Wheel Deal

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Horsepowered Words

By Ted Johnson

The brake service light had come on. A quick check of the owner’s manual suggested something out of the ordinary, so I scheduled a trip to the dealer to check it out. I had no delusions about what might come from this peek into my car’s inner machinations, which, if you took the long view, represented the benefits of this new thing called the Worldwide Economy. Unfortunately for me, the words “constructed in Alabama by a German automaker” didn’t reveal their bittersweet truth until much later, that being Redneck Riviera workers and Teutonic precision do not a good relationship make.
    This I knew: 1) my 1998 Mercedes Benz ML320 leaked oil; 2) anything larger than a pebble produced amusement-park wobbles and rolls, an indication that the shocks had died fighting until the last spring coil had collapsed; and 3) the air conditioning had left for holiday with no indication when it would return.
    In my mind, these were understandable transgressions to be expected with the odometer reading 171 and three digits more. Even though the rear end sounded like a can opener on steroids, this was my Benz. My Benz. We bought it two-years used in 2000 and in six point five years it gave us 130,000 miles, most of it at 80 mph, including mad-dash, loaded-to-the-roof trips to Sunriver, Ore., not to mention countless family days at beaches, parks and ball games.
    I had my fingers crossed when Bill the Service Rep returned with the report. The ML’s differential could seize at any moment (no wonder the rear end had been getting louder), and the electronic key system appeared ready for a blowout. These two repairs would cost more than the car’s worth. Never mind the AC. The light on the dash? Faulty brake light connection — a five-dollar part.
“Dump it,” Bill the Service Rep said. “Dump it fast.”
     A Benz needing a differential at 170,000 miles? German precision, ha. That … that happens to Fords. And didn’t Werner von Braun solve electric circuits when he was engineering V2 rockets in World War II? How can a key one day just stop working?

“Dear CEO …”
In that first pique of anger, physical violence came to mind, but words serve me best. Letters. Gotta fire some letters to the CEO of Mercedes Benz USA and to the president of the company that owns the dealership. “It is with a sad heart that I write this letter …” Remind them I’m the prototypical Benz customer and then let them have it where it hurts — the loss of a potential customer. “I have always sought a Benz for the fact that it was reliable. Unfortunately, I can no longer do that, nor can I think of MBZ in the same light. It is a real letdown.”
The letters hit the mail chute on a Friday. The disappointment continued, however. Even though it had 171K and had been driven hard, the ML was never neglected (save for the shocks). The engine hummed like new. (The oil leaked from the pan.) But that ML razed my Benz desires. I would turn to Toyota, Lexus, Nissan, Acura, Honda and, gulp, General Motors.
    Not that this new car could be just any vehicle. It had to be large enough for the family, including the friends of our two daughters, our dog, and the fact that my wife packs the refrigerator and two closets worth of clothes for an overnight trip.
    That meant SUV, or something thereof. Since we load and go, it had to have some goods — leather seats, navigation, perhaps even satellite radio. And it had to have something that spoke to my conscience, something that said it wasn’t a pig at the gas station and that didn’t fit the American penchant of overkill, best seen daily in the thousands of Suburbans and Expeditions that need four-wheel drive for parking lot speed bumps.
    So, it had to be big but not too big, cool but not decadent, functional but not so utilitarian. I scanned the web and learned about Tahoes and Sequoias, Armadas and XC90s, Pilots, MDXs and something called Aspen. Returning from errands on the following Monday, the light on my office message machine blinked.
    “Hello, this is Mike DiGiulio, the sales manager at Mercedes Benz. I have your letter here, and I’d like to discuss it.” That was fast, considering I didn’t even send him one. The home office in North Carolina must have faxed it to him.

A Unique Sales Strategy
When we hooked up on the phone, I expressed my disappointment in the ML, and Mike admitted that Mercedes Benz at that time had taken its eye off the ball. I expressed my desire to find a new car, and he offered to help, but why not try this new model, the Mercedes Benz GL class?
    It was good, real good. Smooth yet powerful (aluminum V-8), with plenty of room (the electric tailgate and electric third-row seats offered compelling ease-of-use loading, and it had that Benz leather, supple and rich). But that spoke whispers to the elegies of handling excellence that echoed in my gut on a giant S of an on-ramp, the chicane passing with nary a waver or rock.
    My Benz addiction arose again, but I returned the GL. I wouldn’t be swayed so easily. Mike made some calls to friends at other dealers, letting me pursue my anti-Benz bent that included a loaded Nissan Armada (too big for the garage and poor mileage), a tricked out Honda Pilot (didn’t meet the wife’s need for unabashed style) and a Volvo XC that had a Yamaha V-8 but, alas, the body seemed too snug for long family ventures.
    I called Mike back and asked if I could try the Benz R Class, and within two hours I sat in a royal blue creation from Automaker Heaven that had three rows, including the wife’s all-important “captain’s” chairs (full bucket seats) in the second row. The larger-than-normal back doors made third-row access incredibly easy, something that couldn’t be said of the Volvo, MDX, Sequoia and other models. But memory, to its credit, fought back. It was a Benz, a Benz made in Alabama.
    Then it happened. A clog of cars on I-80 east near Davis, a clear lane to the right. Two paddle downshifts on the back of the steering wheel, a swerve and some gas. The R500’s V-8 quietly growled, and I felt like an F-16 pilot at the end of the carrier deck. The clog evaporated in my side view mirror. Two quick shifts up into overdrive had me sailing in open space. Smooth but authoritative. Effortless. So Benz-like.
    “Well?” Mike said upon my return.
    “It spoke to me,” I said. I now drive a black R500 with “macadamia nut” leather, courtesy of a small dealership specializing in high-end used cars. It had 11,000 miles on it but had never been registered, for which I paid $25,000 less than the walk-out price at the dealer. For all his effort, Mike didn’t get his sale, but he did his job. My Benz addiction had burned out, but he rekindled it. 
    Ted Johnson has been writing for more than 20 years about many of his passions, from the San Francisco 49ers to golf to the latest, greatest, and coolest gadgets, including that nasty Porsche Cayman.

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