I’m guessing you all know who Chris Harris is and what he does best, so the combination between him and the new Mercedes-Benz C 63 AMG is pretty mouth watering.
Add the Portimao racetrack in Portugal into the mix and you get the right recipe for extracting the most out of the new AMG car, in the most fun way.
As expected, the video debuts with a big powerslide, something that quickly establishes itself as the theme of the whole video. After all, it is Chris Harris we’re talking about.
He then starts to talk about the new C 63 AMG and how the old model was something of an icon, with over 40.000 units sold worldwide. The new cars loses the 6.2 naturally aspirated V8 engine in favor of the 4.0 bi-turbo V8 we’ve already seen and loved on the AMG GT.
We won’t go into detail right now (we’ll have our own drive test with the car early next week), but he’s pretty happy with the power available from the new M177 engine (it bears a different name tag than that in the AMG GT because it has a wet sump instead of a dry one).
Actually, he describes the car as being “an animal”, which pretty much says it all.
He also praises the adaptive damping system and the new electric power steering, which even though he feels is not as well balanced as a hydraulic one, still manages to be an improvement over what we’ve been treated to lately in this department.
Next is the rear locking differential which comes in two flavors: either mechanical, or electronic – the latter available on the S model. The Mercedes-Benz C 63 AMG S also gets more power out of the V8 engine (510 hp in total), but the carbon ceramic brakes are optional all across the range.
The gearbox it uses isn’t a double clutch unit, but Chris Harris says it is just as quick in sport mode and just as smooth when cruising as a double clutched one. Actually, he states that the C 63 AMG makes for an excellent GT, with very comfortable seats and a decent fuel consumption figure.
As for the dynamics, he sees the C 63 AMG more like a muscle car than a full sports one. When he addresses the inevitable question “is it better than the BMW M3?”, he’s a bit reluctant to offer a direct answer, saying he needed to drive both cars at the same time, in the same place. Still, he reckons they are two very different vehicles and believes that most people are more likely to feel attracted towards the Mercedes-Benz.
The bottom line is that he doesn’t think anyone will be losing any sleep over the old engine since the new one is so great and doesn’t do anything to alter the car’s personality. With a little help from the clever exhaust system which Chris Harris explains in great detail.
