My IMBAS experience :)

[loiphin]

Hei,

 

Jeg skal skrive på engesk

 

So last week was finally my turn to go and fetch my 2017 Mercedes C350e from Sindelfingen. It's my first ever Mercedes. I have always been an VW/Audi guy. I originally ordered my C350e in May this year, and went through Bertel O Steen. I decided to do the IMBAS thing because it may only be once or twice in my life when I purchase a new car.

 

On Tuesday morning I caught the 09:00 flight to Frankfurt from Oslo. I decided to choose Frankfurt as there are no direct flights to Stuttgart. I then took the high speed ICE train from Frankfurt to Stuttgart (33 euro). It took about 1h30m to get to Stuttgart.

 

Checked into the Maritim hotel at 14:00 in Stuttgart central, and then left again at 15:00 to go to the Mercedes Museum in town. I decided to do this on the first day, so that I could leave earlier on the second day when receiving my car. The museum was pretty amazing. By far the best car museum I have ever been in. In around 2000 I was in the old Mercedes museum, but this newer one is just incredible. Such an amazing way the building has been architected, and it spirals down floor by floor to various exhibits of Mercedes vehicles. I highly recommend going to the museum if you are in Stuttgart. Nice cafe and shop to buy some bits and pieces afterwards.

 

The following morning I made my way to the Kundesenter in Sindelfingen. I walked to the nearest train station and caught the S1 train to Boblingen. I decided to walk and take the train , as the taxi was fairly expensive and I enjoy the walk.

 

Arrived at the Kundesenter at 08:00 exactly and explained to the reception that I was here to collect my car and attend the factory tour. They were very professional and arranged everything quickly. I then had some more breakfast (included with IMBAS) in their resturant and wandered around the centre. At 09:00 they called me over and I went to collect my car. I spent an hour with a lady from Mercedes who explained all the features in my C350e and setup the GPS for the way home. All in all a very nice experience to receive my car.  I then drove it in electric mode out of the showroom floor to the adjacent parking lot, just for fun.

 

It was now 10:30 and we were first shown a cool video about Mercedes and their manufacturing processes. Then we took the bus to the metal pressing plant. We saw some amazing robots at work, pressing and welding the metal sheets together. We werent allowed to use cameras of course, nor were we able to see the painting of the car. This was for the S and E class. It was almost all completely done by robots. Hardly any people around, other than to monitor the robots and fill vairous bins with metal bits.

 

We then went to the final assembly plant and saw the new E class being put together as well as the S class. There were far fewer robots, but still equally impressive. One of them puts in and screws in the sunroof. Another puts in the entire dashboard. But most of the work is done by people on the assembly line. It was all very efficient and organised.

 

By now it was lunch time. So I had another meal in the kundesenter restuarant, which was really really nice. I came on my own, as my wife wasn't interested in sitting in the car for two days to get back to Oslo. So I had two 25 euro vouchers (from IMBAS brochure). I used one for the meal and another for a nice bottle of wine and some chocolate

 

At 12:45 it was time to leave. My car had a full tank of fuel and a fully charged battery. That was very nice of Mercedes to make sure all these little things were taken care of. My car had been baking in the sun for the last few hours, and it was really hot inside. While driving, I put the air conditioning on at full speed, but nothing seemed to be happening. Of course I was concentrating on driving this new car, and not being used to it. Finally I realised after about 5 minutes of cooking inside that all the vents were shut, so none of the air was coming out!!! Stupid but are worrying about driving and not damaging your new car.

 

About 10 minutes in the journey I was driving at about 120km/h in the fast lane. There were three cars in front. The front most one was a tall van. Suddenly the tall van slammed on brakes. My mercedes thankfully gave me a warning beep, which helped my reaction times by a second or two! If the car hadnt have warned me, I may have crashed into the car in front, with a 10 minute old car. The reason why the idiot van driver suddenly stopped was because the lane became closed. But none of us behind the van could see the closed lane, because the van was so tall.

 

I had booked a hotel north of Hamburg, but was doing fairly well and decided to push on to Flensburg instead. I eventually arrived at Flensburg at 22:30. I was really really tired. It was quite stressful driving a new car on the autobahn, and having Porsche Cayenne's , a Bugatti Veyron and many other cars coming past at over 220km/h. I did about 140 most of the way, but when I got nearer Flensburg I got up to 200km/h. But I didnt enjoy it all, as I was so tired.

 

It was nice messing around with the Distronic Plus and driving the car in electric mode, charging the battery from engine etc. I used Distronic Plus pretty much the whole journey. I love it! And the adaptive high beam lights than sense when other cars are approaching and turn them to low beam works well too.

 

The next morning I got up early at 06:30 and then left Flensburg at 07:00. Had a nice easy 350km through Denmark. They did stop me at the German/Danish border and were a bit suspicious about my car, the fact that I live in Norway and have a British passport. But they let me through after a few minutes.

 

I got to Hirtshals two hours early, and went to Colorline Cargo just before the ferry terminal to have the car registered as leaving the EU.

 

Got onto the ferry at 12:45 and had a pleasant journey to Larvik. Again, I parked at Colorline Cargo and got some toll document and went through the RED toll lane. The guy was hardly interested and looked at the paper for a few seconds and then waved me on.

 

Drove the final 150km to Skedsmo where I live. In total I did about 1400km. I was pretty tired afterwards, but it was a really cool experience! My C350e performed flawlessly the whole way. The only issue I had was that the Mercedes Me app wasnt working during the trip. I would have liked to have played with it a bit.

 

Now the car is at Bertel O Steen to get Norsk plates, and understelbehandling, and winter tyres

 

PICTURES

http://imgur.com/a/mgiMG

PICTURES

 

 

Takk,

 

Simon.

 

[Lars U.]

Gratulerer med ny bil,

 

ser ut til å være et bra valg du har gjort. coolt med blå bremsekalipperer

 

fin historie dette

 

 

[loiphin]

Takk Lars

 

The blue calipers was not something I was expecting. My friend at work got his C350e a few weeks before mine, and he got silver calipers. Maybe the blue ones are a 2017 standard?

 

Simon.

[ClasT]

Grattis med ny bil!

 

Distronic er konge ja. 

 

[MB JON]

Nice story, one day I hope to do the same

 

 

 

[Megaoctane]

Congrats on the new car, its always nice to read car journey stories

The color looks fantastic!

 

Yeah driving behind a big truck or van is always stressing. I usually try to pass them as soon as possible - as you noted - you can't see whats happening ahead. The collision warning has saved me once also, and the blind spot assist has helped me 2-3 times.

I have only tested Distronic Plus for 10 minutes in a E class, but I tested it for almost 30 minutes in a new Volvo S90. Worked flawlessly.

 

If you don't mind me asking - what made you change from Audi/VW to mercedes?

 

We should try to meet up and exchange views and talk cars and personal experiences. Maybe some time next week? Maybe more Mercedes enthusiasts would join.

[MB JON]

http://mbentusiastklubb.no/smf/index.php?topic=74433.0

[loiphin]

The reason I changed.... I based the decision almost solely on the cost of a new car in Norway. It seems in Norway at least you cannot beat the price/performance of a C350e

 

I managed to get a great deal on a new C350e. The årsavgift is incredibly low because of the stated CO2 and fuel efficiency, along with a healthy 18% discount (kampanje + the company I work for). So the cost ended up being on par with the UK. It was a deal I couldn't turn down. I asked the lady at Sindelfingen (who explained the features in the car) and she said that it was almost only Norwegians coming to fetch new C350e's when it came out

 

But besides the quirks in the user interface of the media system and the crappy functionality spread between the iOS and web app, I really like it

 

I think I would have paid an additional £20K in tax for a pure petrol or diesel car with the same performance of the C350e.

 

So to me it was a no-brainer

[Frodeb]

Gratulerer med fantastisk fin 🚗 og ikke minst super lesning.

 

Sent fra min E6853 via Tapatalk

 

 

[ErikAak]

Gratulerer! Håper på å ta samme turen for å hente en ny Mercedes en dag

[BenzBølla]

Thanks for sharing! Very well

 

I'm hoping to be able to pick up my new Mercedes in december!