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Well, I certainly didn’t expect to see this. When you say “W204 Mercedes-Benz C-Class” to me, I think of an incredibly milquetoast car that was made to a price point for the masses and it certainly reflects that. Yes, the range-topping C63 AMG was a bonkers car that is a ton of fun, but at the same time almost equally as terrifying if you haven’t fixed the headbolts on them. Back to the standard models, you were offered up various V6s with an automatic and a very rare manual that is nearly impossible to find. Well, it looks like someone found one and decided to turn it into a full blown race car to compete in the Trans Am series, along with various other series that it qualified for. You know what they say about racing: To end up with a small pile of money, start with a really big pile of money.
Believe or not, if you want a 6-speed manual in your run-of-the-mill Mercedes-Benz C-Class, you could actually buy one in the United States. Mercedes offered a small handful of them starting with the W203 and even more surprisingly carried that over to the next generation W204. Before you get too excited, these gearboxes were only offered on non-AMG cars and even finding one is nearly impossible because you can probably guess what the target market is for a base C-Class in America. Today, I finally found one that is worth taking a look at because the interior isn’t falling apart yet. This 2008 C300 up for sale in Maryland looks very nice and even has a good service history. Question is, would you even consider this car seeing as what this one costs over 10 years later?
Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, depending on how you look at it, Mercedes-Benz has only graced the United States market with one AMG estate car. Thankfully, it was more than one generation starting with the S211 E-Class and continuing with the S212 and now up to the current S213. Of course, we got AMGs in every SUV, including a R-Class for whatever reason, but when it comes to regular estate cars, the E-Class was it. No C-Class estates, no CLA shooting brakes and certainly no CLS shooting brakes either. Even with the multiple generations of E wagon AMGs, good luck finding one for a reasonable price as even the most desolate ones still bring close to $30,000.
Today, I came across a really nice W204 C63 AMG Estate up for sale at one of my favorite dealers in Europe that is as clean as all the other cars I feature from them. This 2009 painted in Palladium Silver Metallic has all the right lines and curves to keep that aggressive AMG stance and have future classic written all over it. I just wish they brought them stateside.
I don’t write about a lot of newer cars because honestly, I think outside of a few models, they are all pretty boring and soft. Today’s car, a 2011 Mercedes-Benz E550 Coupe, isn’t exactly the most exciting car in the world and it certainly isn’t all that rare. It is rather fast though with 382 horsepower that will get it to 60 mph in the high four second range. But that isn’t why I wanted to check out one of these. It isn’t necessarily what this E550 Coupe is, but rather what it isn’t.
To be honest, I heaved a sigh of relief the day I sold my 2007 Mercedes-Benz C230 Sport. I felt as if the compact executive sedan was becoming too ubiquitous for the upwardly mobile in my area, especially those wearing an Audi, BMW or Mercedes badge. To this day, I’m happy with the choice I made to buy a used 2006 MINI Cooper S, as it still puts a smile on my face every time I drive it. A few months back, while on a business trip to South Africa, my father called and informed me he traded in his W202 C280 for a 2014 C300 4Matic in Dolomite Brown Metallic, like the car we see here for sale in Texas. I didn’t give much thought to the W204 C-class when it replaced the W203 C-class shortly after I bought my C230 Sport. Given that the W205 C-class has a turbo four-cylinder engine, lack of start-stop override and a navigation screen that looks like an iPad slapped on the dash, it has me eyeing these late model W204 C300s with their 3.5 liter V6 a bit more closely.
