The E350 Avantgarde (W212) is the latest generation of the Mercedes Benz E-Class which began its journey with the 170 V in 1947. The widely sold ones in the E-Class generation models were the W123 and W124 sold in the late 1970s, 80s and early 1990s respectively. After these came the W210, which officially made its debut in India with the help of Telco (a joint venture between Tata and Mercedes-Benz).The W210 pioneered the new look with twin-oval headlamps in the E-family.

The Stuttgart-based automaker has sold 10 million sedans across the globe over the last six decades and Mercedes-Benz claims it is the world’s most successful business saloon.

Mercedes-Benz has retained the distinctive look of the older-generation E-Class (W211) on the new E350. The new angular body of the E350 looks more aggressive reminding us of the 80’s E-Class designs. Some of the recent Mercedes-Benz designs had lost the muscular look which the older Benz cars had. The designers at Mercedes-Benz have now bounced back with a sturdy-looking design for the E350.

The twin oval headlamps which had become one of the trademarks of the E-Class in the last decade have been replaced by twin parallelogram headlamps, coupled with hockey-stick shaped LED daylight running lamps. The gently curving hood of the older E-Class has been replaced with the new E350’s bonnet’s steeper rake, more prominent strakes and shut line running up to the A-pillar. The lines at the meeting point of the A-pillar, hood and the fender look mismatched.

The new shoulder-line design and the crisp crease line that rises toward the rear and chrome strip add to the styling. The E350 sports new low-profile 17” 5-spoke alloys, arched fenders and tail lamps extending upto the rear fenders. The silhouette of the E-Class will remind you of the design of the S-Class. The side-view mirrors on the E350 are more rectangular in shape with twin paralle l indicator lights; which Mercedes-Benz claims is highly aerodynamic and contributes to just 3% of the car’s total drag. The rear end of the W212 features classic Mercedes horizontal tail lamps, refreshed with LEDs (seen on the last-generation limited edition E-Class), chrome handle and well-integrated bumper design.

The new E-Class has a coefficient of drag of 0.25, which Mercedes-Benz claims makes it the world’s most aerodynamically efficient luxury sedan. The engineers have increased the rigidity of the W212’s monocoque by 30% and around 72% of the bodyshell panels are made of high-strength steel. Another safety feature in the E350 is the active aluminum bonnet, which rises by 50mm within fractions of a second in case of a collision increasing pedestrian safety. The driver can reset the bonnet without visiting the service centre, which is a thoughtful touch. The E-Class scored an overall rating of 5 stars in EuroNCAP crash tests. The video of the EuroNCAP is shown below.

The Mercedes Benz E350 has included some of the features from the S-Class’s interiors. The Avantgarde has a dual-colour instrument panel and the leather seats and door leathers are available in different colours (black and two shades of beige). Step into the car and you will notice a number of switches and knobs placed ergonomically, without looking cluttered. The interiors have a quality fit and finish, and the dark interior shades are easy on your eyes.

The E350 sports a four-spoke steering wheel which has 12 buttons mounted on it, which control audio, the central display (in the instrument cluster) and Bluetooth for calls. Th e instrument cluster is made up of five white-backlit dials and a central digital display, which displays the engaged gear, transmission mode, ambient temperature and current fuel consumption. The centre console consists of a 5.8-inch colour display screen above the integrated 6-CD changer audio system and climate control unit. The screen displays the audio system details and is controlled by the COMAND knob (Mercedes-Benz calls it the “controller”) placed where one will usually find the gear lever. The audio system has auxiliary and USB connections, of which only one coul d be connected at a time and plays through 8 speakers, to our dismay considering the pricing of the car touch screen display could have be an add-on. The sound quality is very good, but systems like the one in the Volvo S80 V8 are still in another league. That said, it will still play at earsplitting volumes without a hint of distortion.

With the tilt and telescopic steering, motorized seat adjustment and comfortable leather seats, comfort is never an issue. The front seats have four-way adjustable lumba r support. Both rows offer ample space to comfortablly seat four adults. The rear seats of the new E350 are more comfortable than the outgoing W211. The rearward rising beltline makes the rear window smaller and giving the rear passenger a bit of privacy, as it tucks the occupants behind the broad C-pillar.

The slim A pillars increase visibility; however to our dismay the visibility through the left side view mirror isn’t adequate for our traffic conditions due to it being a plane mirror. The bi-xenon headlamps on the E350 have a good spread and reach making night driving easier, not to forget the cornering lamps, which are activated while turning.

One of the main highlights of the E350 is the mood lighting which gives the feel of airline-like ambience. Regarding safety, the W212 features six airbags, the ‘ Attention Assist’ drowsiness detection system which detects the drowsiness level of the driver and gives out visual and audible warnings; this system thought us sleepy early in the morning even though the driver was well awake . The E350 also sports Parking Assist which is the parking guide with sensors for making parking easier.

The W212 offers lots of practical storage space. The boot has a total stor age volume of 540 litres, a large illuminated glovebox which can be cooled as well, two storage boxes located beneath both front seats, coat hooks located on the B-pillar and a huge centre armrest in the front seats.

Powerplant:

The biggest engine which the older generation E-Class (W211) offered was the 2.8-litre V6 petrol engine and with the 5.0-litre V8 being available as a complete CBU and sold only on order. Mercedes-Benz has powered the new E-Class this time with a longitudinally-placed 24-valve 3498cc V6 direct-injection engine which produces a whopping 272bhp and a maximum torque of 355Nm@4500rpm. The E350 shares the same engine block design with the S350 (S-Class) and in international markets the E350 has spray-guided direct injection which runs on 95 octane petrol. The V6 motor on the Benz is peppy, refined and sounds sweet at higher revs it. The engine has a responsive throttle which propels you away when you depress the right pedal. In our test, the car galloped from 0-100kph in 8.5 seconds.

The engine is silent at lower engine speeds; it is the “not push me harder” type of engine. The interior comfort and silent engine, it encourages to hypermile. At cruising speed, the engine’s EGR comes into play which recirculates upto 40% of the exhaust gases back to the intake manifold to maximize fuel efficiency and reduce NOx emissions. When pushed hard, the engine opens its floodgates and the power is almost boundless.

E350 CDI Blue Efficiency:

The Mercedes-Benz E350 CDI Blue Efficiency has a 2987cc common rail, V6 diesel engine which churns out a very healthy 228bhp@3800rpm and a meaty 540Nm of torque between 1600-2400rpm. This diesel powerplant currently meets the BS III norms and is the top-of-the-line diesel motor in the E lineup, since now there’s a new 250CDI variant as well. The engine drives the rear wheels through the much acclaimed 7G-Tronic automatic transmission which is used in the E350 petrol variant as well. You get to play boy-racer with the paddle shifts and just like its petrol-engined sibling; it has a column mounted stalk gear selector.

The engine is fairly quiet except for a brief moment at startup and as expected of a Mercedes, is highly refined. Like the other Mercedes-Benz models, the NVH levels are low and hardly any sound intrudes to break the feeling of calm in the passenger cabin. The diesel engine to us, seemed far livelier than the petrol on our brief drive within the Chakan facility, but we’ll know the whole truth once we do a full performance road-test of the car, which should be fairly soon. The E350 petrol is cuirrently priced at Rs 45.98 lakhs whereas the E350CDI is priced at Rs 47.06 , making the diesel variant expensive by almost a lakh. Watch this space.

Drivetrain:

The E350’s 3.5-litre engine powers the rear wheels with a 7-speed automatic transmission (7G-TRONIC). The gear ratios on this box are similar to those seen on most of the 7G-TRONIC transmissions. In other markets, Mercedes-Benz offers the E-Class with an option of 4MATIC, which is their version of a permanent-four wheel drive system.

Like the S-Class, the gear selector lever is mounted on the steering column and can drive the car in either Comfort or Sport mode. In Comfort mode, the transmission shifts up at lower revs compared to Sport mode for more economy.

Fuel Efficiency:

The E350 requires 91-octane petrol and considering the cubic capacity and the power it can generate, the motor returns an average fuel efficiency of 6.6kpl. During our testing, which is mostly pedal-to-metal driving, the V6 motor’s efficiency was 4.3kpl.

Mercedes-Benz is one of the first manufacturers in history who produced quick and brilliant-handling sports cars. As early as in the 1900s, and later in 1936 the German manufacturer was tagged with the title of “Silver Arrows”, when the racing team manager decided to peel off the race car body paint, scrapping excess weight and exposing the silver metal; followed by Juan Manuel Fangio and Stirling Moss’s drive for the Silver Arrows in the 1950s. The E-Class (W212) retains the tradition of being a good handling car. Slide behind the steering wheel of the E350 and you will find the sedan nimble and fun to drive. The E350 sports struts at its front and multi-links at its rear with electronically controlled adaptive shock absorbers. When cruising the damping is reduced giving a composed and firm ride and while taking bends at a greater speed, damping forces are increased for better stability.

Another special add-on to the suspension design of the E350 is the three-link front suspension with McPherson struts which helps to reduce the transfer of vibrations from the tyres. The spring struts are upright in position to reduce the load on the strut bearing, resulting in longer life.

The E350 offers a Direct-Steer System, first seen in the SL-Class which not just varies the steering ratio as per the speed but also increases driver comfort when the car turns at medium speeds with steering angles. Accompanied with ESP, driving becomes easier and the car can be pushed through corners with the electronics taking care of oversteer or understeer. The steering is light but accurate, but remained light at high speeds and felt artificial with an electronic feedback to it

The brakes on the E350 don’t just feel good but bite progressively also. The brakes can easily take control over this V6 motor powering the sedan with complete support from the low profile 245/45R17 tyres. Our test car has the Continental Sportcontact 3 on them which were soft and gripped well on most surfaces. However, due to the tread design and compounds used the tread noise was prominent on concrete roads but they were quiet on tar roads. However, there is a lot of tyre roar even on asphalt. In our brake test, the W212 covered 32.6 metres before coming to a complete halt from 80kph.

The new generation Mercedes-Benz E-Class is a mini-S Class in terms of design, comfort and features. When compared to the outgoing E-Class (W211), the W212 has more in the offering, considering the pricing of the car. The W211’s E280CDI was priced at approx Rs 44 lakhs (ex-showroom, Mumbai) compared to the new E350 which costs approximately Rs 46 lakhs (ex-showroom, Mumbai). The E350 competes with the BMW 5-series, the Audi A6 and the Volvo S80. Considering the pricing of the top-end variants of the three German brands, the three-pointed star sedan stands out of the lot, with a long list of features, high resale value and brand name in India.