What’s red, has two doors, a three-pointed star, four-wheel drive, “C” badging, and a sweet V6? The new AMG C-Class Coupe has finally touched Indian shores and in its potent AMG C 43 guise no less. How does it fare in our road test? Read on.
![Mercedes-AMG C 43 4MATIC Coupe](https://carindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Mercedes-AMG-C-43-4MATIC-Coupe-web-4-640x427.jpg)
Story: Jim Gorde
Photography: Sanjay Raikar
Two doors equal sports car. That holds true for many. If it’s red in colour, it furthers that cause. Add four tail-pipes and a sonorous soundtrack and it ticks all the boxes. The Mercedes C-Class was always a four-door luxury saloon of choice. Its playful side, however, was something we’d only heard of and experienced in the AMG 43 and the madder 63 S guise. Now, however, with a hard-top sloping roof and no rear doors, the C 43 Coupe ups the excitement and brings in more power than the erstwhile C 43 saloon; a car I adored, personally, as a proper everyday all-rounder.
The Mercedes-AMG C 43 4MATIC Coupe, then, is the new kid on the block, both in the market and in Merc’s ever-increasing line-up. The MultiBeam LED headlights, sleek styling, and tapered rear end (already seen on the C 300 Cabriolet) all seem familiar. What’s not so is the experience.
![Mercedes-AMG C 43 4MATIC Coupe](https://carindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Mercedes-AMG-C-43-4MATIC-Coupe-web-engine-640x427.jpg)
The 3.0-litre, biturbo V6 petrol engine under the bonnet now makes 390 PS ― up 23 PS on the older car ― and an unchanged, but still hefty, 520 Nm of peak torque. Not a decade ago, Mercedes had the SL 500 ― a two-door, then-rocket ship sports car with a big 5.0 V8 making 306 PS and 460 Nm. My, how times have changed. Furthermore, the biturbo V6 is paired to a nine-speed automatic driving a 4MATIC all-wheel-drive system with a pronounced rear bias. That should make for some serious fun and impeccable control. Right, then.
How times have really changed, though, manifests also in a vast number of people, many of whom are road-users ― an aspect that was not so much of a concern for the SL 500. That meant that I would have to be very careful indeed about how far my right foot travelled and, considering the responses on tap, it was a significant piece of the pie for my grey matter to come to terms with.
![Mercedes-AMG C 43 4MATIC Coupe](https://carindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Mercedes-AMG-C-43-4MATIC-Coupe-web-3-640x427.jpg)
In the city, crawl speeds are not the ideal situation. Neither is the quality of road surfaces, mind you. The AMG C 43 felt rather out of place, the low front apron and overall low ground clearance were tested far more than they would have liked ― and not in the dynamic or aero department too. The drive modes on the Dynamic Select include the new Slippery mode (for wet, slippery, and low-traction surfaces), Comfort, Sport, Sport+, and Individual. Cosseted as I was in the lovely AMG alcantara and leather sports seats, my foot was in a different situation. The V6 has it torque peaking from 2,500 rpm ― high up today even for a turbo-petrol ― and while pottering around the city behind a slow-moving scooterist, who simply refuses to move from the fast lane at a mute 12 km/h, there is a pronounced leap forward when foot meets throttle. That’s when Comfort made way for Slippery. The dulled down throttle response was perfect for the crawl.
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