The 430i is only putting out 248 HP/258 lb/ft torque and 0-60 in 5.8 seconds.

 

Yeah not impressive on paper. Is the C? I have no idea what that engine does either. It feels reasonably peppy. I think the tranny is the difference maker, and a more aggressive exhaust sound. The C sounds higher pitched and more raspy than the 4. Does BMW pump fake engine sounds through the audio in the 4? I know they do in the M's.

 

Mike, you're sowing the seeds of doubt in me as well man! But credit to you for calling it like you feel it.

I just leased a C300 coupe... made in Bremen. I picked up a loaner C-300 Sedan for 3 days and the instant i drove out in it i felt that it was a bit 'floaty'. More comfortable than my coupe but not confidence inspiring in handling like you mentioned. In comparison my coupe feel like it's on rails, much lower down etc. etc.

Like you I also never considered BMW, although i kinda liked the 4 series but my wife and kids would not let me consider that or Audi once they saw the C300 Coupe.

Yes the 4-Series looks good, has better proportions than both the 3 and the 5 series and arguably might have better drivability, but the 300 Coupe looks mint! It doesn't look like every other car (like the new BMW and Audi do). I love the lines, the wide shoulders / hips, the lights and to me the diamond grill. Super elegant and sporty! I enjoy my 300, but I will try to drive a 4-series if i get the chance.

If I could afford it, i'd get the C43, but i find it hard to keep the C300 on speed limit, i wonder what the C43 might make me do!

 

C300 has a 241 HP/273 lb/ft torque and puts out the same 0-60.

 

I've heard nothing but good things about the coupe. I should probably drive one before I jump over to another brand. Still there's no getting around the audio issues, which is a priority for me.

From some angles the coupe looks really good to me, but there's something about the rear quarters and tail that seems forced. Like they had to resolve the character lines emanating from the nose somehow but still stay true to their new look. It's discordant and very soft. I feel the same about the E and S coupes. The 'vert soft top makes the car look very feminine so that's probably off the table.

I need to do that sound level check in the 430. It feels S Class quiet to me but I haven't been in an S for a few years. The C sedan is fairly quiet around town but no fun on the highway. Lots of wind and road noise, and the ride gets a little squirrelly north of 70. Too loose. Normally I'd enthusiastically pick my car for a long road trip but I wasn't looking forward to it in the C at all.

I'm going to hop in it the minute we get back to see how much of my BMW lust is just the novelty factor, and I'm going to change the wheel and tire set up to see where that gets me. I'm still going to hate the 7 speed though.

 

So if anything the C should pull better. It's the fricking 7 speed that's the difference maker in performance. I'm still pretty sure the 430 has a superior suspension and steering set up, and it's quieter at highway speeds, but I need to take sound readings to be sure.

 

2018 C Class will be on lots by September with 9G standard. I think it would be worth a test drive to see how it compares to the 7G in yours.

C300 definitely doesn't pull harder and I've only driven the T4 BMW was putting in the 328 (2014) before this new T4 (2016-up) that you're currently driving.

 

What are you going to do with your wheels and tires? I feel like 18" wheels and PSS are the ideal set up.

 

Mike, if I may ask, why did you switch down from the S Class all the way to the C? Why not the E class? Was it because the C was available in the new shape?

By all means the C is entry level. I'm happy because it's my first german car, not just my first Mercedes.

I just checked out the 2018 E-Coupe yesterday. Only available as E-400 4-matic here in Canada, it's also available in rear-wheel drive in the US. From about 30 feet away i couldn't tell it apart from the S-Coupe and this thing is significantly less expensive. Gorgeous interior... panoramic screen and more space in the back than my C. Also the proportions are the same as the S-Coupe! I was blown away by it's elegance! the V6 is roughly 340HP or so and 0-60 in 5.2 with the 4-matic!

 

The coupe feels like an actual Mercedes. There's more steel and less aluminium; the doors are heavier; you feel isolated from the road in that Mercedes way when you're inside. It doesn't feel particularly fast with the 7-speed; I wouldn't be surprised if the BMW feels faster, even if it's making less torque. The ride is better damped on the coupe than the sedan, for sure, but I still felt road impacts surprisingly strongly, for a Benz. Probably a run-flats issue. Overall, the coupe feels very nice and relaxing but a little sterile to me.

If the BMW has a little more feel, a little more soul, to its driving experience (suspension, steering, engagement) without beating you up (I had a ride in a colleague's 2 series coupe with the sport suspension, and it was plain old harsh), I think it'd be a great choice. I'm actually going to go check one out on the strength of your review.

A couple notes - you CAN get H/K on a 428i/430i; it's a $875 standalone option (versus standard on the 6 cyl.). Also, are you sure you had the fake leather? Supposedly the fake leather makes people sweat because it doesn't have an air holes in it like MBTex does.

 

I really disliked the prior gen E, and the replacement was still several months away. I had a C as a loaner and liked it, and the new S was too much money. I thought if I took a C300 and maxed out the option list I'd have a nice little German sedan to toss around for a few years.

I do like the E 400 coupe, mainly because it's not the T4, and overall it's a well proportioned Coupe. But to option one out the way I'd want it (including Burmester 3D) it's pushing $90k. Close to S Class (or 640i) territory.

 

First I need to get back in the C and get it on the highway to figure out why it doesn't track as well or feel as stable as the BMW. I'm on aftermarket rims (8.5/9.5) but with the OEM tire sizes, so there's some stretch. Plus the MPSS are getting near replacement time. And I run them at about 4 psi low to improve the ride on surface streets. So it's not fair to the Benz to vary the OEM set up to the extent I have and compare it to the bone stock 430.

 

I looked for the audio upgrade option on the configurator for the 430, but I'll take another shot at it. My 430 may have Dakota leather but it's not perforated and it's awfully stiff. I think it's Sensatek.

 

Hi Mike, been a while..
Similar but different.. after a few drinks one evening with friends round the boys were looking at carsales.com and somehow I ended up buying a Peugeot 206 GTI.. 3 door euro hatch back nippy old school heap.. It was meant to be a little fun project as the Merc had run out of things to change without enormous cost etc..
2 months later its been torn down, everything serviced, trans off rear main seal, clutch, short shift, cam belt, and aux belt all tensioners, suspension lowered and rebuilt, brakes stripped rebuilt and painted, interior stripped and rebuilt with dyna-mat and sound proofing all round, detailed to within an inch of its life, paint work 3 stage corrected and coated, got its roadworthiness an I have been using to commute for a laugh for 2 weeks....

I had purposely not used the Merc for a week at all.. and on the weekend when I jumped into it, it felt like an enormous sumptuous sun lounger with zero harness and as if it were driving itself... Now that made me realise how cars have moved on..



Oh and the Pug bought and fixed up all in cost the same as a replacement set of Conti's for the C Class...

 

Mike, on the BMW configurator go to the Options tab at the top just before the Summary tab. On that page if you scroll down to Entertainment you'll see Harmon Kardon upgrade $875 and Carplay for $300.

 

Ok, here's the wrap. The 430 on the interstate at 80 mph had an ambient interior noise level of 75db. The C is at 80db. 75db is reasonably quiet. 80db is a good bit louder, which is one of the reasons it's so easy to overspeed in the BMW; there are no audible cues as you go from 60 to 90 to 100.

The 8 speed tranny is well matched to the T4 and with the taller top gear the drive train in general is more quiet and relaxed at highway speeds than the C. (The engine itself seems smoother as well)

The steering weight on.the 430 splits the difference between the C's Comfort and Sport which gives the impression the car is riding heavier than it is but still has a light touch.

To approximate the 430's feel in the C, I raised the tire pressures on the 18" MPSS back to 35 psi (they were at 30), and set the AirMatic to Sport (about a 1" drop). I put the steering in Sport as well. To try to get more smoothness in the drive train, I experimented with the different modes as well as the level of extra boost from the Dinan module. The "happiest" combo appears to be Comfort and 4 psi of added boost. Still not as smooth as the BMW but much closer. (I have the MidCity module that puts the car into Individual mode at start up.

With the new set up, interstate speeds feel very similar to the BMW aside from the noise. Nothing I can do about that. I think part of my problem with the C was that I lacked a benchmark to set it up. My natural frame of reference was an S Class, so subconsciously I was trying to get to that cloud-like ride. Obviously the C is not an S so once I had a chance to drive another example of a small German car that I liked I recalibrated my thinking and played to the C's strengths instead.

Overall I think I'd like to move to a 430 vert when my lease is up, but in the meantime the rental gave me a target to shoot for in the C, and it's significantly improved now.

 

Guys I like hearing what sounds like an improvement in the BMWs quality control. I would just caution all of you who have not had a bimmer longer term, the interiors will generally start to rattle quite a bit in the 3/4 lineup. My last F30 before my current C450 became a rattle box past the 20,000 mile mark. Rattle patrol was an almost weekly occurrence to the point where I actually had electrical tape wrapped on each door lock pin to cut down on them rattling against the trim rings and felt tape between all the seems of the dash and center console. I had felt tape on the contact points of the center console lid and foam tape on the contact points under the iDrive "panel" where is snapped in.

Again, not trying to discourage any of you looking at BMW as an option. I personally like changing it up between brands and will definitely look at BMW again in the future (probably a 5 next time), just check out their forums and look at what people are saying before you take the leap.

I am more than happy to answer anyone's questions about my last Bimmer if you have any. It was a 2014 335 xDrive.

 

Yikes! Good to know. The rental was a brand new 2018 with maybe 1k miles on it, and we put another 2400 on as well. My C started rattling at around 3k and has gotten progressively worse. I have felt tape crammed all over the place. It seems like I get at most a couple of weeks out of a fix before new rattles show up.

 

Hey Mike - It surely sounds like the car is solid and it is very realistic to expect that they have improved QC in the last 4 years. I just think 3400 miles might be a hair too soon for anything to have "shaken loose" just yet.

I sincerely hope they've sorted it all out.

Now what I will say, and this may have changed, is that when the 4's first arrived, the US market cars were still assembled in Germany while the US market 3's were manufactured in the Rosslyn South Africa plant.

May be something to that.

 

Yeah same with the Alabama built C sedans vs the German built coupes. Guys who've driven both say they feel and drive like completely different cars, with the most common description of the coupe being "solid".

 

27K miles and no squeaks or rattles.

 

Apparently mine got built on a Friday close to quitting time.

 

Gotta jump in for a little bit. Gave up my 2002 325 (bought new) for a 2013 ATS as it was my belief that the ATS was the newest incarnation of the pre-2007 325. Although the ATS's 2T engine and tranny don't quite compare to that of the 325, its handling characteristics are spot on. I bought this car to be my new (and better) BMW 3, and I wasn't wrong.

My 2006 (bought new) Z4 was given up for a 2017 C300 coupe. Again, I feel that I made the right move. Had my BMW drive in the ATS, and now in addition I have a very solid, extremely good-looking-inside and out, quiet, luxury car that drives sporty enough for me. Don't know how to adequately describe it, but I find driving the coupe to be a "fine, heady experience." Only complaint is that the Burmeister system stinks!

 

Honestly the ATS-V is high on my list.

 

Yup!
Can't be a coincidence! (I guess it could be a coincidence, but unlikely)