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New Mercedes A-Class Limousine: Specs, features and expected price

Mercedes is targeting not only the new aspirants to the brand, but also the existing customers who’d like a second, smaller vehicle in their fleet.

New Delhi: Making an affordable luxury car is a risky business. A company has to provide not just their luxury symbol, but also the uniqueness that is associated with it. Customers expect a perfect mix of powertrains that match the latest technology and all this has to be done while trying to keep the price from going too high.

It’s no surprise that most luxury car brands generate larger amount of sales from the upper segments because customers often bypass the entry-level and go for more expensive and better car. But, with the new A-class Limousine, Mercedes is trying to attract not only the new aspirants to the brand, but also the existing customers who are looking to add a second, smaller vehicle in their garage.

Mercedes A-class Limousine: interior and features

Interior is where the new A-class has brought the ‘wow’ factor. The new interior comes consists of high-quality plastics, bright work in all the required places and soft-touch materials everywhere. They’ve chosen a good set of specs for India, with cream-coloured upholstery, a black dash top and open-pore wood, imparting a properly luxurious feel. The rotary AC vents are an upgrade to the ones in the old CLA; new vents are particularly impressive and even consist of ambient lighting.

Let’s talk about the design of the dashboard, which is really fresh. The lower-half is made to look like a shelf, onto which sits a slim and never ending panel of two adjoined 10.25-inch high-definition screens. Essentially, the smaller version of the MBUX infotainment which you’ll find in a GLE or GLS is small on features, but not this one. Almost every feature from the bigger cars is present here, including the 64-colour ambient lighting, an AI-based digital assistant and connected-car tech with Alexa integration.

The customisable digital instrument cluster layout is also available. Other satisfying features are wireless phone charging, dual-zone climate control, powered seats with memory function for the driver and front passenger along with a large sunroof. Speaking of the front seats, they’re a little smaller than what you’d see in the upper models of  Mercedes, due to which they don’t offer quite as good an experience, but they’re still pretty comfortable. This is important because the A Limousine is more likely than any other Mercedes sedan to be owner-driven.

The back seat is also important in this section of the market, however, and this is where the upgrade from four-door-coupe to sedan has really paid off. Space in the back is really good for the car’s size, especially the knee-room. All thanks to the long 2,729mm wheelbase and the extra headroom is because of the taller roof.

This extra space gives it a distinct advantage over its only real rival, the BMW 2 Series Gran Coupe, whose sloping roof really covers most of the rear-seat space and makes it a little uncomfortable. The relatively narrow cabin in BMW makes it better suited for just two, and the bigger issue in that is one has to sit very low down, so the person has to push his knees up. You can get around this problem to some extent by putting your feet under the front seats; there’s plenty of space for that purpose.

Spare tyre is usually sitting in the boot of these imported pre-production cars, but the locally assembled version will have a special place for the spare under the boot floor. The volumes, incidentally, are 405 litres for the petrol and 395 litres for the diesel, and you can even fold down the back seats to pack in more stuff.

Engine and Price

There will be three variants available of the A-class limousine at launch – the A 200 petrol, A 200d diesel and the AMG A35. The A200 diesel and petrol have a four-cylinder 1.3 litre engine with a displacement of just 1332cc, but it is turbocharged and gives a very impressive 163bhp and 250Nm of torque. Transferring the power to the front wheels is a seven-speed DCT gearbox.

That price, however, may not be on the cards, as there will be only one fully loaded variant of each, the A 200 and A 200d, and we expect them to cost about Rs 40-42 lakh (ex-showroom), similar to the BMW 2 Series Gran Coupe