Stinky J. Sock

Hello all. Recently purchased a CPO 2006 R350 with the options listed below in my signature.

We had been looking for a while waiting for the right one with the right options and mileage to become available in our market and finally found one. I'm surprised at how many R-Classes out there don't have the Pano roof, which was a requirement for us. Passed on a very nice R350 with just about everything including the AMG package but it didn't have the Pano. To me the car looks incomplete without it.

Previous family car (two kids) was an Audi allroad with the third row kids seats that we loved. We looked at virtually every luxury wagon/suv/crossover out there from Audi to BMW to Land Rover to Lexus to Mercedes and others and narrowed it down to the Audi Q7 and R-Class. I remember when the R-Class first hit the auto show circuit as the Vision GST and always had been interested in it. One of the attributes that we looked at with all the vehicles is the back seat legroom. I’m 6’4” so I put the drivers seat pretty far back, which typically doesn’t leave much legroom behind me. Compared to everything else we looked at, the R-Class has an amazing amount back seat legroom and that pretty much sold my wife on the R-Class.

It’s been a couple weeks since the purchase and we have been very happy. One thing I’m surprised about is that, even though the R-Class is only about 13” longer and basically the same width of the allroad, it feels so much bigger and roomier. The acceleration isn’t as quick as our allroad was but with gas prices the way they are, it’s probably better to give my lead foot some time off.

rosswell

Excellent choice on the R. I too needed room for a 15 and 16 year old and the wife liked safety features and cabin comfort and quietness. (Mine is the Alpine Rain R350 in one of the last posts in the R Class picture thread). I completely agree the PANO roof makes the car what it is, and am thrilled the GST concept is so close to the actual - having waxed mine several times in the past 6 weeks since I've bought it - I know its beautiful body has several complex curves ... I find those who appreciate good art might like the avant garde styling of the R - like the headlights - wow. Previous was a Honda CRV - WAY too small. re: options - I've found most R's were ordered very carefully due to the impact on final price - so if you get 4 options - the other 4 never usually appear in the same car - oh - you want NAV? Then no Harmon Kardon for you! Oh you want rear seat entertainment? No parktronic or PANO for you. Mine has parktronic, Pano, Nav, easy pak cargo blind, ashtray package (don't need), and bird's eye maple. Oh and only 10,000 Kilometres, for which I had to pay a premium. I've only come a cross one white one in California that had the power tailgate, pano, rear seat entertainment, heated seats, harmon kardon, and 18" wheel (I'd love to have them) but had lots of miles. Any car that provokes wide ranging responses (love it hate it) is a trend setter - just look at how many automakers are copying the Pano roof today (Ford Mustang, Nissan Murano, etc etc). Happy driving!!

chilledbenz

Congrats on the R..I LOVE mine with a passion! The reason for the rarity of the Pano roof is quite simple, from 2006-2007 the Pano roof was in an expensive option package. Not until 2008 did they decide to include it in with the P1 package. But even 2008 models are hard to find with the Pano roof for the simple reason when ordering you can opt to swap it for a regular moon roof and get $1000 bucks off the M.S.R.P.

Hope more and more people find this board and find how much we are loving our R classes. With sales dwindling..(due to bad marketing not a bad car) we can all do our part to help save this great ride.

nanoera

hi stinky, great choice.
i wish mine has parking sensors. but that's why i can drive it for now before my wife gets more familiar with its length.