Better is not necessarily better. I first noticed this with cars about fifteen years ago with a 1988 Mazda MX-6 test drive. Compared to other front-wheel-drive cars I’d driven, this then new Mazda was clearly possessed a superior chassis. For one thing, it didn’t feel nearly as inclined to swap ends when turning the wheel and tapping the brake at the same time. Altogether it felt more balanced, precise, and stable. What it didn’t necessarily feel was more fun. Ever since I’ve noted time and again that cars as they because faster, more composed, and more refined did not always become more fun. Too often they became less fun.

The redesigned for 2003 Mercedes E-Class is technically an amazing car. A number of technically innovative systems—most notably brake-by-wire—combine to make it unbeatable on paper. Yet in a test drive my father and I found it a difficult car to like. Somehow it lacked something possessed by a number of technically inferior competitors. A “soul,” if you will.

Mercedes-Benz E-Class Reliability

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Styling

The previous E-Class, introduced in 1996, brought a bit of whimsy to stolid Mercedes in the form of oval headlights. The rest of the car, however, maintained the upright, squarish shape of the previous E-Class. As a result, the front end did not really mesh with the rest of the car.

With the new car this is no longer a problem. The entire exterior form flows beautifully from front to rear. The sweeping roofline resembles that of the Lincoln LS. (To read my reviews of related vehicles, click on the blue hyperlinks.) With the Lincoln this is sleek design feature is let down by other elements of the design. Not here. This is a beautiful car.

The main negative with the exterior is common to fluid designs—the 2003 looks much smaller than the previous car, even though it is virtually the same size. In fact, to me the new E-Class looks not much larger than the Mercedes C-Class. The only other negative is that the beauty of this new design might be too subtle for some. Let them buy a BMW 7 or Lexus GS. Personally, I prefer a subtle design devoid of garish details.

Inside the story is much the same. The interior styling, much more fluid than Mercedes of yore, is very attractive. However, I have a couple of fairly serious issues here. The first is hard to describe. Something about the materials left me feeling that—at least with the light-colored interior—a certain luxurious quality was absent. I’m not suggesting that the materials seemed cheap. They did not. “Antiseptic” is the most fitting word I can think of. Think Honda. Mercedes could learn something from Lexus and Jaguar here.

My second fault I’ve noted in other recent Mercedes: the tachometer is much smaller than the speedometer. Perhaps because my own car has a manual, I’m used to checking the tach frequently, and tend to do so even when driving an automatic. Especially with cars like this Mercedes where the automatic has a manual shift feature. In both the C-Class and the E-Class I found the tach difficult to use because of its small size and peripheral location. This is basic stuff that even Hyundai gets right. So what’s up with Mercedes?

Accommodations

Mercedes does tend to get the driving position right. In the E-Class as in other Mercedes sedans the driving position is higher relative to the dash than in a BMW 5-Series, Audi A6, or Jaguar S-Type. I like this for the visibility it provides. The E500 I drove had the standard front seats. They were good, but not great, in terms of comfort and support. Seat options include “multi-contour” seats and “drive-dynamic” seats. With the latter, the lateral bolsters on the outside firm up automatically in turns. Great concept, but I was not able to check how well this works in practice. Could be good for aggressive drivers, or, if the adjustment is obvious, it could feel strange.

Rear seat passengers fare less well. To maintain headroom with the sleek roofline, the rear seat is positioned close to the floor. This tends to lead to inadequate thigh support. To compensate, the cushion rises dramatically to a prominent leading edge, like a ski jump. So thigh support is fair. Not so good is knee room, which felt more compact than mid-sized. A shortage of toe room under the front seats does not help. I sat in a C-Class for comparison, and found it a bit more cramped, but the difference is not as large as it should be. I also sat in the rear of an S-Class, and found it far roomier. The E-Class needs to be mid-way between these two cars in rear seat room. As it is, there is a huge gap between the E and the S. I guess this is filled by the regular wheelbase S-Class in Europe, but we no longer get that car here.

Trunk room is somewhat better than the average for this class. In the previous E-Class the rear seat did not fold for more cargo room. In the new car, not only is this an optional feature, but with the E320 a folding front passenger seat is also included in the $600 option. Good to have.

Availability with the E500 is unclear. The folding front seat is definitely not available with the optional front seats. However, I do not see even the folding rear seat listed as an option for the E500 anywhere on the Internet. On the car I drove, a folding rear seat (but not the folding front seat) was included as a $100 "special introductory price" option. Is this option no longer available on the E500? A shame if this is so.

On the road

The new E-Class is the most technologically advanced car in this class. All models come standard with electro-hydraulic brakes. In normal operation the brake pedal does not directly operate the brakes. Instead it sends a signal to a computer which then operates the brakes. According to Mercedes, which first offered such a system on the new SL, this permits faster reaction times. In case it fails, there is a conventional hydraulic system to serve as a back-up.

Available on the E320 and standard on the E500 is a semi-active air-sprung suspension. In auto this suspension automatically adjusts among four levels of firmness. Two sport modes are selectable, one in which the system firms up more readily and another where it stays firm all the time. Unlike many other such systems, the difference in firmness between levels is readily perceptible. In always firm mode, you’ll feel every road imperfection.

There are other innovative systems, such as the optional “Distronic” cruise control that automatically maintains a safe distance from the car ahead of you, but these are the most notable for performance. While I am fascinated by such innovations, what I really care about is what the car feels like to drive. How does the new E fare?

With the 302 horsepower V8 in the E500, this is a very quick car. The SOHC three-valve engine doesn’t sound as nice as the Lexus and BMW DOHC four-valve V8s, but it performs about as well. The five-speed automatic shifts smoothly. It can be manually shifted by moving the shifter laterally in D. I find this as easy to use as the more typically fore-aft systems, but must admit that I don’t use any of them much in test drives and never find them as fun as a conventional manual.

Even without the 20mm wider tires that come with the sport package, the E500 sticks well in turns. The standard tires are 225mm wide, so they’re hardly narrow, and they are “performance” tires. I found the E500 very easy to drive quickly along a curvy road. With stability control off, the chassis remained very stable and controllable, unlike that of the Infiniti M45 I drove the same day. If there is one weak spot with the standard set-up it is that the Continental tires like to raise an aural alarm when they start to slip. The salesman along for the ride did not appreciate this. Even if he hadn’t gotten a bit prickly, I personally prefer tires that wait a bit longer before squealing.

The sport package includes no changes to the suspension, just wider tires and various cosmetic enhancements.

The ride is very composed and never rough but somehow lacks the fluid, luxury “feel” I expect in this class of car. A BMW 540 rides better and feels more luxurious, even though it lacks the electronic wizardry of the new E.

I found the brake pedal pleasingly firm. Magazine reviews have complained about the non-linear feel of the brakes. I found little objectionable with them. Perhaps I was too preoccupied with the basic feel of the car.

When the salesman began to complain about what I was doing to “his” tires I had driven the car enough to evaluate it, and asked my father if he was interested in driving it again. Although he was potentially in the market for a new premium sedan, he replied that he had no interest. So I drove the car straight back to the dealership. Afterwards, I asked why he had not been interested in driving the car more. His response matched my own feeling, that the new E500 simply didn’t feel “special.” Unlike the Jaguar S-Type R we had driven earlier that day, in many ways an inferior car, it lacked character. It felt too vanilla. No doubt the new E performs exceptionally well by any objective measure. But, between the interior atmosphere and the somehow distant nature of the powertrain and chassis, it lacked charisma.

Pricing

For quick, up-to-date pricing, and especially user-specified price comparisons, check out the website I created: www.truedelta.com. Why yet another vehicle pricing website? Well, I personally lacked the patience to keep using the others. They were too slow and required too much effort, especially when trying to compare prices. So I taught myself some programming and created a site where there is no need to dig through option packages, prerequisites, and the like one by one -- the TrueDelta algorithm figures these out for you in one swift pass.

The following is from when the review was originally written:

The E500’s base price with a $1,000 gas guzzler tax is $56,570. The car I drove, with just a few options, stickered just over $60,000. Check off many boxes, and you’ll be well into the 60s, even close to 70. Compared to the competition, the E500 ranges from a bit more expensive (540i) to much more expensive (Infiniti M45, Audi A6 4.2). No competitor is costlier. So anyone buying this car is going to have to think it’s better than anything else. Me, I’d save a few thousand and get something with more character, such as the BMW 540i or Lexus GS 430. Maybe even a Jaguar S-Type, as interior as it is in terms of engineering.

Last words

Yes, I did just accuse the E500 of having less character than a Lexus. It’s a beautiful car in and out, very well engineered, yet somehow distant in both interior ambiance and driving feel. A different interior color than the gray of the car I drove might help the ambiance. As for the driving feel, this isn’t the first time I’ve found myself questioning the value of new chassis technologies. Steering-by-wire is coming. I dread the day.

To learn more about my reliability research and sign up to participate in it, or to perform thorough up-to-date new car price comparisons, visit www.truedelta.com. A link to this website and alphabetized links to my other vehicle reviews can be found on my profile page.

My reviews of related vehicles:
BMW 5-Series
Cadillac STS
Lincoln LS
Saab 9-5
Volvo S80
Amount Paid (US$): 60000