stale-bread

+1

Tjdehya

Get it while you can... 2014 is the last year of production.

Arrie

550 it needs to be and take good care of it as you will want buy it at the and of the lease...

marvinlee

We have a 2014 E550 on order with the air suspension. My real want was a luxury tuned air suspension for our potholed rural roads, but it is not available. Nor is the luxury steel spring suspension available for the E550. So...sport air suspension it is, with the stock 18" wheels. Odd that all V8 buyers are deemed sporty drivers. For us a V8 is simply a nice, smooth, power plant that has come in millions of U.S. make cars with comfortable suspensions. If the sports suspension is too harsh for our preferences, I will swap the 18" wheel/tires for 17. The outside diameter is said to be the same.

Tjdehya

The Airmatic suspension is the same for Luxury and Sport. Its not a "Sport Air suspension" its just the air suspension on a vehicle with the Sport body.

You will not be able to put 17" wheels on an E550 because the brakes are too big. I Don't know if that has changed for 2014 but for 2012 and 2013 17" wheels no longer fit the E550 sedan because the inside diameter of the wheel is too small for the larger brakes.

edspider

Exactly. I had the 2006. When I shopped on 2008 MB went all sporty on me. Hated it. I found the 5 series softer and bought a 2008 and 2011.

I drove the 2014 luxury and ordered one. It reminded me of the 2006 E I loved and missed.

marvinlee

Thank you. You are most likely correct and I am pleased to learn that the Luxury and Sport air suspension are the same.

D&G

I totally disagree. The airmatic in sport mode runs very smooth. In my taste not stiff enough for me probably because this is a pure luxury car. If you have a chance to go airmatic go for it.

yxc145

Porsche 991 Carrera S is not smooth at all. It is a awesome car that handles like a super sports car like it should. But it is not smooth at all going over bumps and stuff. And I had the car on the COMFORT mode all the time.

yxc145

By the way, AIRMATIC is only available on E550. It is not an option with E350

BackRoad

I have the sport suspension on my E350 and it's great on relatively smooth roads but annoying as hell on the rough stuff. I called MB and on my car the only difference between the luxury and sport suspensions are the springs. The cabriolet uses 18" wheels on both variants. The springs on the sport are 12% shorter and perhaps a progressive coil. The difference in height is only about a half inch. If this continues to be annoying I'm wondering if I could just swap the sport springs for the luxury ones.

marvinlee

I ordered the Airmatic suspension on a 2014 E550 4Matic. The suspension provides a smooth ride on good roads, acceptable on poor roads, and lacks sufficient vertical travel capability on large, but not extreme, bumps. With the latter, the suspension bottoms out. I am satisfied overall, but think that the strut type front suspension is mediocre for this class of car. When the tires reach their end of life, I will install tires with higher aspect ratio. Doing so on another car materially improved the ride while reducing road noise. Road noise suppression is not one of the E-550's strong points.

BackRoad

What aspect ratio can you go to on the E550? My car has an 18" wheel with 40 aspect ratio. I was thinking I could stretch this to a 45.

marvinlee

I'm not sure how high one can go on higher tire aspect ratios for this car. I plan to go to a 50 aspect ratio, which is, relative to the factory 245/40-18 tire, 24.5 mm taller overall, or just a bit less than a half-inch closer to the wheelwell sheetmetal on the car.

BackRoad

Let us know how the 50 works out when you do this.

alsyli

BMW had been doing wonders w/ a front strut suspension until just recently.... But apparently MB agrees, b/c I remember reading somewhere that the W205 (and presumably the next-gen E-class) are moving back to control arms for the front suspension....

DerekACS

Have you read Car & Driver, Nov.2013, comparison between 535iX, MB E350, Caddy CTS and Audi A6 ? The 535iX was seriously critiqued for having the worst steering, ride and handling of the four cars !!

alsyli

And you read my post where I said "until recently," yes?

BMW doesn't use a front strut suspension on any of its current sedans, including the 535ix. It's actually listed in the specifications chart of the comparo you cite. This is also the comparo where they stated that the MB was the "most satisfying" to drive and yet ranked it 3rd. ::shrug:: Not sure what that says about C&D comparison tests....

Oddly enough, they list the E350 has having a multilink front suspension, which I'm pretty sure is incorrect (esp sine their car-buying guide lists the front suspension as being a strut type).

Arrie

Would be interesting to see the difference in the lower control arm design between the cars when they made it well and the cars that made BMW to go back to the multi link. Something here does not make sense...

DerekACS

Yes, I read the words "until recently".

C & D is correct in describing both front and rear suspensions as independent multi-link. This is confirmed by the Technical Specs published by MB Canada for MY2014 E Class. Maybe this is why the E Class rides better than the 535iX ?

C & D described the 5 Series "as large and ponderous….and the slowest-in-test slalom performance reveals its ultimate messy transitional performance. It feels heavy footed and clomps loudly over broken pavement."

Sure doesn't sound like "the ultimate driving machine" to me !

alsyli

I'm not super familiar w/ the MB Canada website (I live in the US), but I see nothing on the website regarding the type of suspension the E-class has.

In the chart from a Motor Trend article comparing the 2010 E to the 2011 5-series, the E is listed as having a strut-type front suspension.

http://www.motortrend.com/roadtests/...on/review.html

ddeliber

I just (last week) test drove both a 535 xdrive and a new e350 back to back. This was for a friend whom no one would consider an enthusiast. However, she is a die hard BMW fanatic. She is going to replace her X5 and I am helping her learn about the cars and doing some negotiating for her. For the past month she has been all about the BMWs and wouldn't even get in a Merc although we did drive a couple Evoques, Caddies and every BMW SUV along with a 3 and a 5 sedan.

So, last week we drive the 535 xdrive and she likes it and says things like: "I like it", "it is pretty smooth", "it really is powerful" and "I like the interior it is really nice". At this point she is ready to buy one.

Then on the way home I stop at the Mercedes dealer because I wanted to see a CLA up close. While I am in it, I ask her to go sit in the car right next to it (an e350 sport). After I am done fiddling with the CLA I get out and look over, and there she is, mouth open, star struck with her eyes ablaze saying things like "Oh my God" and "it is absolutely beautiful".

Of course we drive it and she is sold in 5 minutes.

Sorry about the long winded background, but now, regarding the suspension as this is the first time I have driven a post 2011 e class. I have both heard of and felt personally the roughness of the older w212 sports, which is why I bought myself a luxury instead. I just don't feel the sports are very good with virtually any imperfections in the road. This is absolutely not the case with the 2014, it is as smooth as butter. Like water skiing on glass. Totally refined in every way, and when pushed it just ate the road up. Infinitely better than the 2010/2011s. I don't know what they changed, but whatever it is, it worked! A few have said that they still think they are too rough on bumps and too much body roll, but I really disagree here. I feel it just rolled on without blinking, better than my luxury in smoothness, and significantly better at the limits. Something is different, and it is magnificent IMO.

We spent countless hours critiquing numerous cars and in 5 minutes this self admitting BMW snob was converted. We have an appointment at 10:00 today to buy one for her (I want one too but that is a different story).

Regarding the C&D article, in defense of the 535, for some reason they tested the vanilla xdrive, no m-sport, no DHP. Everyone knows that the F10s are significantly different (softened) from previous versions and in order to appreciate what the car can do, the simple xdrive is not the version to test. I can appreciate there being hundreds of magazines and head to head comps out there, but for the big ones like C & D or Motor Trend (or whatever), they really should be getting the right options. Hell, I believe the CTS they tested had the magnetic suspension that Ferrari is using.

ocdbroker

Suspension choice is highly subjective. For me, since my other ride has rather harsh sport suspension, I appreciate the luxury suspension on my new wagon. I must be getting really old as I've always shunned non-sport packages in the past. The difference is quite noticeable between luxury and sport and I'm not certain how much the larger wheels on the sport make.

(I also prefer the luxury look versus the lower sport.)

mcbc220

I can't find any luxuries in my area to test drive. I have some experience driving my dad's 2005 W211, which I feel is too floaty and detached from the road. Not quite Buick-like, but definitely sedate. Does the W212 Luxury drive more like the W111, or more like--this is my other E class point of reference--a W124? The W124 was a great luxury cruiser, but it didn't feel detached from the road or in athletic.