Mercedes McLaren Yo-Yo

I am not a fan of old cars. When there is a new model, I usual don’t like the previous one. There are some exceptions! When Mercedes revealed the ugly looking SLS AMG model, I felt the same. It is a retro interpretation of iconic model 300SL from 1954. But it was not the first time, unfortunately it was the second time! They did the same thing with SLR. It was also a retro interpretation of 300SL, but sales did not go that well.

Mercedes thought that, it is like a car similar to estate E Class and planned to keep producing it for seven years, which is very unusual for super car market. And it was not good enough to compete with Ferrari Enzo. They were introduced at the same time. Also Ferrari Enzo was not planned to be sold for seven years and 500 cars per year! With a basic maths, Mercedes planned to sell 3500 SLRs in seven years. This strategy is very normal for a dull E Class but it did not work with SLR!

Anyway, Mercedes introduced the SLS AMG which is cheaper than SLR and boring than SLR and worse looking than SLR and made from aluminium instead of carbon fibre. And SLS something turn into mass production “super” car. You can see it everywhere on earth, Mercedes loves to sell cars to everyone and destroy the uniqueness.

Anyway, I have just saw something in Mercedes merchandise store. I really wish to meet with the person, who is designing the products here. The SLR section offers yoyo covered with leather. What were you thinking while designing this product for SLR! SLR has a fluctuating sales figure and let’s represent this with a yo-yo! I could not find any plausible reason to offer a yo-yo with SLR name on it!

Mercedes did not like the SLR, we all know that but please don’t take revenge like this!

http://shop.mercedes-benzworld.co.uk/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=1541

Pictures' Copyrights

Mercedes

Carbon Fibre Fashion

Carbon fibre became a very popular material in many different areas. It started with airplanes, formula 1 cars, normal cars, laptop computers, iPhone cases and many other things. Carbon fibre is a composite material. This means, it is a combination of carbon and fibre. More basically, it is a very strong plastic! Actually it is stronger than steal and also very light, therefore it is very expensive. This unique characteristics make is very popular for automotive and aerospace industry. Mercedes McLaren SLR was a carbon fibre car, all formula 1 cars are carbon fibre, some Porsche 911 models especially GT series have carbon fibre parts to reduce weight and sustain the same level of safety.

Interestingly this ugly looking material and offers the feeling of plastic become a fashion material. Actually I was afraid of this integration in fashion, because carbon fibre is like a plastic. You cannot feel the difference in fashion products and looks weird. For iPhone cases, it might be okay. Light and robust to damages, that’s fine. A fresh fashion designer from Prague decided to use carbon fibre in shoes, in women shoes! I am not kidding. She designed high heels made from carbon fibre, the material looks exactly the same as a car interior or some unpainted parts of Mercedes SLR.

In terms of creativity, this is a great integration but in terms of functionality I really wonder the benefit. With these carbon fibres shoes, you will use less calories to walk around and even if you use them for breaking some other things nothing would happen. Also you can run faster with these shoes, as they are lighter! Actually I have no idea how carbon fibre create a benefit for fashion.

For more details; Zuzana Serbak and Carbon Fibre

Pictures' Copyrights

Mercedes, BMW, Zuzana Serbak

The best and most forgotten SLR

Sicily, where the Mediterranean sea meets with pure enjoyment of sun light. A great place to spend your holiday and experience Italian food. You will be forgetting daily stresses and refresh yourself.

However, Sicily is not a place to eat and swim! Sicily is the place for racing :) From 1927 to 1957, Sicily held Mille Miglia open road racing. What is Mille Miglia? It means thousands miles racing through the road Sicily. This is not a ordinary race with safety cars and thousands of cameras catching every single point. This race was drawing the between best and worst. Drivers, cars, team everyone was under heavy stress to finish this impossible race in public roads. As they push harder with drum brakes cars, they came closer to see their life like a movie! As you can expect, the cars racing at those years did not have sophisticated safety technologies like now. Actually, racing in Mille Miglia was racing with yourself!

In 1955, Stirling Moss and Dennis Jenkinson with Mercedes 300SLR finished this 1597 km dangerous race in just 10 hours, 7 minutes and 48 seconds and average of 157 kilometres per hour. Basically, they achieved a record which cannot be achieved now, I think so! in 1955, driving at the average of 157 km/h is totally unbelievable. There was not ABS, traction control, carbon fibre or anything else; they had only their senses.

Hopefully; before the contemporary SLR's production stops, Mercedes McLaren produced SLR Stirling Moss Limited Edition. Unfortunately, senseless SLS AMG's PR campaigns shadowed the only SLR worth to buy!

This car is a combination of past and the future. In every single detail, you can see bits from the original 300 SLR and modern racing technology. This kind of integration between past and present cannot be achieved very easily. It could end up either too present or too past. But this did not happen with this SLR.

Probably in future, this SLR will be one people be paying huge amount money during the auctions. Sorry but the normal SLR will stay normal. And if you ever visit Sicily, don't forget remember the Mille Miglia.

Pictures are taken from;

Mercedes, Autospies, Wikipedia Websites

Interesting review from McLaren

Recently Ron Dennis made revealed his feelings about Bugatti Veyron! He defined the world most expensive and most powerful car as piece of junk. He cannot find a single thing which makes him happy about Veyron. Also Veyron could not beat McLaren F1 in Top Gear's lap time chart.

In some points he is right but in some point he is wrong! First of all; why he did wait for so long to express his feeling about Veyron? And the timing is a bit interesting! They have just announced their new car McLaren MP4-12C. I know that, MP4 is not a rival for Veyron but they are both offering high performance. MP4 offers the F1 technology for a road going car and it does not have nonergonomical character of McLaren F1. F1 was really interesting car, it had a fuse switch which is exactly same like in your house. And it was able to accommodate three people. Yes, it was handling really good and may be better than Veyron and it can have many other aspects which are slightly better than Veyron. But Veyron is not offering F1 style handling, Veyron is a totally different. Bugatti's involved with luxury details, high performance and comfort. Veyron is the harmony of these things.

Also Veyron had many state of art technology, this does not mean MP4 of F1 don't have, they do have but Veyron is a great car also. I really wish that Ron Dennis made this announcement a couple of years ago. By the way, they manufactured the Mercedes McLaren SLR which was a totally disaster! A super car which was using a five speed auto transmission which you could find in Mercedes A Class and had the same interior with SL and many more thing which made many people to dislike SLR! I think Ron Dennis should have commented on SLR also ;)

Pictures are taken from;

Worldcarfans Website

TAG Heuer Meridiist, Don't Drive and Text !

TAG Heuer is one of the most magnificient watch brand on earth. If you are car lover and if you don't love TAG Heuer Monaco; you either have no idea what that is or you don't love cars! Nothing on earth can replace the place of Monaco :) Its unique character and being part of motoring world created this unique essence. Of course, TAG Heuer is not only Monaco, the Carrera, SLR Calibre and many other hand made watches are beyond the word of watch. Every unique model of TAG Heuer reflects a unique identity and targets different customer range and people who are buying each model are looking for something different.

Recently TAG Heuer introduced a mobile phone called Meridiist. It has the same unique identity like watches. Hand made with perfection of ultimate production, every button fits on this phone is made so precisely you have the same feeling like a handmade watch. Meridiist is one the best luxury mobile phone which can be purchased.

However I have found something really shocking! The teaser on Meridiist's website is showing a man texting while driving. Yes, I found the same video clip on YouTube and the man is driving Mercedes McLaren SLR and while driving he is texting with Meridiist. As far as I know, driving and texting or talking is strictly forbidding anywhere on earth and TAG Heuer is playing a video which is showing texting and driving. I am pretty sure that, they have missed this point unless they will not place this video on internet.

You can understand this on picture below and please watch the time frame 0:55 and you will notice it.

Alternative link for video: http://www.vimeo.com/11075535

Pictures are taken from;
TAG Heuer's Website

McLaren Aether, better than MP4-12C ?

I don't like to start writing from a negative side but, I have to start this time. I have always mentioned that, a car should have a proper and pronounceable name! But the perfectionist car manufacturer McLaren produced the most sophisticated car on earth and name it like MP3 player!

After the McLaren F1, we did not see a road going version of a McLaren until the disaster of SLR McLaren. Technically SLR McLaren was a piece of engineering but this did not help to lost its value in second hand market. Engineers and consumers are thinking in a totally different way.

Engineer, it based on the word engine!  And that's the most important part of the car and made from steel and does not have any emotions at all. Consumer, is based on the word consume. And that means, buy a product, consumer it, and throw it away. When engineer and consumer words intersect on business environment, which is called a car dealer, things may not go that well all the time! Consumers are expecting more than engineering in a car. They want passion, uniqueness, excitement and also a good name. Not something a like a chassis number or MP3 player as a name.

Unfortunately, McLaren's success in car engineering cannot be observed when they name their cars :( May be Ron Dennis doesn't like branding. And name their most important not in an appropriate way.

Nowadays; if you are going to reveal a car and planning to make a sensation, please focus on the branding a little bit more. Why? Because, people should remember your car easily, if they are planning to buy one and they should not associate unusual notions! Unfortunately, people might associate McLaren's new car with something unusual, a MP3 or MP4 players. MP4-12C might sound cool or help engineers to separate it from Formula 1 cars, but it will not help to differentiate itself from its competitors! It is terribly hard to remember MP4-12C! Instead, everyone will call it "new McLaren" or "MP4 something". They will not have problem to remember MP4, because there are MP4 players currently available on market!

Why I do write these thing on a Saturday night? Because, ideas were so strong in my mind and I could not stop writing it! This car is one of the most smart car on earth and it is not produced in Germany! That's the important point, if a car is not produced in Germany and offering very sophisticated technology you must keep an eye on it :) I will mention only one feature of this car. There is an on board diagnostics system on this car, it may sound senseless for some of you but it is totally a revolution in car business. This car can detect a problem, identify it and contacts with workshop for preparing necessary part (it will communicate by mobile infrastructure not in a magical way). This kind of technology can be seen in some trucks or in air planes. Usually, in most of the cars there is an orange light or "please visit workshop" message to warn driver for any existing problem with the car. Moreover, it won't describe the problem and never communicates with workshop.

McLaren is created a new era in automotive industry and ignoring the second most important thing after engineering in automotive industry, branding! Remember the Bugatti Atalante! Excellent engineering, state of art design and a unique name.

My suggestion; name this car as McLaren Aether. Aether is the first-born elemental Greek gods. He is the personification of the upper sky, space, and heaven in Greek Mythology. How long did it take to find this name? Only half an hour of reading a book about mythology :)