Momma’s sweet ride is meant to be enjoyed slowly

MANILA, Philippines—Why do we have to associate luxury cars with speed, speed and more speed? If Mercedes Benz flaunted all of its cars on the basis of how fast it could go from point A to Benz, then buyers wouldn’t have any choice, would they? But choice has always been the point of the sale, especially when it comes to big-ticket items such as luxury cars. And that is precisely why the uber-obsessively precise Germans at Mercedes Benz have designed and introduced into the world a vehicle that would hold fast to a particular niche: The B Class. Its intended owners: All the happy mommies.

Now, is there a reason the smallest engine in the Benz stable (at 1.5 liters) has been marked for mom? I can only hazard a guess: Does your mom need to shout at you to make you follow what she wants you to do? To get things done, sweet mom doesn’t need to wield that much physical power. Charm and entitlement is everything to make a warm body move. Probably the same is true of the B Class.

I just had my second encounter with the B Class just last week. The B Class is CATS Motors’ entry-level Benz in the Philippine market. Technically, though, the A Class is Benz’s official entry level vehicle, but that isn’t available here. My second helping of the B Class, though in no way reflects my civil status, has made me even more familiar with the simple charms of what Benz considers its compact sports tourer vehicle.

The first thing I noticed about the B Class was its door locks. When the locks activate, they embed themselves so deep inside the door panel that it seems impossible to lift and unlock them manually (and I imagine myself trapped inside the car, in the middle of a railroad track, and the train is speeding toward me). But a quick and frantic call to CATS’ tech guys result in a calming answer. Ma’am, they tell me, those locks are really not intended to be pulled up, or pushed down, manually. You only need to pull the interior lever and the locks will disengage mechanically, meaning even if the power is out, you’ll still be able to open your door and get out.

With that concern put at ease, I found myself comfortably easing into the driver’s seat with its ample adjustments, especially for the ride height (I personally want to sit as high as I can to get a good view of the road before the car rolls over it). The dual climate control also personalizes the indoor temp for the driver and front passenger (which is good for moms, because, sometimes, on a particularly stressful day at home, moms need to cool down more than the belligerent teenaged son or daughter beside her). Answering the protective instincts of a mother are the three rear seats, all of which are equipped with three-point seatbelts, with the Isofix child seat attachments with top tether in the rear.

Mothers, ever the budget-conscious, would find the instrument cluster helpful, even. The standard fit trip computer would show them average fuel consumption (from start or from reset), the number of kilometers covered for the trip, and even real time fuel consumption displayed as a bar graph. For my fuel run, the best fuel efficiency I got was at 16.66 km per liter on a 35-km highway run with an average speed of 68 kph. On heavy rush-hour traffic, the B Class yielded 7.8 km per liter with an average speed of 25 kph.

Though the B Class looks deceptively simple (some observers even carelessly remark that on a certain angle, it looks like a big Honda Jazz. The nerve of these people!), it has been accorded with over 30 state-of-the-art standard equipment and features not found in other competing luxury cars in the field. For example, you don’t need another warm body (like your six-year-old bunso) to guide you through those tight parking spaces, as there is the optionally available Active Parking Assist.

Once the car has detected a suitable parking space, you can engage the reverse gear and confirm that you want to park; then all you need to do is control the car’s speed with the accelerator and the brake pedal. The system turns the steering wheel automatically, and the car will parallel park.

Another mother-friendly tech assistant is the Hill-Start Assist, which makes it much easier (and less unnerving) to set off on a gradient and prevents the vehicle from starting to roll unintentionally when you move your foot from brake pedal to accelerator. Very thoughtful.

Much of the other tech features are directed toward enhancing active safety. The electronic stability program can apply the appropriate braking force to one or more wheels and adjust the engine output if necessary. There’s also the steer control or steering assistance system, and the brake assist (which can recognize emergency braking by the speed with which you press the brake pedal. In fractions of seconds it builds up the maximum braking force, thereby reducing the stopping distance). Also standard are tire pressure warning system and acceleration skid control, or ASR.

Owners of the B Class can expect a boot space of 89.8 cm (loading length) and a capacity of 544 liters (to indulge the comparisons to the Jazz, the trunk space of the Jazz is 384 liters).

The adaptive brake lights are another interesting tech add-on. At speeds in excess of 50kph, the brake lights flash several times a second to warn those behind. If the vehicle is braked to a standstill from at least 70kph, the hazard warning lights are activated automatically as an additional safety feature.

Blue is the new Green

The B Class can also mean “Blue,” which is Benz’s preferred color for environmental responsibility (everybody’s been into Green anyway, so why jump into that bandwagon when you can make your own, er, wagon). The B Class, such as this Horizon Blue color variant which I drove, was developed by engineers to make a compact car with as much interior space as possible, designed to be as practically elegant as possible, and to leave the smallest carbon footprint possible. That latter objective has led Benz to its BlueEfficiency breakthrough.

With BlueEfficiency, the B-Class, like the rest of the 85 or so Benz models presently in production around the world, has been developed to minimize energy consumption. The seemingly trifle details, such as tires developed for low rolling resistance, intelligent alternator management and an energy efficient steering system, when put together, help to significantly reduce fuel consumption by up to 12 percent and CO2 emissions by a substantial margin.

I have also been told that the B-Class is made with recyclable materials such as coconut fibers in the seats. All B-Class models have received the south German technical Inspection Authority’s environment certificate, a five-star seal.

All of these features add on to the retail value of this compact sports tourer, however, so that the tag price amounts to a cool P2.180 million. Then one must factor in the cost of owning or maintaining this model, which could run up to P20,000 every 10,000 km (wear and tear not yet included). But then, you’re a mother who owns a Mercedes Benz, does another 60K every year even matter?

Now, if you’re the hot-blooded son, or daughter, who thinks he or she can run donuts with the B Class, go back to your room. Though the B Class tries (it is equipped with the seven-speed “semi-automatic” gear selection lever managed by the Autotronic continuously variable automatic transmission), acceleration is really not its strongest suit.

What it is is a warm, protective shell that will take you where you want to go in complete security and confidence. Like you were a baby in your mother’s arms. Hence the title of this article.

Would you want to bring your mom to the CATS showroom this Mother’s Day and have her get a better look at the car that was made for her?

Visit the Edsa or the Fort offices, or log on to www.cats.com.ph.

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TAGS: Motoring