Mercedes-Benz GLA 250 4Matic: Social climbing comes first

Don’t get at too hooked up about judging this car by what its badge implies.

Price: $86,500.

Powertrain and performance:  2.0-litre four-cylinder turbocharged petrol engine. 165kW/5500rpm, 350Nm/1200rpm. All-wheel-drive. Combined cycle fuel consumption 7.5L/100km (claim), 8.7L/100km (road test).

Vital statistics: Length 4417mm, height 1494mm, width 1804mm, wheelbase 2699mm. Wheels: -inch alloys with 235/50 R19 tyres.

We like: MBUX interior, smart looker, a hatch with extra ability.

We don’t like: The $6000-dearer GLB 250 makes more sense in the SUV role and has seven seats, no adaptive cruise control.

IN ‘Mercedes speak’ GL stands for Gelandewagen - literally ‘off-road vehicle’ but suggestively more akin to ‘go anywhere over any terrain with jaw-jutting confidence’ – but when meeting the GLA 250 4Matic, it’s really quite obvious the translation is, erm, a bit optimistic.

That’s not to say it lacks a degree of robustness; more a reminder that, as is often the case with this kind of vehicle, ‘road’ has more relevance to ‘rugged,’ so it’s tailored accordingly.

 Take in this shape at the kerbside and it come as across much more strongly as a sporty, if bulked up, five-door five-seat hatchback than something that’d be up for joining a four-wheel-club endurance outing. 

There’s certainly nothing junior G-wagen about how it drives, either. As much as Mercedes will attest that the AWD variant as tested are handy when the metal road turns to a dirt track, chances are the one function on the Dynamic Select system least likely to be used with frequency is the Off-Road mode. As rugged as the whole car in engineered to be, it just feels way too premium to risk for mud-plugging.

No problems there. When did you ever see one its rivals – and, to Benz, they include the Audi Q2 and Q3, BMW X1 and X2, Jaguar E-Pace, Lexus UX and Volvo XC40 – clambering to a mountain top, smashing through a boghole or taking on a windswept beach? Exactly.

 What also comes into question here, as well, is the ‘A’ part of the name. The obvious inference is that you’re looking at a bulked up member of the A-class family, The most compact, mainly (with exception of the AMG 45 hotshot) city-contrived hatchback that aims at everyone from young first-car buyers to those seeking a second set of wheels for town and around.

Can you see it? Erm, not really. Appearances again speak to a different bloodline and unpacking the development makes association seem all the more tenuous.

Really, it’s actually more correct to track that to the Mercedes B Class and GLB, as they are the other models on the platform that the GLA establishes upon. Put them together and it’s plainly obvious that the GLA picks up elements of both co-shares in terms of its exterior and interior styling and layout.

Don’t think this is a whinge. If anything, this car being not quite as it seems is a strength. The big appeal of this car is as with some rivals; it steps out of a proscribed zone. It’s a bit different, a bit edgy and, because of that, it’s a bit more interesting. 

The styling direction is one appeal. The general design influence is plainly from the larger SUVs in the line-up. The manner is which everything is beefed up is certainly set to raise comment and, agreed, the vibe from some angles is better than from others. Yet nothing looks bodybuilder-on-a-steroids-binge obscene. One immediate plus is that the glass to metal ratio looks just right.

 This is Benz’s second tilt at designing this car. Alterations over the previous blueprint are mainly to do with scale. The second-generation is most obviously larger than its predecessor, not in length but in height – it’s a good 104mm taller – and the wheels are 30mm further apart front-to-rear, too, so the overhangs are much shorter. That’s conceivably better for the off-roading no-one will ever entertain, but is not wasted effort, as it also enhances the way it presents.

 Mercedes is on a real roll in respect to its interiors; not just in general look and ambience – which is always swish – but also with its technology. The MBUX displays and functionality is likely the envy of all category rivals and though the ‘hey Mercedes’ voice control function is a bit frivolous, it’s impressive how it synchs neatly with Apple CarPlay’s Siri.

You do have to be careful avoiding your hand or wrist across the touchpad that sits just ahead of the display console; even the lightest touch can trigger unintended consequences. There’s no great chance of this happening with frequency because it’s another of those many Benzs that have a steering column mounted drive selector in place of a centre-set gear stick, so as to free up space in the centre console. The gear wand is likely something that will become second nature if you were a permanent owner, but for those who don’t have that chance, it’s invariably going to mis-interpreted as an indicator at some point. That’s only an issue for left hand turns, as you’ll pop it into neutral.

The cockpit feel is more car than off-roader, but there are a few details to remind you of it being a SUV, in classification at least. Most obviously, some of the controls are chunkier and the seating position is higher than in a pure road car. By a full 140mm compared to an A-Class, apparently, I mention that because, while it’s obviously a bit taller standing, the GLA doesn’t have much in the way of an SUV stance. So, it’s not a car that you need lift yourself up to get into.

The GLA is potentially not going to cry out of attention as a family car, and not just because it’s probably too plush to risk being besmirched by crayon-wielding junior terrorists, with a panoramic powered sunroof and heated electric front seats. 

It’s also not the best size. For one, it is a touch too compact and, for another, even though the back is not too bad for head, shoulder and lower leg room, the seat is set low and the roof and rear window shape do make the back part of the car feel a bit claustrophobic.  

Performance is decent. The 250 variant packs a turbocharged 2.0 engine that is good for 165kW and 350Nm, running through an eight-speed twin-clutch gearbox. It’s an eager but smooth engine, not overly hot hatch snappy at kick-off, but very responsive once it gets moving and endowed with good mid-range muscularity. The torque spread is wide and rich; conceivably, that’d be useful if you were heading onto non-sealed terrain. As if. 

Even when the driver’s chair is set to its lowest point, you’re sitting relatively high up. There's great visibility in all directions and its comfortable, because the driver's seat and the steering wheel have loads of adjustment.

The driving is brand-typical solid, but there’s a degree of enlivening sharpness; the AMG Line specification does sacrifice suppleness, but it's not anything like outright harsh. The 250 achieves what’s called the Lowered Comfort Suspension setup, which aside from being odd-named makes it look nice but does introduce some fussiness into the ride. For all that, wheel and body control is quite decent, in fact, and more large hatch than small SUV. The only letdown for push-on is that the car will at times outrun the actions of the eight-speed gearbox, at least when it is kept in the default mode. You’ll find yourself livening it up by utilising the gearchange paddles behind the wheel.

There are plenty of incredibly good crossovers and SUVs just in the premium end of the market, but so improved have a number of less expensive mainstream models in this category also become that, really, some of those could be considered as relevant rivals, as well. Really, it does come down to how important a prestige badge is to you.

If the GLA is to outdo its rivals in any key area, it’s in respect to its technology inplementation and functionality; though big screens with lots of trick functions and touch and voice activation are spreading across more vehicles, the MBUX set-up really is still in a class of its own.

So there’s that, and there’s the GLA also being quite stylish in how it looks, plus it drives more like a sporty hatchback than any kind of SUV. 

On the other hand, this is the cheapest variant with all-wheel-drive and it’s exactly inexpensive.

 Tick a few options, such as our car’s AMG Line and must-have Driving Assistance packages, and you’re up into $90k bracket, where the GLB with the same powertrain, all the same kit and fundamentally far more family-friendly functionality awaits.

If you want the look are seeking to escape some of that hit, then why not the GLA 200: Smaller engine, one fewer cog in the gearbox and front-drive … but frankly, none of that probably penalises if making an impression counts most.

Mercedes Benz EQC: Electric stuff gets serious

So impressively polished it’s hard to believe this is Benz’s first electric production car.

MERCEDES-BENZ EQC 400
Base price: $142,900.
Powertrain and performance: 80kWh lithium-ion battery pack, 300kW/760Nm, dual electric motor AWD, consumption 21.4kWh per 100kmh, range 417km (WLTP), 0-100kmh 5.1 seconds.
Vital statistics: 4761mm long, 1624mm high, 1884mm wide, 2873mm wheelbase, luggage capacity 500 litres, 20-inch alloy wheels.
We like: Beautifully engineered, hugely refined, impressive ride.
We don't like: Not as spacious as rivals, slightly anodyne styling.

WHEN his Lotus cars were cleaning up Formula One, Colin Chapman famously attributed everything to a process of “simplicity and adding lightness”. 

Electric car makers must hate hearing that. For them, a satisfactory kilowatt and kilogram balance is fiendishly challenging to achieve. Lithium ion battery performances keep improving, but at present commensurate weight reductions rarely avail.

A degree of podginess is an unavoidable for the Mercedes EQC. Another burden might seem to be the cost. It’s a hard fact that, in any part of the market, electric just right now unavoidably still means expensive. Assuredly, it won’t always be so. One day, cost equality with regular fossil-fuelled product will come.

Then again, premium is hardly unexpected for this brand. It’s the place where Benz has always preferred to ply its trade. Tree huggers on a budget might whine about how only the affluent have means to really influence EV acceptance, yet it’s surely easily understood why the marque positions where it does. If you want the best, you have to pay for it.

Big spenders will surely be intrigued by what is proposed by a model targeted at the Jaguar I-Pace, Tesla Model X and Audi e-tron, in part because it is obviously not setting out to be too different to regular Mercedes SUV fare that it snuggles in with. In look it is striking but conventional; in driving feel it is clearly ‘electric’, yet also very much free of revolutionary tendencies.

The price structure placement between the GLE and GLS, when sizing up more appropriately with GLC, reveals more about how the EQC asks for some dispensation. This and the fact that, operationally, it further blurs the already well obscured lines between car and SUV.

If ‘SUV’ means off-roading? Well, best not. As much as electric drive has awesome potential – instant torque to the individual wheel that needs it, for instance – it’s not an adventure car. Towing is possible, but it’s not set up to haul stuff that’ll go behind the big diesel and petrol models. As much as anything, it’s designated an SUV by virtue of happening to have been based on one. You could just as easily call it a very big car.

Which is fine, actually. Regardless of where it sits, it’s impossible not to find this product hugely interesting. Driving EQC very much raises excitement about others to come - EQV, a van-based people carrier, the EQA and EQB compact crossovers and EQS, aimed at the Tesla Model S and Porsche Taycan – and a brand strategy expected to result in up to 50 percent of the make’s sales coming from EV and hybrid models by 2030, up from a projected nine percent this year. 

Will you buy in? With Benz also aiming to also progressively reduce its present lineup and platform and powertrain options (a big call as it presently has 45 models), it’s a moot question 

Patently, this transition’s a stepped process. EQC’s introduction comes with acknowledgement tomorrow’s products will better what’s here today. The point is enforced specifically in that it does not follow other makers’ practice of being based on a standalone platform. That process is coming for Benz, but it’ll happen when EQS arrives in 2022. However, even then the brand will continue to make others to the formula of expedience applied with EQC. That is, adapt an underpinning also designed for fossil-fuelled fare. In this case, it’s the GLC.

To be fair, the relationship is hardly obvious. Just 15 percent of the older goes into the electric. Above shared steering and suspension bits, the EQC has entirely new body panels and acoustic glass, and that swooping profile, smoothed-out roofline, and trick grille reduces the drag coefficient to a slippery 0.28 to help eke out more mileage from each charge.

Engineering conversion also goes well beyond just ripping out the combustion bits and transmission and banging in two drive motors, one in front and one behind, and an underfloor battery.

The one quirk of ensuring EQC behaves as protectively as GLC in a crash is explained when the bonnet is lifted. The steel-tube replicas of the combustion car’s engine block and gearbox housing occupy a space others would re-shape as a luggage space. Benz though about giving it ‘frunk’ but then preferred to put safety and structural integrity first.

Also, it makes EQC slightly tighter inside than the Jaguar I-Pace and Audi e-tron, even though all three have a similar footprint. It’s not tight, but it is cosier, in part because the others have a flat floor.

Like a GLC Coupe? Funnily, they share almost the same luggage capacity, but the EQC’s boot is higher-floored and only accommodates 1060 litres when its split-folding rear seats are down.

If you’re hoping for this compactness to deliver compensation on the scales, well, like I said, battery packs are heavy. EQC’s 384 cell unit lends a significant 652kg to the quoted kerb weight. Maybe the surprise isn’t that it’s 650kg heavier than a GLC 220d 4Matic but that, at 2420kg, it outweighs the Jag and Audi, but don’t be dismayed. Like all electrics it has sharp step-off and the torque stream is rich.

The claimed 0-100kmh time of 5.1 seconds is utterly believable and impressive, given that is only two-tenths off the Mercedes-AMG GLC43 performance SUV's claim.

Despite what Teslarati believe, the dash from a standstill to the legal limit isn’t what it’s all about, of course. What it does even better is drive really nicely. It holds the open road pace very easily and with everything feeding asynchronous electric motor/generators on each axle to enable four-wheel drive, but actively varying the amount of torque to manage traction, nothing wastes.

Yet it’s not bombastic. Though AMG accessories avail and, as in other Benz SUVs, it can be finessed to suit driving styles, through personalising or choosing from three pre-sets, it’s a car tuned for refinement, civility and comfort.

So despite firmish damping, and well-controlled body roll that clearly benefits from having so much battery weight positioned low down, it

doesn’t like being pushed too far. It’s best as a cruiser in which you can enjoy the serenity of a cabin is impressively isolated from the outside world.

Efficiency encouragement is naturally to the fore. The Eco mode familiar in fossil-fuelled models has more bearing here. Beyond that comes Max Range, which actively encourages e-driving, including the use of a haptic accelerator pedal that 'taps' the driver's sole to suggest easing off. Altering the level of energy recuperation harvested on deceleration, enabling one-pedal driving further enhances Green-ness.

Still, when it comes to range, it’s in the same boat as most others. Mercedes claims consumption against Australian Design Rules’ testing of 21.4kWh per 100km, which equates to an ADR driving range of 434km between charges. However, the more accurate WLTP test claims a range of 353km, which is more in line with what – from my experience – you should expect to see. Likewise, in terms of energy use, the car was mainly between 26kWh and 28kWh per 100km. Using WLTP for reference, Jaguar claims 470km, Audi 436km, and Tesla between 375km and 505km depending on which version of the Model X you purchase. That doesn’t mean those cars will be guaranteed to give you those ranges in real-world use, but does suggest that they will go further between charging requirement. But that’s hardly a crippling blow, in that you can accept that all those cars will entertain big drives at open road pace over perhaps half a days’ duration at least before you need to think about recharging.

The cabin is mainly as you’ll find in any other modern Benz, notwithstanding that the lower fascia, steering wheel and split centre console is pure GLC. The top part of the dash takes a specific design course beyond the usual adjustable lighted pipes and cold steel inserts in the doors. The copper-coloured sections are apparently inspired by electrical wiring, and the air vents by circuit boards.

The dedication to battery push means there are also EQ-only toys and menus to find your way around, mainly via the twin-10.25-inch-screen display running the vaunted MBUX infotainment system controlled by touch or Siri-like voice commands.

You have an endless procession of display modes to cycle through, and some particularly cool features like a large head-up display, energy usage monitors, and the option of Mercedes' ingenious augmented reality satellite navigation, which overlays a moving blue directional arrow over a live forward camera feed onto the screen.

A set-up glitch that defied rectification meant this car wasn’t as smart as it could have been – it couldn’t locate the rechargers provisioned by the network the brand partners with - but enough operability remained to signal just how key the Mercedes me smartphone app is.

The specification is fulsome, with multibeam LED headlights, a sliding sunroof (albeit smaller than the twin-pane GLC's), 20-inch AMG wheels, a 590W and 13-speaker Burmester audio system, wireless phone charging, a head-up display, leather seats with heating, Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, sat-nav, proximity key and electric seat and steering column adjustments.

Also standard re nine airbags, a high-resolution 360-degree camera, auto parking software, active cruise control with GPS-based speed adjustments, evasive steering assist, autonomous emergency braking, blind-spot monitoring, and lane-departure assist that steers you between road lines, sometimes too obtrusively, admittedly.

What really hammers home is that it feels ready for the world of today and tomorrow. There’s just no sense of this car being a new territory for the world’s oldest brand. No shoddy workmanship or low-quality materials to embarrass. You’d think Benz had been doing this for as long as Tesla. Engineering and finish-wise, it’s already doing it better.

That in itself is a fantastic reassurance to buyers looking to make the leap. And the compulsion to do so will surely not go away. If the EQC doesn’t suit, there’s more coming. EQC will soon be bookended by the a small full electric crossover and that big limo, but by 2023 there'll be seven Mercedes-badged EVs sold here.