In just some weeks I’m going to Austria to do lots of issues within the Alps with Mercedes-Benz, one in all which shall be a winter testing journey alongside within the upcoming third-generation CLA. As that automobile inches nearer to manufacturing Mercedes has launched a video that includes CEO Ola Källenius driving the brand new CLA across the firm’s Immendingen check facility exterior Stuttgart, Germany. The video and accompanying press launch have given us some new particulars concerning the automobile, however I’m most enthusiastic about the star-shaped headlights.
When the Idea CLA debuted final September, everybody mentioned there can be no method its three-pointed star headlights and taillights would make it to manufacturing. Ha! Ye of little religion. Because the video’s host Sarah Harman reveals when she takes off a chunk of camouflage, the CLA’s headlights have a distinguished LED cluster formed like Mercedes’ brand. When you can’t actually inform from the pictures and video, the taillights will too, and the star lights received’t simply be reserved for the electrical model of the CLA.
That’s proper, I mentioned electrical model. The third-gen CLA rides on Mercedes’ new MMA compact automobile platform, which may also underpin the next-gen GLA and GLB, and it was designed as an electric-first platform in thoughts — meaning Mercedes targeted on making a improbable EV after which adapting plug-in hybrid combustion powertrains to the platform, as an alternative of the opposite method round that usually leads to extra compromised EVs. Each electrical and PHEV variations of the CLA ought to look just about the identical, aside from a blocked-off grille that I hope shall be illuminated just like the idea. The remainder of the design seems to be killer similar to the idea, with a extremely glossy roofline and frameless doorways.
“Despite the fact that I’m a petrolhead, I want the electrical automobile,” Källenius says as he takes the electrical CLA onto the check monitor, commenting on how clean and quiet it’s and the way good the dealing with is and all of that typical stuff. The CLA’s electrical powertrain was designed from the bottom up, and it’s already been utilized by the record-setting EQXX prototype. It incorporates a two-speed transmission that Kallenius says lets the automobile be “extraordinarily environment friendly in any respect driving speeds,” including that Mercedes “can completely calibrate how the electrical motor works.” He additionally confirms that there shall be an AMG model of the electrical CLA, which I noticed testing at Immendingen earlier this summer time with an enormous ducktail spoiler on the again.
Different options of the brand new CLA embody a very new software program stack and infotainment system designed in-house by Mercedes, referred to as MB OS. It can embody an superior AI voice assistant and principally any characteristic you possibly can consider, Källenius says, and the CLA may also be the primary manufacturing Mercedes to debut a pillar-to-pillar display screen, like on the idea. The nerd in me observed new energy seat controls, which I’m enthusiastic about.
On the finish of the video they plug within the CLA, and whereas Källenius doesn’t say actual charging speeds, he says the CLA’s “high-powered charging system” makes charging “extremely quick, virtually like fueling.” Mercedes mentioned the Idea CLA might add 250 miles of vary in quarter-hour, and that it could have a spread of over 450 miles (on the European cycle), each of which the manufacturing mannequin ought to obtain.
Mercedes says the brand new CLA will debut in 2025; my guess is at CES in January. What do you wish to learn about Mercedes’ next-gen compact automobiles and EV powertrains? I’ll discover out every thing I can subsequent month.
