Mercedes-Benz CLA

Mercedes CLA

Have you ever looked at the Mercedes-Benz CLS and thought ‘my word that’s a gorgeous looking car’ and then been reduced to tiers by looking at the $130k plus price tag? Well weep no more because in a cloud of dry ice and pop music in Detroit this morning the lovely new Mercedes CLA emerged. It’s just like the enormous luxury land yacht CLS except it’s smaller and most importantly much cheaper, around half the price in fact. In America – the land of opportunity and cheap cars – the CLA is going to cost as little as $30,000 and will undercut similarly equipped C Class models by a few thousand dollars. 

Mercedes CLA at Detroit show. Pop music and dry ice essential.

Mercedes has done quite a good job with the design of the CLA. They haven’t muddled up all the proportions when shrinking the CLS to fit the A Class chassis, unlike BMW who has done for the past seven years with the almost perfect X5 and weird looking X3.  

The only model variant that we currently know of is the CLA250 which will make use of a 2.0 liter turbocharged 4 cylinder engine which produces 155kw. The engine is mated to a 7 speed dual clutch transmission which sends power to the front wheels or through an optional 4MATIC all wheel drive system. The top speed will be somewhere in the vicinity of 150mph and 0-60 sprint times are currently unknown but are expected to be close to those Mercedes quotes for the A250 which the CLA is based on. The interior is an almost identical design to the A Class hatchback which makes use of a more sporting interior than those fitted in the C and E Class as Mercedes attempts to ditch the beret and beige elbow padded blazer wearing old man image and attract a younger audience with these smaller and more affordable models. 

Mercedes CLA Interior

A CLA45 AMG model is also expected to eventually join the CLA line up and will boast the same 2.0 liter turbocharged engine and 4MATIC all wheel drive system as the upcoming A45 AMG hatch. The 2.0 liter AMG engine is said to be the most powerful 4 cylinder production engine in the world producing around 250kw and making the A45 capable of hitting 60mph in under 5 seconds.  

We can expect to see the Mercedes CLA in Australia by the end of this year priced from around $50,000. And at that price they’ll sell better than the new One Direction CD.