1994 Mercedes-Benz 600SEC Consumes Conspicuously

From the December 1993 issue of Car and Driver.

What can you say about a car that weighs nearly 5000 pounds, costs almost $150,000, and barely seats four tall occupants? If you’re one of the more affluent members of our society, you can say, “I’ll have mine in smoke silver.” After all, if you have that kind of money to spend on an exclusive monument to over-engineered excess, that’s your prerogative.

The rest of us will simply look at the car’s broad face with its weird lidless eyes and that giant star in its mouth and con­sole ourselves with the knowledge that this time perhaps Mercedes went too far. But we also must admit that this S-class coupe (to be rebadged as the S600 with no major changes from the 1994 model year onward) is no flabby barge with sloppy responses, and that there’s something very appealing about rolling down the highway in this solidly built chunk of German craftsmanship. Besides, with the thick end of 400 horsepower under your right foot, you can propel all 4960 pounds at consid­erable speed without losing any of the regal hauteur the car exudes when trolling through town.

The SEC’s substantial presence makes itself evident. To begin with, there’s the big profile it presents at curbside. Then, when you tug on a door handle, the long, heavy door yawns open like a bank vault. Everyone comments on the doors as they get in—first about the mass hanging on those hefty hinges, and then, if the doors have proved too heavy to close properly, about the automatic device that cinches them shut through the last few millimeters. Not many people notice that the frameless windows twitch down a hair as the doors open and shut, to form a better seal, but that’s what they do.

High-tech gadgetry abounds inside the opulent wood and leather-lined interior, and it can’t be ignored. You’ll most likely take advantage of the three-position seat memory first, selecting your preset arrangement of seat, wheel, and mirror positions. Then, after you twist the match­box-sized key-cum-infrared transmitter and hear a very expensive-sounding starter motor pin the V-12 into action, a robot arm at your shoulder thrusts the seatbelt conspicuously into your peripheral field of vision. The seatbelt anchor point is behind the door, and having to twist around to reach it would put unendurable stress on the seam of your Armani jacket.

Around you are arrayed the controls to more devices than you could shake a Dun­hill umbrella at. There are seat heating controls, dual climate controls, a switch to activate the electrostatic air filter (there’s also a carbon filter in there somewhere), a two-level traction-control switch, a button that raises and lowers the rear headrests, another one to raise and lower the rear sun­shade, and, oh, a whole lot more. The funny thing is, the layout still seems reasonably uncluttered, and the primary controls are as unambiguously arranged as in any Benz.

You can get in, find all the major stuff immediately, and be sliding the transmission selector down its zigzag slot within seconds. The transmission selects second gear for starts, which the big Mercedes performs fairly leisurely and almost silently, wafting away as if under sail. If you stomp on the pedal, it initiates a smart downshift into first, producing a lunge so strong and steady it’s as if someone down the block had switched on a 50-ton electromagnet. Keep standing on it and the 6.0-liter V-12 almost defies physics in its race to its 155-mph limiter.

The 600SEC is surprisingly quick for such a heavy car, but its refinement under­states the speed. Despite that, the car’s drivetrain communicates a clear mechan­ical presence. While transmission shifts are smooth, they’re evidently calibrated for deliberate engagements rather than the slurred ones that Lexus and Infiniti use to achieve smoothness, so you often feel them. At low revs the engine sound is a muted sweet hum. At higher revs the sound hardens to a mellifluous baritone that is clearly audible but not loud.

In line with the company’s preoccupa­tion with damped responses, the 600SEC has a recirculating-ball steering mech­anism that is well-isolated from road shock. The same conservative priorities probably also explain the on-center slow­ness that some staffers here describe as mushy. A little hard cornering dispels any notions of mushy steering, because the big coupe turns in well and cleaves to the cho­sen line with pleasing accuracy. It’s not exactly nimble, and the fairly soft spring­ing (the automatic damping control notwithstanding) does allow some roll and a tiny amount of body wallow, but the 600SEC does a great job for a large, lux­urious vehicle. And, of course, its long-dis­tance cruising capabilities are sensational.

Double-glazed windows put the fin­ishing touches to a well-insulated chassis, and the loudest sound you hear on the move is a steady tire hum. If you pay attention, you can even hear the sound frequency shift in corners as the wheel speeds vary. The ambience inside is always reassuring, restful, and comfort­able. Despite the reduction in rear-seat space that accompanied the metamorphosis from four-door to two-door, we seated a six-foot passenger behind a six-foot-five driver during short trips without much discomfort.

The most difficult-to-describe aspect of 600SEC ownership is the subtle osmosis a driver undergoes as the innumerable engineering details that were sweated so obsessively in Stuttgart begin to insinuate themselves. It’s on this essence that a lot of the development money was spent. We won’t say that it justifies the car’s out­rageous price, but we think it’s a better rationalization for purchase than just the car’s obvious status value. Naturally, $146,710 takes care of that, too.

Counterpoint

Where do you draw the line between opulent luxury and plain excess? With the S-class Benzes, it’s somewhere between two and four doors. As environmentally and politically incor­rect as it is, there is a pretense of func­tionality about the four-door 600SEL that underlies its frilly buttons and syrupy V-12. Not so the two-door 600SEC. Its only justification as the most expensive Benz is a mechanical valet that brings your seatbelt to arm’s reach. Theoretically, this bruising two­-door makes for a tidier package, but in practice it’s overkill. —Martin Padgett Jr.

My problem with the 600SEC isn’t that it’s fat (it is) or that it has mushy steer­ing (it does). My problem is that I climbed into a BMW 850Ci the week­end after I drove the 600SEC. The BMW causes more pedestrians to gawk, smile, and applaud. It tracks down the Interstate more sure-footedly. Its cockpit isn’t too much smaller. And the 850Ci does $56,590 less injury to one’s savings account. This means I could own a German V-12-powered coupe plus, say, a Villager minivan and a Lexus ES300 sedan and still have enough left for a trip to Grand Cayman. —John Phillips

Certain staffers wring their hands when it comes to cars with as many digits in their prices as the 600SEC. What they overlook is that with all the high-qual­ity mass-produced items in the modern world, superiority isn’t cheap. I see 50 percent price hits for 10 percent product improvements all the time—in watches and stereos as well as in cars. If you evaluate the big coupe’s superb ride, uncanny silence, and effortless speed on that scale, it won’t disappoint those who can afford it. And despite their clucking, even the hand-wringers were scrambling to drive it overnight. —Csaba Csere

Source: Reviews - aranddriver.com