Mercedes’ magnificent SL63 AMG loves to get vocal delivering its 518 horsepower, says Road Test Editor HOWARD WALKER.
You’d buy this car just to hear its bad-to-the-bone exhaust note. Its off-kilter rugga-rugga-rugga cacophony is the sound of Schwarzenegger gargling with roofing nails, played through the speakers at a Bon Jovi concert!
Just gaze at its pipes. Sprouting from beneath that rear bumper is a quartet of chromium-plated Howitzers. Blip the throttle and it’s like Godzilla clearing his throat.
Unless it’s down-pouring like Katrina in full Cat Five fury, or our mid-August humidity is replicating the sauna swelter at the Ritz-Carlton spa, you’d never want to drive this car with its top raised. Only with the top down and the windows lowered can you hear this orgy of octaves, this bevy of basso profondo.
We could be talking about the latest bad-boy Mustang or tricked-up, big-block 427 or 454 MOTION Camaro. But we’re not. This is the Mercedes-Benz SL63 AMG, a $139,925 hot-rod that’s motivated by a 518-horsepower V-8 sledgehammer hand-built by the Mercedes in-house tuning wizards at AMG.
Think of it as Daniel Craig playing Bond in Casino Royale. On the outside, it’s all Brioni tux elegance and suave, shaken-not-stirred cool. But in a flash, it’s a seismic explosion of raw anger and pugilistic pummeling.
Don’t believe me? Try out for size the car’s so-called Race Start feature. Select the manual sport mode for the seven-speed auto transmission. Now slot the lever into ‘drive’ and hold the brake pedal with your left foot. Floor the pedal with your right foot, and with the tach needle hovering at the 4,000 rpm mark, simply step off the brake.
The SL’s computing brain will then ensure a full after-burner, tire-smokin’, maximum-velocity take off which translates into zero-to-60 mph acceleration in a mere 4.4 seconds. OK, childish I know. But for a car that weighs as much as a small pachyderm – 4,468 pounds for those who are counting – that’s blisteringly fast.
You’ll adore this car. It’s fast, it’s furious but somehow it manages to retain an aura of refined elegance. In laid-back, top down, going-to-the-restaurant mode, it is happy to burble along making few demands on the driver.
Now pull back on the center console flap and the power hardtop will whirr closed in just 16 seconds. Fritter away an extra two-grand and you can even get the roof with a Panorama glass panel to let in sunbeams of light. Then the SL becomes just a perfect, car-for-all-seasons, closed coupe.
But winter in Florida is convertible nirvana, for feeling the warm sun on your face and the gentle breeze in your hair. What about last winter’s January/February chill, I hear you say? Don’t worry; the Mercedes has you covered, courtesy of its highly innovative Airscarf feature.
At the touch of a button, toasty-warm air flows from vents in the front seat head restraints, acting like an invisible scarf – cashmere, naturally – around the neck and head.
With the Merc’s top lowered, the side windows raised, the mesh wind-blocker in the locked and upright position, and the Airscarf on full blast, it could be 20-below and driving topless would be a truly delightful experience.
But while you can get the same open-air delight in a regular $103,475 SL550, the reason you hand over that extra $36,450 is for the excitement of AMG tuning.
You get it in the SL63’s fighter-jet exterior styling. On the hood there are bigger cooling intakes, and on the sides more dramatic-looking power vents. Contoured side skirts also carry the angry, razor-edged lines of the bolder front bumper to the rear, where an AMG rear apron emphasizes the beamy width of the car. Throw in a set of racy AMG-designed 19-inch rims and you have a car that looks all set to run hot laps at Daytona.
Drive it like you stole it and, despite its bulk, the car simply shrinks around you. With steering that’s surgically precise and tires that stick like lint to velvet, the SL carves curves as if running on invisible rails.
Come up behind slower traffic on a two-lane country road, see the gap up ahead, click down two gears with the steering-wheel-mounted paddle shifters, and the Merc rockets past.
And there it is again, that truly awesome exhaust that rips and roars even louder as the revs soar. Maybe that’s what the SL in SL63 stands for – Stupendously Loud. Enjoy.
For more information about 2011 Mercedes-Benz vehicles, please visit, http://www.mbusa.com/mercedes/index