Not to trump on your passion about the car, but Mercedes is not what it used to be. A friend of mine who used to work on Mercedes, because he thought they were the greatest thing on Earth, quit because he can't stand the quality of the cars anymore. You could see his desire drop for them as the years went on. Same thing with another guy too - My sales guy at Cadillac used to sell Mercedes. A couple years back he went to selling Cadillac for much the same reason - he no longer felt good about the product he was selling.
Why? Haven't you noticed that Mercedes haven't changed in price in 10, 15, to 20 years? Other car manufacturers costs keep going up, but theirs stays pretty much the same unless you buy a 'specialized' version. That means their quality is what has taken it in the shorts to make up for the stagnent rise in the cost of the cars. Everything is cheaply made now on Mercedes. BMW, though they have done some things similar, has for the most part avoided the pitfalls Mercedes has fallen into. Hopefully at least one of the good German car manufacturers stays inline, and that torch goes to BMW to carry on for now.
Maybe Mercedes will pull out of it at some point and go back to building top notch cars, but I seriously doubt it.
-S
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