Four-wheel-disc antilock brakes are standard, with larger, cross-drilled front discs on Sport models. The steering, while easy-mannered in parking lots, feels vague and sloppy on curvy roads. Body roll is ever present, and in sweeping curves the wagon plows as much as the nose-heavy C-Class. Short of perhaps the high-performance E63 AMG, the Mercedes-Benz E-Class isn’t much of a driver’s car, and the E350 wagon handles little better than Mercedes’ more top-heavy crossovers. There’s little payoff on the handling front. For a car of this league, I expect better. The suspension cushioned highway imperfections well enough, but around town it responded both noisily and harshly to potholes and other crevices. Our Sport tester had a set of optional 18-inch twin-spoke alloy wheels and low-profile P245/40R18 tires, and the sum of it all exposed plenty of bumps. Absent the sedan’s available Airmatic adaptive air suspension, the E350 wagon gets ordinary suspension tuning in Luxury models and firmer tuning in Sport ones. In its V-8 E550 guise, the E-Class offers unrivaled ride quality, the sort that even its $60,000 peers can’t match. Naturally, combined or hwy mpg, your actual mileage may vary. What’s more, both competitors are much quicker. Overall gas mileage is a disappointing est-combined 19 mpg - a figure the supercharged Audi A6 3.0T Avant (wagon) and turbocharged BMW 535i Gran Turismo (wagon-like) beat by 2 or 3 mpg. There’s a Sport mode that holds lower gears longer, but it does little to clean up the shifts. If you need immediate power, though - passing slow traffic, for example - it can stumble clumsily through two- or three-gear downshifts. The standard seven-speed automatic upshifts smoothly and kicks down to a lower gear soon enough to accelerate lightly out of a corner. With two occupants and some 500 pounds of cargo, the E350 didn’t feel outmatched at low speeds, but it required the drivetrain’s full reserves to merge onto the highway. Power is strong enough around town, but the engine needs to rev high to muster up interstate passing power. The wagon’s sole drivetrain - a 268- horsepower, 3.5-liter V-6 - is up to the task of moving this barge, but it never feels sprightly. Its considerable 4,213-pound curb weight is greater than the V-8 E550 4Matic sedan’s. Throw in the upsized dimensions and standard all-wheel drive, and the E350 wagon is, well, portly. Upgrade to the E-Class’ optional variable-focus xenon headlights, and a strip of LEDs replace the fog lights. Bumper to bumper, the wagon is about an inch longer than the sedan - and 4.5 inches longer than Mercedes’ M-Class SUV.Ī year in, the Mercedes-Benz E-Class’ newly angular quad headlights have worn well, though the standard quad fog lights look out of place, and cheesy. Like its predecessor, the E350 wagon looks like a proper family-hauler, complete with a flat roofline, large rear windows and a massive tail. Good news: Mercedes-Benz ignored that trend. You can also check out our reviews of the coupe, sedan and convertible.įrom Honda to BMW, the handbook on wagon styling evidently calls for anything but a wagon - which leads to sleek, quasi-crossover profiles that lead to minimal cargo room and even worse blind spots. I’ll focus primarily on the E350 Sport wagon we evaluated. Click here to see the E-Class lineup compared, or here to compare 20 versions. Rear-wheel drive, a V-8 and a diesel V-6 - all available in other E-Class cars - weren’t offered in the wagon as of publication. The E350 wagon brings some useful innovations, but its undersized cargo area and puzzling driving dynamics diminish the appeal.Īs its name suggests, the Mercedes-Benz E-Class wagon comes with a V-6 engine and all-wheel drive, in Sport or Luxury editions. I predict Wagon Five won’t go down as a particularly memorable edition. Its arrival was all but certain: Of the nameplate’s eight prior generations, four have included a wagon. The latest example is the Mercedes-Benz E350 4Matic wagon, based on an E-Class that was redesigned a little over a year ago. America’s fickle regard for station wagon body-types hasn’t meant much to most luxury automakers, who’ve continued to offer a steady stream of wagons and wagon-like cars.
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