Last week I took a week vacation with a couple friends and we drove to the famous "tail of the dragon". We stayed in a cabin in Robbinsville NC, a few miles away from the dragon. There was about 6 cars that went on the trip. We did a few runs up and down the dragon, as well as the smokey mountain back roads and a few skyway drives as well.
2018 Panemera, 2016 m4, a e92 m3, v10 m5(e60 I beleive?) 2016 f80 m3 and of course my e63s. It was about a 700miles drive each way, and we did another 200-300 miles of driving once we arrived.

The experience was something that every car enthusiast should experience and make sure you go there open minded knowing that the chances of a vehicle breaking down due to brakes, tires etc can happen when being pushed around these corners, especially with our heavy boats.

The added horsepower and torque of the e63s(especially with a s2 tune, tcu tune etc) combined with it's awd system made the dragon a super fun and exciting trip. Transmission was in manual mode, traction in sport, suspension on full stiff(oem suspension) It comes out of 90* 45* corners like no other car there. The confidence the car gives you when in a corner and the braking force it applies along with the engine downshifts make it stop on a dime for being a big heavy German sedan. I unfortunately suffered from my rear brakes taking a crap as the brake light came on a few miles into the dragon run. Luckly I had my scanner with me, Plugged it in and saw rear pads. Of course no reception anywhere untill we got to killboys location, used wifi calling and called fcp euro, ordered a set of rear pads and sensor for overnight shipping and was back at the dragon on Tuesday afternoon.

Here is a few pictures I had to size down due to limitations uploading.


. (MB of Knoxville wanted 475 for pads and 65 for sensor.. Fcp euro was 150 shipped for some textar pads and sensor with next day air!). All in all we all had a blast. A bunch of pictures were taken so I cant post them all. The amg held it's own against the competition, and it also bested everyone in the mpg department on the way There. I saw 23.7mpg, while everyone else was at 13-18mpg.I stopped once to get gas, everyone else 2/3 times. Remember all these hills and corners require trq to get you up the hills, and most of these guys needed to keep rpms high in order to pass people or even try to have some fun.

 

Was anyone else tuned?

 

Yes Porsche had s1 tune, m4 was fbo with upgraded turbos(no e85 there so had 93 tune), m5 had just a exhaust and others had bolt ones. Nothing crazy

 

sounds like a lot of fun

 

Glad you had a good time, even with an unexpected brake pad change...I'd done a dragon rally twice now, and going back for a 3rd in October. A lot of fun and having a mapped out event with gas stops, walkie talkies and free photos from killboy.com make it an amazing day. We always do the dragon twice, one at the start and one at the end of the rally, and then we spend another 5+ hours on less traveled by equally amazing roads. Always some local traffic to deal with/slower tourist traffic but so fun. The 2016 and 2018 both were a blast to drive but the 2018 seemed to stay cooler - granted I took the 2016 in October and the front was covered in leaves by late in the day.

 

Sounds and looks like a ton of fun! My oldest son is getting stationed down there with the 101st so might try and get a pass in when we go to visit. Though not sure the wife would approve of the 2,400 mile road trip

 

Yeah I drove my 05 CTS-V down there from RI back in 2011 with a friend (pre-kids). Met up with my cousin who had (and still has) a Lotus Elise. His GF at the time had some gen of Cayman but I drove it and it was sterile.

I have some Killboy and other pics around somewhere. I have a Dragon coffee mug.

Total blast. I recorded all time high peak Gs on the G-meter (which I use as my desktop background at work, to this day). 1.26G to the right and 1.17G to the left. I drove it hard but stayed in my lane. The pics show rubber being left from the REAR tires while I was dead center in the lane. That car rotated nicely...

 

Love the rolling shots! The E63s looks fantastic in any environment, and on the road cornering hard it looks great.