Bruce
Kraftwagen König
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- Bruce McCulloch
Could this be the perfect two-car fleet for those not needing more than a pair of seats?
It’s the stuff of our dreams, and why we work at Road & Track...generous quantities of horsepower, channeled effectively to a sticky set of tires, contained within a chassis so utterly responsive that changes of direction seem more like an act of will than the result of physical input.
Within this framework, vastly different approaches can achieve the same end. Take the Mercedes-Benz CLK63 AMG Black Series, a street-legal DTM car with a howitzer under the hood — 6.2 liters of AMG hand-assembled V-8 belting out 507 bhp and a guttural roar that sets off car alarms and registers on nearby seismographs. And then there’s the pearl-handled revolver, the Lotus Exige S, with considerably less firepower (220 bhp from its supercharged, Toyota-sourced 1.8-liter) but a curb weight that’s nearly half of the big Merc’s and that sliceable, diceable handling sharpness that can come only from a fine-tuned featherweight vehicle. Sure, the sewing-machine-on-uppers soundtrack may not stir the emotions, but its ability to lock onto apexes like a Sidewinder missile more than compensates.
This is not a head-to-head comparison, as the cars vary in their missions. But we never pass up a chance to lap a racetrack in cars so equipped, so it was off to Willow Springs Raceway in Southern California’s high desert for some hard cornering, evaluation, and yes, some smoky gratuitous sliding shots. And, of course, we provide the hard numbers through our standard battery of instrumented tests.
"Hasta la vista, baby!" You can almost hear The Governator’s Austrian-accented Spanish in the background as this Schwarzen-Benz thunders off to a 12.4-second quarter mile and rolls over the competition, girlie-man or otherwise. The CLK63 AMG Black Series is all about brute force and blunt trauma, its 6.2-liter dohc V-8 administering a 507-bhp wallop through a 7-speed torque-converter automatic, dubbed AMG SpeedShift, that bucks the trend of servo-actuated manuals. If rear tires could cry Uncle, its 285-section Pirelli P Zero Corsas would be screaming for mercy.
This Black Series is really a sight to behold, as its bodywork originates directly from the Mercedes-Benz F1 safety car that’s seen leading Alonso, Räikkönen, Hamilton and the rest at Formula 1 races. That means an ultrawide stance, ample flares (the front fenders are plastic), a deep front splitter, dramatic forged, thin-spoke 19-in. wheels, and judicious bits of carbon-fiber — those low-mounted extractor vents flanking the nose, a rear deck spoiler and a straked rear diffuser that also houses a differential cooler fed by an electric pump. And its silver paint, almost iridescent in the late afternoon light, shows every mean-spirited bulge and wicked vent off to best effect. "I just can’t stop shooting this car," said photographer Barry Hathaway between frames.
It’s equally hard to stop driving it too, so addictive is the rippling flow of torque to the tires, routed through a clutch-pack limited-slip diff that chatters (as any proper high-performance car should) around very tight corners. Defeat the stability program, and wheelspin in 1st and 2nd gear is no more than an inch of throttle travel away, but hook it up and 60 mph arrives in a thunderous 4.1 sec. Aluminum steering-wheel paddles select from the seven available ratios, but even in the so-called Manual mode, we wish the upshifts were quicker...and that the electronic throttle would offer rev-matching blips when changing down.
On Willow Spring’s big track, the first thing you notice is the utter slot-car immediacy of turn-in, felt through a small, thick-rim-section wheel whose squashed-oval shape and deeply sculpted thumb grooves tactilely communicate the Black’s serious mission. Grip is impressive, 0.98g of stick by way of the Pirellis’ R-compound rubber, and remote-reservoir shocks adjustable for both jounce and rebound damping help to maintain that grip. Also, threaded spring perches all around allow for ride-height and cornering-weighting adjustments, and there’s significantly more camber and caster adjustability for hard-core track work. Also aiding the seat-of-the-pants feel are special leather-clad bucket seats whose width-adjustable, plus-size bolsters effectively transmit even the slightest sensation of yaw to your torso.
Turn off the stability control (ESP), and there’s more than enough yaw to go around. With production settings, the Black has a near-neutral balance, with the slightest prod of the throttle sending it into a euphoric powerslide. Fun through lower-speed corners, but downright hairy through Willow’s 120-plus-mph Turns 8 and 9. With wider rear tires, a softer rear bar or a little less spring rate back there for a touch of comforting understeer, the beast could be tamed a little yet still impress the circus audience.
Brakes are hugely effective, big 6-piston calipers with floating rotors up front, and 4-pots at the rear clamping solid rotors; their friction surfaces both slotted and cross-drilled. So ABS stops will throw you forcefully into the 3-point belts, with a pedal as firm as Ah-nold’s biceps, ultra-short stopping distances and no perceptible fade.
Look more closely and more details emerge to justify the Black’s $135,000 price. The rich Alcantara headliner. The seductive carbon fiber on the center console and three-dial instrument panel. The tiny, satin-finish gear selector, its smallness so out of proportion with the power it commands. And the absence of a rear seat, the area trimmed neatly with edged carpet and plastic finishing panels...the perfect place to store your helmet.
Look at the two of these cars...how can you think about anything other than going fast? They flat-out scream excitement. And while they are incredibly different animals, they share one thing in common: They aren’t quite what they appear.
The Mercedes-Benz CLK63 AMG Black Series looks and sounds like a race car, but in reality it works far better as a street machine than it ever will on a track. The Exige S, on the other hand, is basically a race car that Lotus has thinly disguised as a road machine, leading some to believe it’s livable for everyday, drive-to-the-office use. Trust us, it’s not. Take the Exige S to a track or on a back road, though, and holy cow! You’ll think you died and went to sports-car heaven; it may be the purest driving machine on the planet, even if it’s nowhere near the quickest in a straight line.
The Exige S is much improved over the normally aspirated Elise and Exige models (the last is no longer sold in the U.S.), due to adding 7.3 psi of boost via a Roots-type supercharger to the 1.8-liter Toyota 4-cylinder mounted transversely aft of the driver. The Exige S makes 220 bhp (versus 190 bhp in the Elise/Exige) at 8000 rpm and 165 lb.-ft. of torque at 5500 rpm. The supercharger’s aftercooler is mounted atop the engine, making what was already a difficult car to see out the back of...now an impossible one.
While its 0–60-mph acceleration of 4.6 seconds was only 0.2 sec. quicker than the normally aspirated Exige we previously tested, what’s significant about the Exige S is how much more driveable it is over an Elise or Exige; those models make all their power at 6000-plus rpm, while the Exige S makes 80 percent of its max torque at just over 2000 rpm. Basically, it now has power everywhere, accompanied by a light whining noise from the supercharger.
Running full-tilt around Willow Springs Raceway showed the unbelievable capabilities of this car. The non-power-assisted steering, fed to your gloved hands through a tiny Momo steering wheel, is the most direct you’ll ever find, and quite quick at speed. Aim the Exige S toward a corner and it goes there right now. Get hard on what appear to be tiny brakes (11.5-in. rotors all around, 2-piston calipers up front/single-piston at the rear) and it scrubs off speed so quickly through the firm pedal that you’d think the car weighs only 2030 lb. Wait — that’s because it does!
Trail-brake into a corner and the tail will step out slightly, sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. Get back on the throttle too early and that light front end will push — that means you did it wrong. Take a corner correctly, for instance the left-hand, uphill Turn 3, and the tail wags just slightly as you trail-brake, and then wags a touch more under power as you exit; but don’t count on big powerslides — its mid-engine layout endows it with terrific traction.
Proving how perfect the Exige S is as a track car, we found that despite the legendary gripping ability of its Yokohama Advan A048 tires, they wore at a far slower rate than we expected, especially considering we were running in desert heat — there was still plenty of tire left when we drove home. And those tiny brakes? Even after many, many laps of pushing the car to its limits, we never experienced any fade.
The track is where the Exige S is brilliant; the street — especially daily use — not so much. The seats are neither comfortable nor laterally supportive, their extreme light weight not really a good enough excuse. The ride is rock-hard; the 4-speaker stereo fights a losing battle to keep up with road and engine noise; and it’s downright comical to watch anyone over 5 ft. 8 in. tall try to crawl into or out of the diminutive interior.
But none of that matters if you have the right intentions for the Exige S. Factor in price — $64,855 as tested — and the Exige S is the best street-legal production track car you can buy. Period. No need to install a big brake kit, do any suspension modifications or even carry out an expensive search for more power; it’s ready to rock and kick butt on overweight, overpowered cars as soon as you drive it off the showroom floor.
About 350 fortunate Americans will have the pleasure of owning the Black, available in black (naturally), Arctic White, Iridium Silver and Mars Red. To paraphrase another Hollywood action hero, "You must feel lucky, punks." Just be ready with opposite lock to catch the slide.
Video:
The CLK63 BS sounds awesome.
