Drove down to Naples, Fl from DC earlier this week by myself in my 212, non-stop (other than fuel). Left DC at 7:00, pulled into the driveway in Naples at 11:30pm. I-95 the entire way to Daytona Beach then made the cutover to the western side via I-4 to Tampa and down I-75 to Naples.

Man, what a fantastic road machine these cars are. I averaged 70mph and 28.6 MPG. Absolute comfort, rock steady at some pretty high speeds (saw 90+ several times), true joy to drive. I arrived feeling perfectly fine.

Going to head back in two legs next week up through Birmingham to see some friends and then the scenic route through the Appalachians. Looking forward to it!

It just amazes me how well this car uses its torque. How you can gently roll on the gas pedal and the thing will just take off from 60 to whatever without ever leaving 7th gear. I could swear the thing has a little turbo under the hood to make it do that so effortlessly. On this trip, with the new plugs and cleaned MAF sensor, it really purrs along with absolute authority and road presence. The faster you go, it just sets down onto the pavement and cruises like no other. Had many a BMW, Audi and other MB’s form a traffic train with me and we just flew down the road. Love this car!

 

And it looks good too

 

Yes, indeed, the W212 is in it's element on long Interstate Highway trips.

I made a similar trek in Oct, 2018, some 1300 miles to N. Carolina and 1300 miles return to Dallas area. https://mbworld.org/forums/e-class-w...lina-back.html

My travel buddy and I alternated the driving when we got tired. On journey's end, he mentioned how effortless the car was to drive, hour after hour. Some complain about seat comfort in these cars on long trips, but I have found the W212 MB-Tex seats to be a dream on long hauls...

As I now think more about it, I covered more miles one-way on that trip (driving home in a single day) than I have driven all year during this Pandemic. I started 2020 on 27,032 miles, and currently have 28, 365. WOW!

 

I saw only a couple of other 212’s in general on my trip, each of them looking excellent and they both tracked along with me for a while so we could both check out what they look like on the outside cruising down the road. I agree, they look just stellar!! MB really nailed it with the design and beauty factor.

i bought my wife a new 2020 GLS this year for her 41st B’day. I spent a lot of time in the dealership around all sorts of gorgeous new MB’s. I drooled over them all. But I also came away with the feeling that ours is the last of the breed of the heavy thick steel, heavy door, throwback to the old school MB cars. While all the new ones are superb and I would love to have any of them, it also made me appreciate mine that much more. I really do think it’s meant for a place in the “classics” category of Mercedes Benz someday. I have a neighbor who has an old SL, like 60’s old that has been featured in the MB magazine before. Prestige, garage queen, just flawless. He recently purchased a 2016 E350 sedan as well, said it is one of his favorite MB’s he has ever owned. It’s just a marvel of engineering, handles because of suspension linkage and not computer assistance, etc. I agree!

Ever since I figured out how to mess with the seat cushion to tweak it for comfort, it has been the most comfortable car I’ve ever owned, and this last road trip proved it to me. Mine will be me for many many years, and I don’t care if it costs me a few grand every other year or so to keep it up and perfect. I’m thinking when I get home, I might have the drive shaft flex discs and shaft bearing replaced as a preventive, and I’m definitely going to be ditching these OE drilled rotors for the aftermarket options. They are too noisy and warp too quickly. Next year I think I’ll have the AMG rims professionally cleaned up and maybe refinished back to new. I’d like it to stay OE as much as possible, with the exception of the brake rotors and pads.

its the first car I’ve ever had where I really don’t see the day of ever needing to replace it any time soon, like 10 years or more. I see several 2005 era’s around my area where the owners have taken good care of them, and they just look amazing as well with no end in site. This is why I was willing to buy the GLS which was about $40k more than what we were initially thinking for her replacement car. We looked at everything, and ultimately came to the decision that nothing except the MB really appealed to us in terms of lasting beauty. Second place was the Atlas, but they are already screwing with it and making it look worse and cheapening it. We figured why spend $50k on something that we know we won’t really like or care about in 5 years, and just spend the extra for something we know we’ll still love at that same time and not want to get rid of it when the first $2k repair bill hits.

 

Not bad. I do the drive in my diesel from my home in Northern NJ to Marco Island every few months. For me, the biggest issue is getting PAST Washington DC metro area.

I usually hit a BBQ joint in Georgia for dinner.

Do you take 301 in Florida?

What stands out to me about the W212 is that while it's not the most comfortable car you've ever sat in when you first get in, after 15+ hours you don't hate it like you might other vehicles.

/

 

I agree, it's a great riding car and nice to park. I used to drive my S classes to Arizona from Cleveland and back, like floating on air. I could go 11-12 hours with stops for food and gas. The E's are not S classes but truly the next best thing, I believe better than my friends 7 series and A8's. I must admit at first I thought there was no way I would get used to the seats, but I did and finding a good driving position made it comfortable for eight hours or so.

 

I have taken 301 in the past for this trip, but didn’t do it this time. By the time I got to Jacksonville, it was dark and I decided I really didn’t want to get off the main freeways right now during the whole COVID mess.

 

the seat cushions are definitely a unique thing. On mine, my passenger seat has hardly been used and is extremely comfortable for me, whereas the previous owner of mine was clearly a heavy set person and the drivers seat was a painful torture device for me. I think an easy fix (other than the Macgyver setup I did for mine) might be to just order a new foam seat cushion and replace the old one. No need to buy the new cover if not damaged.

 

I agree. 3 years ago, my wife and I flew from WI to MA to buy our E550 and drove 2500 miles taking the long way home (not all in one day )

We both agreed this is the best road car we've owned. I told my wife it's almost criminal to have a car like this with US speed limits - It needs to be on the autobahn so it can really run.

 

E class is a great interstate cruiser....

I do a 900 Mile trip twice a year to see family and yeah I dread the 12 hours spent in a car but I do enjoy it better then other vehicles I have done long trips in...
mpg is amazing for car going 80-85mph... So wish we had autobahn type roads with unlimited speeds....as that is what this car is made for.

But I will say my gas pig truck does provide a better ride just takes 2 hours more due to stopping more for fuel....the long wheel base and large sidewall tires and wide wide seats just make for comfort..

 

Made it back to DC in a little better time (went the 301 route). 3 stops to top up one tank and drain another, but otherwise a great drive! This car really does drive better the faster you go. Briefly saw a speed in Fl that has 3 digits in it (traffic was flying), had the windows down and roof open, and it was excellent!

 

Last time I drove from Chicago are to myrtle beach South Carolina I averaged 33 MPG. Not bad for a 6 cylinder car. Very comfortable ride. Do not know when we will be going on vacation again due to covid 19 but eventually we will travel again. Love my 2014 E350 sport 4 matic.

 

We were planning a trip early this month of about 2,000 miles in our E350 (to Islamorada, FL in the keys and back) but it got scrapped due to COVID. I'm coming up on 1 year of ownership with my 2016 and I've only put 12,000 miles on it.. I usually run double that. This thread really makes me want to take it out and go.

Unfortunately, I myself have tested positive for Covid as of last week.. so I shall sit at home. It's no joke.

 

Sorry to hear you tested positive. I believe that my wife and 2 boys and I had covid in January 2020. We had all the symptoms and it lasted about 2 weeks. I went to doctor and he sent me for a stress test. They said I might have a bad valve on my heart.and I need to see a specialist. I never went to the specialist at the end of 2 weeks I had no more symptoms and felt great and so did the rest of the family. This was before Covid 19 was popular. I go to the VA a lot and I believe I picked it up from one of the veterans that came back from overseas. But who knows. Eventually things will get back to normal. I am just glad I did not have them mess with my heart.

 

Sorry to read this. I hope your symptoms are mild.

 

Bloody hell! Very sorry to read this as it's the first I've heard from a member that has it! Really hope it all works out for you.

 

I have been sick since 11/13 and while it has been rough, I'm pretty lucky. I was an active participant in the W203 forum from 2008-2012 and one of the best known, well loved contributors from that forum actually died earlier this year from COVID complications. I am 35.. he was mid-50s.

 

we recover from Covid 2 weeks ago. Very mild symptoms, when being retired we don't have to go anywhere.
Good part, now we are immune for several months, so can go ahead with visiting our son in Georgia.
I read all I can get about Covid and when all those millions of dollars spend on research can't give definitive answers - Covid to date has 7 mutations and looks to me I've got the light one as people in the city are dying in accelerated rate.
Than you might want to consider that 40% of infected people are asymptomatic.
Meaning they walk around and spread the virus not even knowing.

 

Hmm, sorry to read other members; or anyone has passed from this plague. Thank you for sharing this with us too I JUST got over a bout with lung cancer and am happy as fawk to still be here for my family.
Wishing you continued health and recovery

 

Nice to be retired I love it but I would not count on being Immune. According to what I have read those that have had the covid are not immune since there are so many different strains. And as far as a Vaccine I would not get one for a couple of years until you find out how many people died from getting something else from the vaccine. You will not be able to find out what happened to the people that took the various vaccines for a year or two. How many people have taken high blood pressure pills and found out later it gave you cancer and the pills had to be recalled. Please be careful on what you take.

 

Don't confuse the mutations with whether the vaccine will be effective or not. It's already been out since April 29th when the study started with stage 1 testing, we're already at stage 3 now. Basically the way the two vaccines out for approval now work is that they use mRNA to make the body produce the spike that's in Covid and the body produces antibodies to fight the spike. The spike is still there in the mutations. This could be like MMR vaccine which hasn't changed since it came out. There's always mutations but mutations don't always make the vaccine ineffective. Also while some got reinfected, the number is really small so far. One of those unknowns. This is basically like the seat belt debate. If you don't wear it, you might be thrown clear and survive a crash, but the other 99% of the time, you're thrown clear and killed whereas if you were wearing it, you would have survived. People just don't know how to play the odds. Sure don't get the vaccine, get infected and risk death, more for the rest of us, it will be in short supply for a few months anyway. So far data on the vaccine looks good, but it'd be nice to see more. The odds given the unknown of the vaccine vs the known effects of Covid aren't being properly weighed. Yeah, science is never 100%, if you wait for certainty, the wait itself isn't risk free. Would make sense if it were, but it isn't.

I'll take my chances with the vaccine and I'll wear my seat belt.

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728

 

Yep, me too. Bring on the vaccine, the sooner the better.

I asked my 98 y-o uncle the other day if he will take the vaccine. He responded, "Absolutely... even if it kills me."

 

Well so far I don't think it's killed anyone yet. There might have been an adverse reaction but they didn't think the vaccine caused it. So far about 44k enrolled in the study although for stage 3, only half of them actually got the vaccine. This would probably be like the Polio vaccine, a bunch of people said they wouldn't get it but the number that got it was quite high as people saw the results of not getting it. That was even after a bad batch that killed a bunch of people. I'm hoping that QC is better now than back then.

 

I already have one mutated gene. I am immune to small pox. I had about 20 vaccine for small pox when I was in military and none of them took. I am also immune to several other things. I will wait on the vaccine. Maybe after a year or so I might take it.

 

I really have no idea what you said or even what you mean. There's probably over 100,000 human genes, just because you have one mutated gene it means that you're immune? Smallpox was eradicated by vaccination. So you're immune to smallpox but the vaccine didn't take?

Vaccines aren't 100% effective, they never claim they are. The flu vaccine is good for between 40-60% depending on the variants. The two under consideration now claim about 95%. Basically about 5% of those that got the vaccine also got Covid. The data hasn't been released, I wonder if they got it before the second shot or if they got it right after the second shot or weeks afterwards. It takes a couple weeks after the second shot for the body to fully ramp up. Basically the death rate for Covid is probably around 1%, I think it was higher in the beginning maybe more like 4-6% when the hospitals were overwhelmed. That might happen again. So far the death rate from this vaccine is 0 but I'm sure it'll be much lower than those who didn't get the vaccine.

https://www.who.int/news-room/featur...ariola%20virus.