Iceman's C230

Is there a reason why MB made this car to hit 60mph in 3rd gear instead of 2nd? Most car's are 1st and 2nd..Bang.. your at 60. If your racing some one from one light to another, your dead in water because this car stars to open it's legs at after 70 mph.. I find 1st and 2nd gears on this car very slow, it is not very responsive enough. Do you guy's feel the same way about the gearing on this car?? Now no flaming.. This is just my opinion.. I mean if the car made around 260Hp then i would understand but with around 190Hp 3rd gear = poor 0-60 times. But i still love my car..

vadim

I agree here... Feels like the coupe doesn't want to move... I liked my bimmer's 5-speed much better, despite its less powerful engine.

These short gears would make more sense in a Honda-2000/VTEC-type car, where you can rev it into 9,000rpm range, or with a low-rev hi-torque engine (such as Volvo 2.4T low pressure turbo which reaches its peak torque at 1800 rpm and stays there until 5200 - that will let you utilize the sweet 2000-3000 rpm range very nicely).

That said, 0-60 is not something I would be much concerned about, it's just the weird feeling I'd never had with my previous manual cars - shifting gets very busy with this 6-speed tranny...

But then again - the coupe isn't a drag racer, it's a high-speed cruiser built for the autobahn, and it sure excels as such.

Mike T.

In an effort to achieve lower 0-60 MPH times, many carmakers (not M-B) adapt their gear ratios to ensure that 60 MPH and/or 100 km/h is reached in second gear. But this makes the gearbox poorly adapted to fast driving at low speeds - for example, on hairpin alpine passes, the car with the taller 2nd gear (and the better 0-60 time) would bog down easily. The same would also be true on autocross (slalom) courses or rallies. So the question is: do you want a nice number in a book, or a gearbox that is better adapted to the characteristics of the engine, for real-world use?

I'd choose the latter. Even with its reasonable second gear ratio, the C 230 K is a very quick car, at something like 7.5 seconds or less for 0-60. Surely that's enough...

I will say though that the first gear ratio does seem to be a bit of a stump-puller - maybe it was designed to let Mercedes taxis in Germany chug along at 1000 rpm in an Autobahn "Stau" withough stalling In any case, it's good for restarts on steep hills and for pulling trailers in the mountains!

silentrage

hey ice what dearler did you buy your ride from? i'm bought mine from lone star....i've been told not to goto hyatt. have you had any problems with your car yet? just wondering because there are so many posts with bad things happening to their cars. just wondering....

renncpe

I agree the Coupe does not give you the strong pull feeling in 1 and 2, but by the clock it's getting the job done. I not sure why that is. I can tell you that you will do better than you think light to light or in a 1/8 mile. ESP robs you of 0-60 time. I've cut my 0-60 to 6.49 it's not stock , on the track I can hold my own with the new Acura RSX-s and on the highway I can own them. 3

Randy

Iceman's C230

I also got my car from Lone star. Very good service and awsome people. I have had no problems yet other than a cracked fog lamp. It just cracked in half but they are(lone star) going to look at it no biggie. Love the car but wish it had more Punch 1st and 2nd gear..

TimmyC230boy

With the other car makers its mostly a marketing thing. I had the coupe up to 130ish last night racing a new RSX. He pulled first gear i pulled second and I left him in third, and it pulled hard all the way up to the speed limiter. I gotta find a way to get that out. I hit 130 in 4th. At least i think it was 4th. But I think it mostly has to do with the manual with the gears going out too soon . I am at about 57 or 58 when 2nd goes out. My Z28 Camaro had a 2.73 rear end and would hit 60 in first gear. That was really nicce stoplight to stoplight racing. It would do 90 on the highway and only turn 2000 rpm's. Great gas milage, but as soon as I get a pulley and maybe a chip it will make a huge difference.

gab

timmy was it a rsx or rsx-s that you raced?

TimmyC230boy

RSX-S.

Yellow_Fly_Red

Hi Guys....

I also purchased my Car from Lonestar. My salesperson is Gary Trudell (he's been promoted to 'sales manager' now).

Silentrage, who was it that told you NOT to buy cars from Hyatt??

The reason that I am asking is that when one of friend's Mom learned that I got my car from Lonestar. She said that I should've got the car from Hyatt instead because their Service dept is much better than Lonestars. She says this from their previous experiences by purschasing cars from both dealerships. Their first car was purchased from Lonestar and 2nd car from Hyatt.

I will still take my car to Lonestar for servicing but if they give me problems, then I will try getting my car serviced at Hyatt.

I'm still MAD that I didn't even get a Key Chain for buying the car. I paid FULL MRSP price for the car with zero discounts and paid FULL price for all the options.

I ordered my car on May 20, 2001 with a $1000.00 deposit and my car arrive on December 9, 2001.

So far.. no probs with my car.... except that I think the auto dimming driver side mirror stopped working. Its not a big deal since all my previous cars did not have auto dimming mirrors but I want everything to work as perfectly as possible.

I will be servicing my car at the end of this month for the 1st Oil Change.. and I will post if I encoutered any problems with the service dept.

Yellow_Fly_Red

OH yeah...
I think 1st and 2nd Gear feels SLOW too......
wonder if the Kleeman Pulley will help with that..??

TimmyC230boy

I would think it would. 25 more lb/ft of torque all the way accross the rpm range and 20 more hp would difinatly help it out. I would like to see the Klemann pulley and upsolute chip dyno. It would be nice. Even though the car is made for top-end speed versus low-end acceleration, a little more gear would be nice. I dont 60 in second would be such a bad idea.

Iceman's C230

Hey yellow fly.. You didn't even get a key chain?? I got a nice key chain worth $25 also a leather Benz wallet worth $60 and a wine temp. reader worth $75 (It is really cool gadget) also my wife got a key chain and some other stuff.. So far my car has 600km on it without any problems (knock on wood). She is very smooth maybe thats why i can't feel i am going fast in 1st and 2nd gears on this car..

SoCal240/6

I agree with what some of you have said. With my 240/6, I would actually prefer a 5 speed. 1, 2 and 3 are a little too close for everyday driving. 1st esp. is too much of a stump puller.

While those very close gears may give the best acceleration if you are flooring it and speed shifting, it actually makes the car slower in every day driving, because the advantage of the lower gears is outweighed by the time it takes to shift an extra gear in normal driving.

I'd make the current 6th gear 5th gear and spread 1-5 out among 1-4 instead.

I don't know what the fascination is with 6 speeds, I actually think its overrated and for most street cars, 5 speeds is the optimum number.

silentrage

nice to meet some calgarians in here....yellow, you didn't get any free stuff huh? i bought my car from chirstine oneil (sweet lady), i paid full msrp except she kicked in the cd changer for free. well i hope i get some free key chains and stuff but more importantly the service and reliability of the car.

have any of you done any mods to your car? if you guys need anything i'll give you my hookups guys for car parts. i'm thinkin of sellin my evo wheels but unsure as to how much to ask for (in US$). any ideas?

well i don't get my car till june but hopefully i'll run into you guys at eu claire or something....race city maybe ?

silentrage

do they always give stuff like that or did you know the ppl well?

vadim

Not to sound rude, but do Calgarians always hijack others' threads?

CME4BENZ

Yes, Vadim it looks like the Canadiens have taken over.

Take cover south of the border!

Iceman's C230

I don't know about other dealers but at Lone Star they were really nice. I didn't had to ask them for all this stuff. They just gave it to me with the car...

P.S Beware Of Canadians.. They are taking over MBworld..

kingyellowsnake

Holy smokes, yellow_fly_red, no wonder you roll into work tired. Check out the time on your last post.