It’s a step up in class
SURELY my favorite part of any product presentation of the Mercedes-Benz M-Class is hearing German engineers pronounce “Tuscaloosa,” as in Alabama, where in 1997 Mercedes started building its first sport-utility vehicle: Too-ska-loo-sah.
In their mouths, Tuscaloosa sounds like such a dreamy, enchanted realm, and not the sweltering, book-banning land of tainted catfish it is.
After eight years on the market, nearly 300,000 unit sales in the U.S. and some of the worst vehicle-quality ratings ever to befall Mercedes -- a time, it’s fair to say, when Americans embraced the M-Class in spite of itself -- Mercedes has produced the second-generation: the 2006 ML350 and ML500.
These all-wheel-drive vehicles strike a chord of refinement unheard of in the last generation. The previous M-Class used a ladder-chassis design with heavy frame rails undergirding the body, conventional for truck construction but not ideal for light suburban duty. And let’s not kid ourselves: The M-Class is employed primarily as a fancy-pants minivan.
The new M is a unit-body vehicle, welded up out of stamped steel pieces by flailing, sparking robot arms on the Tuscaloosa assembly line. The unit-body construction gives the new M-Class a stiff, tensile quality and massed integrity familiar to anyone who has driven the company’s sedans. The new rig is handier and more stable around corners and has a more supple ride, particularly if it’s equipped with the optional Airmatic suspension (adjustable air springs instead of coil springs).
The Airmatic system provides adaptive suspension damping in three modes -- Auto, Comfort and Sport, the latter providing the firmest control of body motions in corners.
At the other end of the terrain spectrum, Airmatic’s off-road mode provides 11.5 inches of ground clearance, which is huge. Meanwhile, the M-Class’s tow rating remains 5,000 pounds.
Unit-body is also a lighter style of construction, which is a good thing since the M-Class has swollen like Alabama road kill: nearly six inches longer and three inches wider over a 3.7-inch longer wheelbase. The larger ML350 weighs almost 200 pounds less (4,623 pounds) than its body-on-frame forebear.
Ballast jettisoning includes the low-speed transfer case (a second set of gears that puts more torque at the wheels) that is now part of an optional off-roading package. The new vehicle dispenses as well with the third-row seats (no third-row seat option is available), which frees up space for a more livable second row of seats.
Now, as for styling: The luxury SUV is not a very dramatic morphology, as a brief glance at the Porsche Cayenne will tell you -- and brief is recommended. Mercedes-Benz expends enormous geometric capital on the M-Class, creasing its skin with a variety of rays, angles and parabolas that very nearly makes the sum attractive. Note the compass-cut lines over the wheel wells. This thing could not have been easy to engineer. The sporty, laid-back slope of the windshield imposes a low slope on the hood of the vehicle -- the two have to meet up at the base of the windshield -- and cramming the ML500’s 5.0-liter V-8 under that low hood must have required no small amount of pig fat. Fortunately, the stuff is available in Alabama in strategic quantities.
A fully kitted-out ML500 with the chrome grill like a Norelco shaver, 19-inch chrome alloys and privacy glass, looks -- no doubt about it -- pretty dang evil. The stock ML350 looks disconcertingly like an oversized Toyota RAV4.
The interior is terrific, faithful in Mercedes’ current aesthetic but with some lovely grace notes that point to the future. I really like the metal-trim grab bars along the central console and the big chrome vents in the dash. The burled walnut wood trim is first-rate.
Highly astute shoppers will realize two beautifully engineered cup holders in the console are where the gearshift used to be. For 2006, Mercedes has gone with a wand-style gear selector on the steering console, like that found on the BMW 7-series. This switch is connected to a seven-speed automatic that is standard with both the 3.5-liter, 268-hp V-6 and the 5.0-liter, 302-hp V-8, both four-valve models compared to the previous three-valve motors. For those who feel the gear shifting imperative -- even though the auto gearbox is almost certainly smarter -- there are paddle levers on the back of the steering wheel. But generally it’s better to let the tranny purl along with its own agenda.
Despite their considerable weight, the M-Class vehicles, V-6 and V-8, motor right along. The ML350 is solidly in the low eight-second range to 60 mph and the ML500 a second or so quicker still. Once in seventh gear, penthouse-level overdrive, the vehicles purr along effortlessly at supralegal speeds.
For all the technology brought to bear on the M-Class powertrain, they come up significantly short on fuel economy: The ML350 model -- that’s the one with the little engine -- gets 16 miles per gallon city and 20 highway. The V-8 gets 14 mpg and 19 mpg, respectively. Both vehicles would benefit from a turbodiesel powerplant, which Mercedes will likely offer in the next few years, or a hybrid powertrain, which, in all likelihood, it will not.
In any event, this is a major upgrade for the M-Class, a fact reflected in the price. Because of the way the option packages are structured, if you want your ML500 just so -- a DVD nav system here and rear-seat entertainment there -- you can easily spend $65,000 or more.
That, needless to say, is a lot of tainted catfish.
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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
2006 Mercedes-Benz ML350/ML500 SUV
Base price: $40,525 (ML 350); $49,275(ML500), including $775 delivery
Powertrain: 3.5-liter, DOHC, 24-valve V-6 (ML350) or 5.0-liter, 32-valve V-8 (ML500), with variable-valve timing; seven-speed automatic with manual-shift; permanent all-wheel drive with open differentials
Horsepower: 268 at 600 rpm (ML350); 302 at 5,600 rpm (ML500)
Torque: 258 pound-feet at 2,400 rpm (ML350); 339 pound-feet at 3,700 rpm (ML500)
Vehicle weight: 4,623 pounds (ML350); 4,743 pounds (ML500)
0-60 mph: 8.2 seconds (ML350); 6.7 seconds (ML500)
Wheelbase: 114.7 inches
Overall length: 188.5 inches
EPA fuel economy: 16 miles per gallon city, 20 highway (ML350); 14 mpg city, 19 mpg highway (ML500)
Final thoughts: Sweet home, Alabama
Contact automotive critic Dan Neil at dan.neil@latimes.com.
