Has Anyone Else Bought Or Test Drove One??

fred from nashville drives the new cla 250

i have a 4matic version on order but did get to drive a beautiful jupiter cla 250 this morning. this a car of contradictions. the price was 34000 (about) and had the 18 inch wheels . first, the red is beautiful!!!!!!!! they had a blck one too with the stock wheels. hate to say it but they are butt *** ugly. the sticker does indicate 38 mpg on highway. pretty good. on the outside its like a narrower version of my 2010 c300 4matic as far as size goes.inside it seems narrower. the stock seats are extremely comfy for me (5ft 10 168lbs). i dont care aboutthe rear seat headroom but itf you do you are right. the gap in the door that others have mentioned DOES exist. engine fires up instantly . if you step on it it is noisy 4 banger sound of valves and stuff. does not seem to be insulated. in the eco mode it is a dog dog dog. wants to shift into 7th asap. the feel of the wheel is rather racy in that it is small and quite comf (for me). the ride is choppy over bumps and somewhat noisy over them too. in the s mode the shiftng is quite good and easy to control. in manual the paddles are fun and seem to be the way to drive most of the time. gives a lot of control and shifts without tooooo much lag. the engine is a surprise. if you gently accelerate it is a little slow. stand on iit and you hear the loud noise of the engine. then that turbo kicks in and you are down the road! quite quick feeling. seems like a stiff ride but when really pushed corners really well!!
summation. this car will be a huge delight for some and a big disapointment for others.
this is NOT a smooth quiet luxury/ semi luxury car. BUT this is a REALLY fun car that you can sling around and have a blast with. at the same time on a smooth road it is silent (except for the 4banger noise)
im going to have a blast with my4matic version when it comes in this spring AND get good mileage at the same time
i hope ive addressed evrything. it was only a 15 inute drive but it was a hoot. i then got into my 300 and quietly serenely drove home
fred from nashville

Back from test drive

OK, so I'm back from my test drive. While waiting to take the test drive I was browsing around the showroom and was checking out the attached CLA250 Edition 1. The sticker was $41K and change. The Edition 1 package alone was $10K+. The car is beautiful and I love the color combo. What I thought was odd was that along with the package it included the 18" AMG black polished wheels (which are beautiful) and drilled rotors but only the front rotors are drilled. The rear rotors are your standard solid variety. I thought that was weird and looked odd and mismatched. Right next to it was a pretty much stock Cirrus white CLA250 coming in at just over $31K with a couple of standalone options, no packages. So even before I got to drive the car I got to thoroughly check out both CLAs. The seating position was good and the seats felt comfortable in both. I love the small yet thickly wrapped steering wheel. The switches are located in the perfect positions but the car was quite small so nothing can be that far out of reach. The visibility out the front and sides were good but not so much through the back. The rear window is quite small but not too small to be dangerous. With the front seat adjusted to my height I jumped in the back (both driver and passenger sides) and there was a decent amount of room. Big caveat here, I’m only 5’8”. In the back sitting up straight there was about an inch between the top of my head and the roof. I had a few inches between my knees and the seat back. Having 4 people is quite comfortable but 5 will be very tight in the back. The rear seat back folds down 60/40 with no pass through. The trunk isn’t as deep as I expected but does go back farther than expected. There’s some additional storage space under the trunk floor because there’s no spare tire. All models have run flat tires regardless of wheel size. As for storage in the cabin, there is some but not a lot. The glove box is quite small as well as the storage space under the center arm rest. Below the center dash near the front of the center console there is a cigarette lighter and a ashtray. If you don’t smoke then I suppose you can put some spare change in there. Just in front of the center arm rest are cup holders. In the back seat there’s a 12v socket and another small compartment in the middle with vents just above them. Then you have the usual bottle holders and map storage on the doors. That’s about it for storage. In the compartment under the center arm rest there’s another 12v plug. So in all there are 3. I think there’s also a USB plug in there, too. I’m not sure.

So finally I get to go on my test drive. Unfortunately they only had cars with the stock 17” wheels available for test drives. I got one with the panoramic roof, HID lights (which I didn’t need because it is day time), and Premium Package. I left it in ECO mode to see if I can get use to the Stop/Start feature and I can’t. It wasn’t as smooth as the VW Passat one I rented in Germany where I didn’t even notice it. With the ECO in the CLA the engine shuts down when you come to a complete stop and your foot is on the brake. As soon as you take your foot off the brake you can hear the engine start up but it didn’t start up as smoothly as the Passat did. There was a definite lag between taking my foot off the brake and getting going again. Once I got going I could really hear the engine and it didn’t take off as smoothly as I has expected. Once it got going then it started to feel much better. The engine was quite responsive. The suspension was a bit on the sporty side but not too much to be annoying (note: this was with the 17” wheels. I didn’t get to try out the 18”). It handles around turns and curves quite well and overall the car felt good. As mentioned before, the rear view vision wasn’t that great but the blind spot warning system worked well and helped out.

Overall it’s a nice car and has its pros and cons. Although the car is comfortable to ride in, it is a small. I would say the car is comparable to a Civic in interior space. It looks nice and has a lot of style. I’m not 100% sold on it just yet. I’ll have to check out the competition when they come out with their comparable models.

My ride was a pretty base car. The grill was black (the hexes), not chrome. I apologize for not taking a shot of the sticker. It had the lights and 18' wheels with perf. tires, but no sport suspension. My salesman knows I am not a buyer for this car; I just wanted to see the color, (Mt. Grey) and seats. I got the 5 mile little old lady test drive which I drove like a little old lady in Eco mode. I found the very slight jerk on restart acceptable. In the real world I think this is the way the car will be driven in crowded city, suburban conditions, and I don't think you will notice it in a few days. (I don't know why I took the time to mention this. It ain't an option. You get the car; you get the eco mode.)

I did not find the car small, but my last cars have been an '04 M3 which I sold in a year because of harsh ride, an '06 Lex is350 which my wife inherited when I got my '07 335 coupe. This is the size car I feel comfortable with.

With the 18" wheels and standard suspension I found the ride "Mercedes like". Obviously it was not as firm as the C63 I drove a week ago, but it didn't feel like Lincoln Town Car either.

The steering wheel felt fine and the paddle shifters probably worked just as well as the larger AMG shifters, you just have to know they're there.

The MBText upholstery looks like leather if you need bifocals, but don't have them on.

The car had the small screen which looked - OK, i.e. not a deal breaker. There was no rear camera, and I didn't notice if there is any audible back up warning. I don't think so.

This was not a $30K car; it was $34K, and if it didn't have an MB badge, I would expect to pay 28. YMMMV

I hope this was at least somewhat helpful,
Richard

I test drove one last week in the pouring rain. It had the pano roof and p1 package. It was raining all day, so the roads were really bad. What better way to test it out. It handled great in those conditions. I'm currently in a 2012 C250 so trying to compare the two. Inside, I didnt notice much of a space difference. I'm 5'6 so the car had plenty of room for me. So the things i noticed between the C250 and CLA, CLA was definitely quicker. I didnt notice much difference in the FWD vs RWD. Minor things I thought CLA didn't have as nice. The steering wheel felt smaller, didnt have as much cushion. Lacked a lot of the metal trim the C250 has. The center console is all black plastic vs metal in the 250. No metal trim on the doors or the pedals either. Also steering wheel didnt have the metal on the voice command buttons etc on. The ECO thing will take some getting use to. You can always turn it off too, but I could tell the engine shut off and turned on. So again minor things, i loved the CLA. I ended up ordering one fully loaded... Bi-X lights, Pano roof, sports package (def recommend that), Prem package, leather (i liked the stitching in the interior) media package (5inch screen is too small) and blind spot assist. It could just be me, but it wasnt the easiest to see out the back and sides.. They said production of my car is late oct, should be in by early dec. Two dealerships ordered it, i didnt ask. they said it will sell regardless. But timing is good as winter event will be going on and the GM said they will be incentives then, so they will be able to work on a better price.

Does anyone know if the front and back tires are different size? The C250 has different size front and back. so you can't rotate them.

thanks!