All of fame
It’s a familiar idea: big diesel estate with all-wheel drive. But the EClass All-Terrain’s execution makes this an extraordinary family car. By Ben Oliver
I CAN REMEMBER the precise moment when I knew this new long-term test car and I would get along. It was 10 o’clock at night in mid-February, just a couple of days after it had been delivered. We were on the M6, somewhere in Lancashire. The Beast from the East 2 was dumping snow on the motorway in such quantities that the slowing traffic wasn’t clearing it, and we passed maybe half a dozen cars which had spun out on the other carriageway and come to a halt at crazy angles.
Inside our E350 All-Terrain my four-year-old slept in the back and my five-year-old watched all this unperturbed from the front seat. His calmness was doubtless a reflection of my own. I wasn’t cursing my stubborn refusal to let a weather forecast cancel our long-planned trip to Northern Ireland. I knew that unless the motorway was closed, the E-Class would get us to our hotel in Cumbria and onto the ferry from Cairnryan to Belfast the next morning. And despite having set out from Sussex at tea time, everyone’s mood was better for the All-Terrain’s seat comfort, noise levels and ride quality.
Sure, any all-wheel-drive estate on winter tyres might have provided the same progress. But it’s the manner in which it does it and the state in which it leaves you after even the toughest of drives that you pay the extra for with this Merc, or any of its premium rivals. And it is quite a lot extra over the dimensionally and conceptually similar Vauxhall Insignia Country Tourer which has been on the long-term test fleet at the same time (see p130). But the E’s ease encourages you to do more. The kids liked the road trip from Sussex to Belfast so much that we did it again in July, but this time went all the way to Donegal. What sane single dad does a 1500-mile road trip with two small children, twice? One with an E-Class. There were also trips to North Wales, the Isle of Man and France, just because they felt easy. The All-Terrain racked up 13,000 miles with me in nine months, more per month than I’ve done in any other long-termer, and a lot given that I have access to other cars. It needed a service at 14,000 miles which was carried out efficiently by the dealership in Brighton for
£385. They were also very helpful in replacing the two (two!) 20-inch rims bent by potholes on the rural lanes around my house, at £639.76 each. I’ve never buckled a wheel before, but the holes were particularly vicious so I can’t blame the design.
The second incident also ruptured the tyre, which cost £334 to replace. The absence of a spare meant Merc’s dedicated breakdown service had to come out, fit their space saver and follow me to the dealership to retrieve it, while I left the car overnight until the replacements arrived and taxied home.
It’s not a problem unique to Mercedes, but you have to wonder if the saving in weight and emissions of omitting a spare is worth the faff, especially in something intended to off-road and thus more prone to punctures. Living on a farm, the extra ride height of the All-Terrain was of use: it never got stuck or bottomed-out, even on more remote tracks. Only West Sussex’s terrible roads could stop it.
The E350d which I have just reluctantly relinquished is now obsolete, replaced in the Merc range by the 336bhp, 516lb ft E400d. I’ve tried the new engine and it’s enough to make the nation fall in love with diesel again. It gives the All-Terrain a seamless, scary and near-silent surge of acceleration which is almost Tesla-like.
It’s also nearly four grand more expensive now, at £62,900. But the car which encouraged me to do more can now do more itself, and its price-insensitive private buyers will like it even more as a result.