What is it?
It’s come a long way, the A-Class. All the way from the 1990s car and its infamous elk-avoidance issues to this: the all-new Mk4, which looks to be so posh that it’s virtually a shrunken CLS.
A haughty hatch, perhaps - but in a good way.
From launch, the A-Class is automatic-only and is offered as an A180d, or as A200 and A250 petrol models, with manual gearboxes and more powerful diesels and petrols due to flesh out the range by 2019.
As has already been discussed in our international drive of the A180d, the A-Class gets torsion beam rear suspension on everything up to and including the A200. The A250 we’re testing here gets multi-link rear suspension as standard.
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Jaguar need to produce a rival to show Merc how to do it
With Mercedes' resources this new A Class should have been class leader and by a huge margin too. But it isn't, it's merely average, albeit much better than the previous one which was simply a lemon. It just goes to show that Mercedes still doesn't have the engineering, design and technical prowess to deliver world beaters. If Jaguar made a car for this class, it'd go straight to the top of the tree, even though Jaguar is tiny in comparison. I bet when the new Focus is tested it'll trample all over this new A Class.
Roadster wrote:
C class is merely average compared to what? In it’s class, the newer A4 is usually thought of as been better, but it’s very close competition with the 3 series and XE. I agree Jag should could and should produce a smaller car to get people into the brand at a lower price point. I doubt the Focus will trample over this A class. It does seem like the best one Merc has produced.
Is this premium?
Just looks gaudy and horrible to me. And noone yet appears to have mastered in car touch screen UI to match what we'd expect from a decent Android or Apple phone.
However, I am getting old, so I guess this is not for me...
But where's the car for all the latte swilling tech entrepreneurs? Although I guess they dont drive. Theres no hipster car though. Gap in market surely? (Probably used to be Saab/Citroen)
The digital instruments
Honestly, that digital instrument pack looks like a painted on cardboard cut-out that looks like its just been stuck on the dash. So, not sure I'd say 'it looks great'!