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First Impressions (0-1 years)
7.8
The Review
A poor show for the new A35, with a customer sending the car back after 8 months
I don't know about anyone else, but when I heard that the mighty AMG boys and girsl were adding another sibling to their range, in the form of another hot A Class, I naturally assumed my Meerkat position. Haven driven the A45 and GLA45, I figured that, with the exception of a few small gripe I had, this sounded like some very promising news. Reading all of the published articles, there was nothing to suggest that this would change. Launch day came and went and tons of happy customers took delivery of their shiny new baby AMGs.
So, curious as I am, and still in my meerkat pose, I reached out to a customer who was up their in the queue and had already taken delivery of his shiny new toy. His initial impressions were good! Fast and handles well.. Of course, there is really no way that the Afflerbach army could ever afford to get that one wrong again. But after that came a few issues with various "bits". First was some rattles on the right side. Then there was the right side lane assist which also didn't work as expected. Mid range sound was the other gripe, but that is something I hear and have experienced with the drone like sound of the GLA45 I lived with for a while! The same owner then almost lost his.... mind when the service indicator popped up after only 4.5k miles.. hmmm.. Meerkat receding slightly.
Undeterred, I decided to try and speak to another owner from Instagram, so see if they had better luck. I asked for a statement and to provide some scores for his car.
Hear is what he had to say: “ Amazing car, definitely turns heads by its looks and the sound of it. Don’t see many about. Aggressive engine and gearbox making it very fun to drive and hard to get bored off. The interior is at another level and never seen one compare. But I wouldn’t recommend getting it in white or with leather seats, as the polar white models are having paint problems under the bonnet and turning yellow after about 1000 miles. Secondly the leather seats after 50 miles are going saggy and not fit for purpose, making them look about 10 years old. But fair play to Mercedes as they have excepted full responsibility and after owning the car 8 months, they have taken back and giving a full refund.”
He also scored the car above, which as you can see was not all bad at the end of the day! But definitely some significant room for improving build quality across the board!!
What is now clear for this particular Meerkat, is that, although the idea of an A35 is a great one, it feels like it might have not been quite ready to take the world by storm, but certainly could once they have sorted out their teething challenges.
Do you own, or have you driven the A35? Write and review and let us know what you think!
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