market segment.
This American LOVES his 2012 VW Golf TDI (certified preowned with 50,000 miles), the reasons I bought it were;
1; diesel engines are built far stronger than the equivalent gasoline engine, they have to stand up to the much higher pressures involved in compression ignition, their durability is infamous
2; they are generally more reliable than the equivalent gasoline engine, and the chassis is typically more durable as well, barring variables such as corrosion from road salt, small diesel passenger cars can easily go 400,000+ miles with routine maintenance (oil changes and the like), there’s a good video series on YouTube by “Car Throttle” that details his experiences with a Skoda Octavia (similar to a VW Jetta)sedan with 450,000+ miles on it, (He named it Miles 
), in one of the vids, he took it to a local mechanic and performed a teardown on the engine to check for wear, at 450K+ there was nearly no wear at all, the mechanic said if he didn’t know the history, he would have thought the engine was nearly new based on the wear patterns (or lack thereof)
3; They generate all their power/torque at low RPM, making them far more drivable around town and on backroads, my Golf TDI may only have a humble 140 HP, but it makes a respectable 236 Ft-Lb of torque at under 2,000 RPM, accelerating from a stoplight feels like a jetliner taking off, the torque shoves you back in your seat with authority, and under power, it pulls like a frakking freight train, it’s incredibly FUN to drive in daily use, no it won’t win any 1/4 mile drag races or top speed records (until I tune it up, that is ), but it’s the perfect FUN daily driver
4; depending on how I drive, on my 2 lane hilly backroads, with speed limits from 25-55 MPH, I can get around 31-45 MPG, and, unlike the utterly soulless, asthmatic, gutless prius transportation appliance, the Golf TDI is actually a major hoot to drive, it’s incredibly fun, and puts an ear-to-ear grin on my face every time I drive it, yes, the prius will get better absolute fuel mileage, I won’t debate that, but the prius sacrifices EVERYTHING ELSE at the Altar Of Fuel Economy, i’m willing to sacrifice a tiny bit of fuel economy to gain a huge amount of fun
5; (not limited to the Golf platform, but a reason nonetheless), it’s a hatchback, hatchbacks are awesome, period!, fun and utility in a very practical package
I plan to keep this one as long as possible, I plan to drive the wheels off it, then add newer, better wheels, the TDI platform is well worth preserving, my plan is to get at least 400,000 miles off it , this is one car i’m planning on keeping the rest of my life.
the ONLY downside to the car is that it’s a DSG “Automated Manual”, the ONLY reason I got the DSG version is that I needed a replacement car as my previous car, a 201 Honda Element LX AWD (my first, last, and only sludgebox automatic) was totaled out in a car accident, and I needed something inexpensive, the DSG Golf was the only one in my price range at the time, $9,000 for a car with 50,000 miles, a 2 year unlimited bumper to bumper warranty and a 4 year/150K powertrain and emissions warranty (4/150 from date of CPO purchase) was hard to resist…
….however, I am keeping my eyes open for a similar deal on a manual version, if I can find a '12-'14 CPO Golf TDI with a manual, I will trade out of the DSG to get the manual version
so no, not ALL Americans are opposed to small, economical diesels, I prefer them over their gasoline siblings
….once battery-electrics become feasible in brutal New England winters I may consider a Tesla as my next car, ideally a Golf-style hatchback would be nice, rear wheel drive (or selectable AWD that would allow me to turn the front motor to a generator/recharge motor instead of a drive motor, hey, that’s a great idea for the current crop of AWD Teslas, give the driver the ability to turn one of the drive motors into a generator, an easy way to reduce range anxiety…
this is not true. you’re comparing heavy truck engines to light vehicle engines. The car world has had plenty of diesel engines which were trash.
this is no longer true, modern diesels are even more complex than gas engines. and reliability of the emissions controls has been “problematic” at best.
236 lb-ft is pathetic out of a 2.0 turbo engine. Go look at the specs for all of the other 2.0 gas DI turbo engines out there on the market; you’ll find that nearly every single one puts out more torque and way more hp than that 2.0 TDI. And they’re capable of doing so at just as low an RPM as a diesel. Here are a few examples: Hyundai Sonata 2.0 GTDI, 245 hp, 260 lb-ft 1350-4000 RPM. Buick Regal 2.0 GTDI, 250 hp, 260 lb-ft 2000-5000 RPM. Honda Accord 2.0 GTDI, 252 hp, 273 lb-ft 1500-4000 RPM.
and so on. Turbocharging gets you low end torque. diesels only have that reputation because for decades people have been comparing turbodiesels to normally aspirated gas engines.
Diesel cars had a brief period of popularity in the US in the early 1980s in response to the fuel spikes of the 1970s, and during this era Detroit made some diesels that were complete garbage. As I understand it Oldsmobile had one that was notoriously bad, precisely because GM failed to design it to handle a diesel’s higher compression ratios (I think they might have simply modified one of their existing gas engines to burn diesel, but I might be wrong). IMO the diesels from this era gave them a bad reputation in America. But most European car companies are more skilled at building reliable diesels since they’ve been doing it longer – see the legendarily indestructible Mercedes 300D.
Yes, you do have a point about the emissions control devices, though.
you are wrong. the Olds 5.7 diesel shared almost no parts with the gas engine. it was built in the same plant so certain aspects of it (bore spacing, deck height, cylinder head bolt layout) had to be the same, but apart from that the diesel 350 and gas 350 were almost entirely different engines. The two flaws it had were 1) weak head bolts causing blown head gaskets, and 2) the lack of a water trap in the fuel system which damaged injection pumps and could contribute to blowing head gaskets.
the only thing the OM617 has in common with a modern diesel engine is they notionally burn the same type of fuel. those old engines were so durable because they made practically no power and were really understressed. The modern OM624 V6 is known to have several weak points, as does the VM Motori 3.0 V6 used in several FCA vehicles. High pressure fuel pumps are a weak point on a lot of engines.
I guess my lack of being impressed with MB partially has to do with this. What does MB have to offer in regard to extras,over and above a fully loaded Chevy or Cadillac?
Part of it is simply that what the Chevy or Cadillac have as options, Mercedes considers baseline. Sometimes it happens that by the time you load everything (including some stuff you don’t give a shit about but which is part of each successive “package”) onto another brand’s similar-sized car, the fully-loaded car is more expensive and has a worse functionality ratio* than the one which started as more expensive and also as already having all that other stuff.
- hereby defined as “things I really want” divided by “stuff I had to get because it was part of a package”. For example, back in the Dark Ages I bought a car which, in order to include a CD player, would also have acquired several speedy-looking stickers. The price of the change from tape player to “CD player plus snazzy stickers” was higher than that of a truly high-end sound system. More-expensive models already came with a decent-to-high end CD player, no need for snazzy stickers.
Long ago (in the 80’s?), I was listening to a car talk radio show. A caller had called in about some persistent noise while driving that he couldn’t seem to track down. During the call one of the hosts told a story from when he was the manager of a dealer service department and a customer came in several times with a complaint about noise while driving. About the third or fourth visit to try to fix this, the customer complained “You’d think that these kind of problems wouldn’t be allowed in a 20,000 dollar vehicle”. The service manager replied, “You don’t own a 20,000 dollar vehicle. You own a 10,000 dollar vehicle with 10,000 dollars worth of options”. That was the service manager’s last week with that dealer. 
Nobody talks about a “fully loaded” Mercedes (or just about any other top end luxury vehicle). Everything is engineered in from the start. It makes a difference.
You may not know this, but we city dwellers laugh openly at folks who try to five such beasts in the city. It’s hilarious to watch them try to park, either on the street or in a cramped parking garage.
Sorry, I had to laugh at this a little. Try going here (Porsche configurator) and prepare to be horrified.
I don’t want to go all “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” here but I do think there can be a very noticeable difference in quality between a Mercedes/BMW and lower end cars. If you don’t get a certain satisfaction from feeling the solid “thud” of a Mercedes door closing versus the tinny feeling of a Kia, then that just means you’re not looking for such things (which is absolutely fine). Some people appreciate clothes, some appreciate wine, others appreciate cars and probably pay closer attention to the differences between them.
Many years ago, I hated BMWs, not because I had ever driven one but because of the image of the yuppie scum cruising around like he owned the road. But then I noticed something in every magazine article I ever read. Whenever they road tested a Mustang or Nissan, they would always say something akin to “The handling is fantastic. I mean it’s not quite as good as a BMW but it’s really, really good.” Finally, I went out and test drove a BMW just to see if it was better than anything else. Most car dealerships will take you on a very specific set of roads that are flat, smooth and well maintained while talking your ear off to keep you from noticing any problems. The BMW dealer just put me in the car and said “Go to it!”. It really did handle better than any other car I had driven. Hit a bump? The car doesn’t even get fazed. Take a corner a little too fast? It lets you feel exactly how much grip the tires have. I ended up driving BMWs for 20 years and they honestly saved my life once when another car ran a red light and I had to swerve around it to avoid a full speed collision.
I certainly don’t mind that some people don’t appreciate a nice car the same way I hope they don’t mind me wearing sneakers and a T-shirt. But some of us do.
Those people took themselves off the high shelf when they came up with That Monstrosity, the one named after a spice :mad:
I generally don’t have a problem in American cities with my Expedition, although my last business trip to Chicago, the valet indicated that it wouldn’t fit in their garage, and so I had to self-park. It was no big deal, other than having to walk a couple of blocks like a caveman.
I had an Expedition in the Mexico City area for a year and a half. Wonderful vehicle, but I absolutely refused to drive it if I had to go into the city proper, as it was much, much too huge. Whenever a coworker wanted to swap cars for a weekend road trip, I was always happy to take the Fusion, because it meant I could drive to Reforma or similar destination in town. Ironically, I never had issues with it in places like Guanajuato City or San Miguel de Allende, despite small streets.
One of my coworkers tends to leave at the same time as I do, so I notice what car he gets in when he leaves. I noticed he apparently owns both a Tahoe and a Mercedes sedan, which of course made me think of this post. Evidently he sees benefits in both vehicles.
Back when he worked for an oil company in the 70s, my dad used to be given Ford Granadas as company cars. And he hated them deeply. Was much happier when his company went to Chevy Malibus.
I’m in Australia, so perhaps my experience is different. I owned an E320 (very much used) for a number of years. It was a bit of a tank, but it was the most amzing car I have ever owned. For a few years I needed to do a 200 mile round trip (that’s each way, so 400 miles in total on one day) each week. I just pointed it down the road and never worried about it.
The only problem was that every service cost a fortune.
I unfortunately needed to give it away when the repair bill was going to be over $6K, and it was worth nowhere near that much,
If you’re truly interested in the side by side comparo, you should spend a little time researching a loaded Escalade and a loaded GLS. Go sit in both and drive them both. Even better, compare the features, look and feel of both cars from 10 years ago. I think you’ll find that MB is generally first by a number of years as far as almost every new technology and safety feature you find in cheaper modern cars today. They were first to produce Anti-lock brakes in 1978 in a production line car. They continue to be leaders in virtually every market segment. Now, maybe you don’t care about the latest new bell or whistle. Fair enough. Not everyone needs or wants a self parking car. But you can’t say you’re not impressed with the fact that if it exists, more often than not, MB introduced it first.