Previously on Meet the S-Class DIGITAL:
You need to experience it.
And I’m very positive that once you do, you will remember this conversation.
And now, you know, this is not a coincidence
what you’re going to be feeling, but it’s an Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
And there you have it. On previous episodes of Meet the S-Class DIGITAL
it was all about that avantgarde design
and class-leading safety features amongst many topics.
You know me, I’m a hands-on girl and learning by doing is what I’m best at.
So lucky me, we do have several new Mercedes-Benz S-Class models right outside the door.
And I would also like to say, hello and welcome.
Thanks for joining us.
We are here at Mercedes-Benz proving ground in Immendingen in Germany.
So welcome to the wonderful world of the all-new Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
And now it is time for us to discover what the Mercedes-Benz exhibition has to offer.
Follow me!
Dirk, just the man I’ve been looking for. Hi, Dirk.
Hello, Yasmine. How are you? Good to see you.
Good to see you as well from afar. How are you today?
Very good. How are you?
I’m fine. A bit cold, so I can’t wait to hop inside.
Remember, do you know why I’m here?
Do you remember the promise you made me?
Absolutely and promises are there to be kept.
Before we get started: Why don’t I ask you
just one or two questions just to set the mood?
Absolutely.
First of all, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, we have the all new Mercedes-Benz S-Class here
and the Mercedes-Benz S-Class is the first model that comes to mind as a consumer
when we speak of the brand of Mercedes-Benz.
Why is that so? Why is the Mercedes-Benz S-Class so special to you?
For us at Mercedes-Benz, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class is hugely important.
It is our flagship and it always has been our flagship
and it really embodies all of our knowledge, all of our experience
and, I guess, all of our pride in building cars.
It’s exactly the Mercedes-Benz S-Class with which we push the boundaries in car building
of what can be done from a technological point of view,
but also from an innovation point of view, and speaking about innovation,
the only thing that we’re still working on, which is not yet in this car,
is a weather control feature, but I still think you will enjoy this day.
Yeah. Work harder. I’ll be back again, I’ll be back next year.
Now, Dirk, you also have a very personal connection to the model,
to the Mercedes-Benz S-Class model. What is your story?
I guess as a car guy, you have to have a connection to a Mercedes-Benz S-Class,
I grew up as a boy in Stuttgart and obviously, you have these posters of
V12 mid-engine cars in your room
but you always look to the best car in the world, which always was the Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
So, I was running around in auto shows, collecting those catalogues,
which I still have at home. So, that’s my connection, I guess.
Wonderful. And you had one in your family?
Yeah. At one point my father was able to afford a Mercedes-Benz S-Class
and he made his dream come true, but also my dream come true.
So, I really do remember the first time I rode in a Mercedes-Benz S-Class
somewhere in the early nineties, I guess.
And I will always remember this day,
the first time I rode in the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class and you have set the mood perfectly.
And that’s going to happen today.
It’s just right for me to hop in. May I?
Absolutely.
All right. Let’s get going.
And I’ll give you a call from inside the car, okay?
Absolutely.
All right. Now, we finally have the opportunity to take sort of a deep-dive
into some of those topics we were talking about previously
on Meet the S-Class DIGITAL.
Starting out MBUX: Mercedes-Benz multimedia system.
And I’m a great fan of the MBUX.
Let’s try calling Dirk. Hey Mercedes.
How may I help you?
Call Dirk.
I am calling the cell phone of Dirk Fetzer now.
Hello?
Hey Dirk, we tried out MBUX, voice control and driving.
Let me tell you, this is so much fun.
It’s not only extremely comfortable. It’s super intuitive.
I have no work to do at all as a driver.
Oh, I love to hear that.
I mean, I was waiting for your call.
I almost thought you did a runner with the car.
I wouldn’t blame you. So, remember we said last time,
during the Meet the S-Class DIGITAL, when I stop talking, so what do you hear?
Absolutely nothing.
Exactly as promised. Very happy to hear that.
So, you said you got acquainted with the MBUX already a little bit.
We had some expert talks on the MBUX and I’d love to show a clip.
What do you think?
Let’s do it. Roll the clip.
My name is Maxi Vogel and I’m responsible for
the holistic user interaction concept of our new Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
MBUX has tonnes of thousands of features, as you already know,
but I’m going to show you my top three.
Let’s start with the first one.
Smart Home Integration finally arrived in our all-new Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
And I’m going to show you how you can use that one. Hey Mercedes?
How can I help?
Are the lights turned on at home?
I checked it out for you. Currently, all lights are on.
Please turn them off.
Sure, I’ll turn off your lights.
My next highlight is our MBUX Sharing panel.
Since MBUX is now available on all seats,
you can have a very cool collaborative experience with our Sharing panel.
You can control the displays, for example, switch them on,
or you can also block them and, very cool and easy, share content,
for example videos.
Let me show you my third highlight.
It’s the Sport context in our instrument cluster.
You get there very easily with just a few swipes
and get a very cool emotional sport context within red colour,
but also a lot of engine data info, G-force, Newton metre, but you know what?
It’s better experienced while driving. So, let’s take a ride.
Okay, Yasmine, after we’ve seen some details about MBUX,
you remember in Meet Mercedes DIGITAL,
we also spoke about the plug-in hybrid.
Yes, I do recall it was all about busting myths
that surround the plug-in hybrid, right?
Exactly. And we’re going to have a Mercedes-Benz S-Class plug-in hybrid very soon.
Right? I should’ve known, sorry.
Yeah, I let you get away with it.
Let’s also have a look at a clip about the plug-in hybrid.
Yes, let’s do it.
My name is Matthias Klöpfer, at Mercedes-Benz, I’m responsible
for the development of hybrid transmission software.
As you know, there are a lot of myths about plug-in hybrids,
but still plug-in hybrids are combining the best of two worlds.
With our new plug-in hybrid in the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, hybrid of the generation four,
we are getting more electric than ever.
The most impressive effect is an electric range of approximately 100 kilometres.
And this is a value which you can also reach in real life.
We achieved this electric range with a big battery of 28.6 kilowatt hours energy.
And we also have more power in the battery and to charge more power,
we also have new chargers with an 11 kilowatt AC charger, which is series.
And we have an optional DC charger, which has 60 kilowatts.
With this charger you can give the battery a full charge within
about half an hour.
The heart of the plug-in hybrid is the electric motor.
The electric motor is between the gearbox, the 9G-TRONIC and the combustion engine.
We have an electric motor with 110 kilowatts,
and we have 120 kilowatts for recuperation.
And there’s a lot of technology here.
We have a torque converter, we have the lock-up clutch.
And we also included now the power electronics in the power head.
As I said before, the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class hybrid is more electric than ever.
And now let’s go for a ride and see how this feels.
So now we are in the Mercedes-Benz S-Class hybrid and we are
driving electrically, smooth and comfortable.
Let’s see what the vehicle is doing.
So we can see torque and power now.
So, I’m full on the gas and electric maximum.
And if I decelerate, now, you can see the recuperation.
Well, as I told you, the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class hybrid is more electric than ever before.
All right, Dirk. So, what else is there you’d like to tell me
about the all new Mercedes-Benz S-Class?
Remember, we talked about the safety systems in the car,
like the rear seat airbag.
We have such a comprehensive safety system in the car,
it almost extends to each and every component of the vehicle.
All right. Well that is, I think, definitely a topic that our viewers
would like to see more about in a video featuring our experts. Here we go.
My name is Matthias Struck.
I’m a senior safety engineer in vehicle safety at Mercedes-Benz.
Real-life safety is what is driving us, the engineers at Mercedes Benz.
The unique safety concept of course is true for all Mercedes-Benz models.
A flagship like the Mercedes-Benz S-Class has some special features.
The driver assistance package comes standard with the Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
In addition to that, vehicles with DRIVE PILOT also feature, for instance,
this LiDAR sensor up front here in the grille.
And now we’re coming to my personal favourite:
40 years after the introduction of the driver airbag in a Mercedes-Benz S-Class,
we are now introducing the rear airbags.
That’s the first frontal airbags for both rear seats.
And what is so special about that is that this airbag uses
a special tubular structure and ambient air to create
the restraint function.
Dirk, another thing I’ve always wanted to know more about is Intelligent Drive.
What can you tell me about that?
I think it’s best if you try that out for yourself.
So why don’t you let the test car pass you right now?
All right.
Oh, wow. Okay, so the ambient lights are actually indicating
that a car is passing by.
That is absolutely true. And if you have tried to move over,
it would have indicated quite differently. You would have noticed.
But what we haven’t talked about yet are the standard
driving assistance features in this vehicle.
They are quite comprehensive, but in 2021, we even go one level further
and we do conditionally Automated Driving Level 3.
All right. Now that is definitely something I’d like to hear more about.
So here come, once more, our experts.
My name is Jochen Hab, here at Mercedes-Benz in Immendingen,
I’m responsible for concept and field validation, testing technologies
and technical communication of
the Intelligent Drive driver assistance systems.
If you want, I’m responsible for real-life safety testing.
We’re sitting in the Mercedes-Benz S-Class equipped with DRIVE PILOT,
our level three system in this new and beautiful car.
And we will encounter a traffic jam in a very few moments.
And as soon as the car detects the traffic jam and we’re in the range
of these cars and in the range of speed, it offers me to activate the DRIVE PILOT.
I just have to press one of these buttons.
And as you can see, they turn turquoise, both of them,
and also the rim of the steering wheel.
Plus, I get a display here and then I can let go.
The car will drive by itself.
The responsibility is with the car and I can do other things.
For example, let’s just check what’s on the browser.
Even in tricky situations, the car can assist me.
I can stay relaxed and I can just enjoy the ride.
And I can rely on the safety of this car.
Ooh, even as in this example, if there was an unforeseen end of a traffic jam
that I couldn’t see because there was a big car ahead of me.
But of course I have to stay alert and be prepared to take over.
The car tells me to take control, I take control, I press the buttons.
There was a police car in this case, and it’s safer if I steer the car,
so the police car can pass through the emergency corridor.
But of course, afterwards, I can always reactivate DRIVE PILOT
and just keep going.
So, this is the comfort we can offer you in the DRIVE PILOT,
the comfort and the safety.
And we’re convinced that by the time we offer it next year in the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class,
you will love the system.
Dirk, one thing that is really impressive is the rear-wheel steering,
especially at higher speeds, it makes driving really agile and a lot of fun.
Yeah. Our engineers have done a great job there and it very much depends on
the rear wheels to actually steer with or against the front wheel.
So, depending on that, you either have a lot of agility at higher speeds,
or you have a great manoeuvrability when you, for instance,
want to park in a tight parking spot.
I would like to hear even more about that, but we’re running out of time.
So, I’m just going to come back to where you are. Okay, Dirk?
That is tough luck, but I’m happy to meet you right here.
Meet you. I’ll see you in a minute.
See you in a minute.
There she is.
It was amazing. It was so much fun.
I’m so happy you loved it. I was almost sure.
I did love it. Thank you for letting me have this fantastic ride.
Thank you for today.
Great, before you step out of the car, I need you to experience one thing.
It’s our new 3D instrument cluster.
So, you might just want to press this little 3D button on your centre screen,
and now check the instrument cluster and tell me what you see.
Wow, a tunnel, and it looks like a real-life tunnel that I’m driving into.
Amazing!
This 3D feature is so hard to get across if you don’t experience that.
So, I was just using you as a medium to tell us how great this feature is.
I feel honoured. Thank you for choosing me to be your medium
and thank you again for today.
My absolute pleasure.
And that is all the time we have for today, I’m afraid.
But thank you so much for watching, ladies and gentlemen.
Don’t forget to check out all of the Mercedes-Benz channels.
We have various channels for all of the news, the latest insights,
not only about the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class, but everything else
to keep you up to date, have fun doing that.
And I look forward to seeing you again soon. Bye.