Mercedes S-class

摘要

Ugly, corpulent and indulgently specified - perfectly timed for a recession. This was the wheeled technological wonder of 1991; last week I saw one at the bottom of a stack of scrap cars and another mouldering on a roadside verge. Most cars must end their lives at some point, but there's still something faintly amazing about seeing a car as heroically indomitable as this S-class laid to waste. It was Mercedes' fattest saloon for decades, conceived in an economic boom, built as solidly as a pyramid and rammed with technology. It carried as many motors as a robotics factory, its seats whirring every which way, doors soft-closing themselves. Its rear bumper was so distant that a pair of chrome prongs motored skywards from the rear wings when you engaged reverse, so that you could see where this Benz ended rather than hearing it. And Merc was only just denied the triumph of announcing its most absurdly indulgent feature as a world first; BMW trumpeted double-glazed door glass for its 7-series a day or two before.