There’s something to be said for publishing in print. When you’re faced with limited space, you have to make tough decisions about the most important information to include. But when a bunch of old-Benz fanatics banatics band together in the boundless expanse of Wikipedia, they birth a page where each pedant can show off every bit of their knowledge.
And, if the emotionally-invested parties all share similar beliefs, a rambling page filled with useless facts can go on until the end of the Internet.
The Wikipedia page on the W124-platform Mercedes contains useless facts like:
- The exact tire size used on the most-aerodynamic variant.
- That retractable-rear-headrest option was not available on wagons.
- That “engines incorporated features that maximized performance.” You don’t say.
- One of these features is an oxygen sensor. You know, like Toyotas also had.
- How many of the 68 AMG cabriolets were built with the steering wheel on the left side or right side.
Nevermind all the rows and rows outlining what each chassis code indicates, and, later, the rows of engine specs, including all the tinyest changes.
Please don’t try to read all of it. It’s miserable.
Listen, I’m a sucker for spreadsheets. I really do enjoy dropping numbers in, trying to find ways to manipulate them, bouncing rows of data off one another and seeing what rattles out. I dig creating complex formulas, trying to identify patterns.
Scatterplots. Rolling averages. Bah chahts.
But I also am (now) aware enough of other people’s tastes that I understand that charts are lame. Hella lame. Maybe even… the lamest.
Unfortunately, that’s about all the appeal there is in the W124-chassis Mercedes-Benz.
Boxy Galore
It’s 1995 and a German automaker’s mid-range car that had boxy nailed down in 1985 is now fighting with Volvo for aesthetic supremacy and wiper-blades-on-your-headlights opulence. Its jellybean-Taurus-imitating W201 is still a year away and the 190E Cosworth alphanumeric-soup-car is but a memory.
No, it’s not as bad as sticking with shoulder pads or skinny ties. It was good once, and the nature of Mercedes’ then-conservative styling is that it aged fairly well. But it also didn’t change, and it lost its edge in the intervening years.
By 1995, the E-class was Billy Joel – but not Piano Man. It was River of Dreams.
Remember River of Dreams? The song that sounded like it was born in an elevator?
And while we’re on the topic of urban transportation…
It’s a German Crown Victoria, and that’s OK
I visited Germany in my early 20s, and I was surprised to see these things were all over the place. At first I thought, “Wow, things sure are nice here if even the taxis are Mercedes.”
But I later realized that they’re not special just because they have that three-pointed star on the hood. A Teutonic German brand can still produce boring cars. They can make versions with diesels that amble for hundreds of thousands of kilometers, clattering from fare to fare.
The E-class has ample cargo space, sure. It has four round things that it uses to roll along. It has suspension. It has an automatic transmission (manuals were only available overseas). And, as mentioned, it can be remarkably durable. It can also be cut, stretched and refitted in a number of ways.
It’s been lauded as a great-driving car that’s well-engineered. It may be responsible for the brand’s reputation for making solid, reliable, conservative cars. A machine you can enjoy and count on.
That’s the enigmatic thing about being a lame car. It’s not necessarily bad – it might even be a masterpiece. It just might be the case that this particular master is so good at “understated” that its venn diagram with “dull” is almost perfectly circular.
The Mercedes-Benz E-class gets an 8 on the Lamestain Index.
[Vintage press photos courtesy Daimler-Benz AG]
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