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Mercedes-Benz’s mighty S-Class sedan is often regarded as the world’s best luxury car. Now it has an electrical alternative called the EQS.
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The EQS has a remarkable drag coefficient of just 0.2 and reaches a range of 479 miles during the European test cycle.
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The EQS is a forward design with a fast rear end.
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A Photoshop version by Aurich Lawson, creative director of Ars Technica, showing what the car can look like without the two-tone paint.
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The EQS uses a 400 V electrical architecture, but can charge up to 200 KW quickly.
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The inside is dominated by this 56 inch “Hyperscreen”.
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The passenger display will fade if it detects drivers looking at it while they are supposed to see their eyes on the road.
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Not quite as luxurious as the Rolls-Royce Ghost we tested recently, but not far off.
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Retractable door handles help the EQS get such a low drag coefficient.
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The main instrument screen can show you.
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It can also show you a map.
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The MBUX system is powered by an eight-core CPU and uses 24 GB of RAM.
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On-board AI helps optimize your navigation routes for state of charge.
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The disk settings in the EQS are very configurable.
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I like a good seat massager in a luxury car.
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This is what Android Auto looks like on the central infotainment screen.
Mercedes-EQ
You can see that this week there was to be an international car show with the wave of announcements about new cars. These announcements have already included new battery-powered electric vehicles from Mazda and Audi, as well as a small Hyundai truck that apparently impressed many people. Meanwhile, Mercedes-Benz has found an electric alternative to its mighty flagship S-Class. Let me actually correct this – this is the first car of a new sub-brand, called Mercedes-EQ, and the car is called the EQS. And unlike the EQC crossover, this one is definitely going to be on sale here in the US.
Do not mistake this car for an S-Class with a battery and some electric motors instead of an engine and transmission. Although the two cars share technology, the EQS uses a purpose-built BEV architecture that we will see in other, probably more modest Mercedes EQs. In the conventionally powered world, the S-Class has been the best car for the title of ‘World’s Best’ for decades, and the EQS sticks to the playbook.
The EQS has a drag coefficient that can make a Lucid Air driver wonder if someone is leaving a window open. It has a range that is much more than a Tesla Model S Long Range. It can generate more brake energy than a Porsche Taycan Turbo S. And the dashboard has been replaced by 56-centimeter AI-enhanced computer screens. Oh, and did I mention that the doors close themselves?
Mercedes has a history of creating low-drag shapes, but the design team has outdone itself here by producing a forward-facing cab shape that has already drawn comparisons to nineties chryslers. The EQS has a drag coefficient (Cd) of 0.2, which is the 0.21 achieved by an EQS competitor, the Lucid Aid. With a front surface of 2.51 m2, the EQS therefore has a CdA – the number that really matters – of 0.5 m2.
The incredibly impressive drag coefficient helped Mercedes-EQ reach an estimate of the range (using the European WLTP test format) of 770 km (479 miles). (In this context, the Tesla Model S Long Range Plus, with an EPA range estimate of 391 miles, is rated at 610 km under WLTP.) However, the EQS packs a lot of lithium ion to get there: a usable 107 , 8 kWh in total. (The battery is guaranteed to maintain at least 70 percent capacity for ten years or 155,000 miles.)
Mercedes-EQ says it should only take 31 minutes to charge the pack quickly (from 10 to 80 percent charge), although it does require a 200kW GS fast charger. However, the EQS uses a 400 V vehicle architecture, which means that in practice you may not find any compatible public chargers with more than 150 kW.
There are initially two choices of power station. The EQS 450+ is the rear-wheel drive, powered by a 245 kW (328 hp), 550 Nm (406 lb-ft) permanent magnet-synchronous motor. It is sufficient for a 0-62 mph (0-100 km / h) time of 5.5 seconds and a top speed of 130 mph (210 km / h), and the EQS 450+ can also revive brake energy up to 186 kW . (A faster Mercedes-AMG BEV is also underway.)
If it sounds too plebeian, there’s the EQS 580 4MATIC, which also adds a permanent magnet-synchronous motor for the front end. This version has a combined output of 385 kW (516 hp) and 828 Nm (616 lb-ft), reducing the time from 0-62 to 4.1 seconds. The 4MATIC drive can even brake up to 290 kW regenerative, which is higher than the Taycan Turbo and, interestingly, also 45 percent higher than the maximum DC charging rate.
I hope you like screens
The sheer amount of screens in the EQS is not a surprise, as Mercedes unveiled it in 2021’s virtual CES in all its centimeter glory. In fact, these are actually three separate screens with a single-glazed glass cover that extends from one side of the cabin to the other. The main instrument screen for the driver is a 12.3-inch screen. In the center of the dashboard is the 17.7-inch central screen that uses an OLED panel and haptic feedback. And in front of the passenger is another OLED haptic screen, it measures 12.3 inches. The one will also play video content for the passenger, but the driver monitoring system for gaze detection in the EQS will dim the screen when it sees the driver looking at this screen.
If you do not want to sting the shiny screens with a fingertip, Mercedes’ Linux-based MBUX infotainment platform includes extremely effective voice recognition in natural languages. MBUX also uses AI to know its driver behavior and optimize routes for charging stations, and so on.
The Mercedes-EQ EQS will arrive in the US later in 2021, and although prices have not yet been announced, the $ 110,000 S-Class is likely to be a decent measure before any incentives are considered.
List by Mercedes-EQ