Impulse buy

Right, first things first. Gorgeous car! Nice price too.

My only criticism (and it's with Merc, not the buyer) is why, oh why the wood effect??

It makes it look like a Rover (well, alright, it doesn't, but you know what I mean):(

We ended up buying an "avant gard" A class for the wife, even though she would have been happy with the "elegance" model, simply because they had stuffed plastic wood into the elegance, while the avant came with the much nicer ally trim.

We said "can't we have the ally trim as an option on this model?"

"no, sorry," came the reply, "you only get ally with the avant model"

WHY?? Who sat down at Merc and thought "right, this model is a bit more expensive, with a few more toys, so it'll be bought by people who want the interior to look like a Rover, so we'll stick some plasticky pretend wood in there. And we won't let them change it because that's what they want, they just don't know it"
 
I guess the look of the wood is a love or hate thing, i assure you it isnt fake. From the brochure:

"Wood is a natural product which ensures every S-Class is both exclusive and unique. Because no two wood trim parts are ever exactly alike. That said how-ever, they do all have one thing in common: they were all carefully selected by experts who travel all over the world looking for the best quality raw materials. The burr Walnut wood, for example, is imported from California"

Rovers use plastic...it looks quite different. I guess some might see both as a touch vulgar, but IMO it really doesnt look tacky like a rover interior does :)
 
It looked naff in the A class. I haven't seen it in the S class, so I'm happy to accept what you say. I know it is wood, but in the A class it still looked plastic. Too shiny and "deep".

It's not so much vulgar, two of my cars have a walnut dash, but it looked anachronistic in a modern vehicle.
 
It is still very shiney, its a love or hate thing. I agree it does seem silly that you cant replace it with a metal trim part, but there are plenty of wood options, some of them are very subtle so i guess Mercedes consider this to cater for all potential buyers.
 
I liked the piano black wood in some. The base A class had black trim which was probably plastic, but it looked similar and was quite nice, the ally is also quite nice, but the walnut looked out of place to me.

I had grey birds eye maple in the Jag, that was nice too.

I think it's just because I consider walnut to be "classic" territory. The sort of thing you'd find in many old British luxury and sports cars of the 60's and 70's. I just think it looks out of place with modern soft touch plastics, backlit plastic switchgear and so on. If it's encased in leather and chrome, it's fine though :D
 
Jez said:
200k+ Miles? :confused: I bought it at a touch over 80k....
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Ignore me mate! I must have crossed my wires somewhere!:o

[TW]Fox;10372234 said:
Other than your fuel cost and the fact you've said things break, both of which I agree with, I can't help thinking your indy was ripping you off.

£400 for a service? The most I've ever paid for a service was £200 and that was an Inspection 1 at a BMW Main Dealer. They've quoted circa £350 for Inspection II. Quite what on earth your indy was playing it charging you £400 every time you had a service I don't know.
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In no way do I imply my specialist was a ripp-off - quite the opposite infact.

I was merely bemoaning the £400+ cost from a specialist, never mind a dealer when the price creeps up due to the wear & tear of age & mileage

My dad has a wallet full of £500 - £1k+ bills for BMW dealer servicing for his e39 (which he's had from new 215kmiles & BMW History until 198k) and some of the previous bills my e38 had in its past were well over £800 from dealers for routine servicing plus, other jobs, be it tyres, brakes, whatever.

The last inspection 2 service I had cost me £450 but included both bottom suspension arms, an exhaust repair and a power steering issue iirc. The Insp 2 on its own was circa £250.

BMW dealer servicing is reasonable until they find something above & beyond the routine service items that need fixing, a good example would be the £400+ it cost me to fix an early ABS problem with my e38.

Moan about it as I do though, I always expected running costs to be quite high given the class of car.
 
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Drove an s320 CDI, power wise it was acceptable, but the quality of the car was shocking, the doors felt flimsy the buttons on the dash and the window buttons cheap. The boot was made out of recycled pepsi cans - who pays £60+k for this vehicle new?

It was an ok place to sit in though, i wouldnt mind sitting for a few hours the best things I liked were the speed adaptive steering and the cruise control. The 3 pointed star on the bonnet makes you feel special :D

I don't know if the 03 facelift improved things much, but as an initial impression I wasn't impressed.
 
The problem you have jamoor is that you drive an e39, which interior wise has some of the best build quality on any car - even newer bmws are not quite the same. This will mean most cars you get into now will underwhelm you in terms of build. This makes replacing one a bit of a pain.
 
jamoor said:
Drove an s320 CDI, power wise it was acceptable, but the quality of the car was shocking, the doors felt flimsy the buttons on the dash and the window buttons cheap. The boot was made out of recycled pepsi cans - who pays £60+k for this vehicle new?

It was an ok place to sit in though, i wouldnt mind sitting for a few hours the best things I liked were the speed adaptive steering and the cruise control. The 3 pointed star on the bonnet makes you feel special :D

I don't know if the 03 facelift improved things much, but as an initial impression I wasn't impressed.
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I dont understand the quality concerns, i have had a few nice cars and the mercedes blows them all away in every aspect, and i am not one of these fanboy people who only praise what they own, i dont get attached to cars. Build quality is certainly on par, if not superior to all of the BMW's i have seen of the E46/39 era (which is saying something, as BMW's are some of the best built cars available). The look and feel is completely different and is a love or hate thing, a lot of people dont like the look of high end mercedes interiors.

Facelift only changes the electronic gadgets, build quality is the same.

Also, they are no sports car, if you like the actual drive of your E39 then consider a BMW 7-series as a good all rounder, nothing this side of a rolls royce is as good for lots of motorway work though which is certainly where my cars spend all of their time, so it suits me down to the ground, absolutely love mine.
 
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Jez said:
Also, they are no sports car, if you like the actual drive of your E39 then consider a BMW 7-series as a good all rounder, nothing this side of a rolls royce is as good for lots of motorway work though which is certainly where my cars spend all of their time, so it suits me down to the ground, absolutely love mine.
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Spoken for truth, all the attributes of a 5 Series (i.e. build quality etc) but much bigger! :cool: - I miss mine! :(
 
jamoor said:
Phaeton looks a good buy - 20k for a 5.0 v10 tdi with everything, although depreciation is a huge concern.
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Superb car and the V10 is amazing. Depreciation is less of an issue when the £70k car has dropped to £20k though. These cars will never drop like stones to nothing simply for what they are.
 
They can easily fall to £5000 or so though, the 7-series and old S's are a testiment to that :) I like to think i am too clever with cars to lose £15000 in depreciation, therefore one wont feature in my portential car list for quite some time.
 
Jez said:
They can easily fall to £5000 or so though, the 7-series and old S's are a testiment to that :) I like to think i am too clever with cars to lose £15000 in depreciation, therefore one wont feature in my portential car list for quite some time.
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I don't think so. Well, not the V10 model and not for some time yet either. I do think the lesser models will continue to fall in price though.
 
The V10 is a good engine but it's amazingly complex, and puts incredible stress on the components. On the Touareg at least, propshafts and differentials regularly let go at about 60,000 miles for example, which isn't great if you don't have a good warranty!

Servicing is expensive, especially major ones, it's very heavy on fuel (my mum's V10 Touareg averages just under 20mpg - the best I've ever got out of it is 26mpg on a long motorway journey sat at ~60 - fairly busy traffic), insurance is expensive (group 19), it's heavy on brakes and tyres and the fronts wear unevenly (apparently a 'characteristic' because of the weight of the engine?!).
 
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OllyM said:
The V10 is a good engine but it's amazingly complex, and puts incredible stress on the components. On the Touareg at least, propshafts and differentials regularly let go at about 60,000 miles for example, which isn't great if you don't have a good warranty!
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I think the extra weight of the Toe-rag over the Phaeton, and the extra stresses of a 4x4 compared to a saloon car have a lot to do with that though.
 
The problem with the Pheaton is that to drive or be driven in it simply feels like a large VW Passat. It lacks the sense of occasion, the prestige, which you get with its rivals. Badge snobbery accusations aside, this is a must for a car of its class and the main reason why nobody buys them.
 
[TW]Fox;10449907 said:
The problem with the Pheaton is that to drive or be driven in it simply feels like a large VW Passat. It lacks the sense of occasion, the prestige, which you get with its rivals. Badge snobbery accusations aside, this is a must for a car of its class and the main reason why nobody buys them.
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The only real thing that stops the Phaeton selling in larger numbers is the VW badge. Slightly alter some of the body panels so it looks less like a Passat and rebadge it and watch the figures go up. I've spent a fair bit of time in a Phaeton and IMO as a car it was almost if not as good as an S class. It looks average compared to the S though.
 
This is where i do not understand VAG. Why does the Pheaton exist, and if it should exist, why is it not badged as an Audi? Ditto Touraeg. Why have we had the Touraeg for 4 years before we finally got the Audi Q7?

When will VW learn that it is to compete with Ford, Vauxhall, Honda et al and is neither a BMW nor a Mercedes rival furthermore it doesn't NEED to be a BMW or Mercedes rival becuase they've got Audi.

On that note, been in a new Passat? My god, what an awful car.
 
This is the whole issue though, as it stands it IS badged up as a VW, it looks like a VW, and the interior is going to use VAG switchgear. You also have to say you have a VW every time you get asked what you drive which is important in a lot of circles of these type of car owners.

Even my old '99 S-class has had loads of comments. Big AMG styled mercedes look and feel fantastic to drive, it feels like you are piloting a ship or something, the crosshair at the end of the bonnet finishes it off nicely. I wouldnt get the same with a big VW, can completely see why they dont sell.
 
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