Mercedes-Benz C350e 2015 review

Plug-in hybrids are about as popular as parking inspectors in Australia but a version of Australia's best-selling private sedan aims to amp up the interest.

The Mercedes-Benz C350e will go on sale locally late this year as part of a three-pronged bid (along with the GLE soft-roader and S-Class limousine) to convince buyers there is more to series hybrids - where the engine and electric motor can both propel the vehicle - than just a smaller carbon footprint.

For the 85 per cent of Australians who travel less than 30km to work each day that figure could be zero, providing they have access to a power socket where they park their car

The C-Class's official fuel consumption is 2.1 litres/100km. For the 85 per cent of Australians who travel less than 30km to work each day that figure could be zero, providing they have access to a power socket where they park their car.

Mercedes drivers are more likely to be among the 70-plus per cent of drivers who commute less than 15km to the office, meaning they can theoretically make the round trip before recharging.

A 2.0-litre petrol engine kicks in if the battery capacity is drained and can also act as a generator to top-up the lithium-ion cells on the run. It all sounds good on paper. The key obstacle for Mercedes will be to overcome buyer indifference to the technology: just 482 hybrids have been sold to private buyers this year. 

That's partly down to a lack of government incentives and to a lack of debate on the need to lower emissions and avoid having Sydney and Melbourne joining the smog-smothered cities. Smoking kills ... but so do exhaust emissions.

Value

The numbers haven't finished being crunched in Australia but early indications are the C350e could be priced around $85,000 - or $16,000 more than the C250 sedan on which it is based. That's comparable with the premium Audi plans to charge for its hybrid-powered A3.

Beyond the potential fuel savings, the C350e will be better equipped and ride on standard airmatic suspension rather than steel springs. The price difference still won't have buyers besieging their local dealership to get behind the wheel … but the hybrid Benz has another trick up its sleeve in terms of performance.

The combined outputs of the engine and motor propel the car to 100km/h in a sports car-quick 5.9 seconds. That's 0.7 of a second quicker than a C250, despite the 280kg extra mass the hybrid system adds. The C63 AMG aside, this hybrid is now the performance champion of the C-Class range.

Driving

The C-Class is Carsguide's reigning Car of the Year and with good reason. The C-Class combines a luxury interior with one of the best handling chassis on the road. The C350e faithfully adheres to the same formula.

The extra bulk isn't evident in terms of acceleration or changes of direction until drivers start pushing seriously hard through downhill turns. At that point the tyres will start to whine moments before a regular C250 would simply because of the extra inertia they're having to contend with. That happens well before understeer and means 99 per cent of drivers won't notice a thing.

What they will notice is the surge of torque as a combined 600Nm launches the Merc at the next turn - at last when the four-mode power delivery is in Hybrid mode.

The C350e's other modes are electric only, "Hold" (which preserves the battery until drivers reach a city) and "Charge" which uses the engine to re-energise the battery while driving.

Haptics - the force feedback most people are familiar with from gaming consoles - are used to encourage drivers to maximise electric propulsion.

In electric mode the accelerator has an artificial limit which resists normal foot pressure and a way to warn drivers they are at maximum e-ccceleration. Press on past the détente and the engine kicks in.

Similarly when approaching a slower moving vehicle the pedal "double pulses" to encourage drivers to ease off and use energy recuperation as the motor acts as an alternator rather than just the mechanical brakes. Like most technology found in the C-Class, both features take very little adapting to.