Time for a new family car.

[biggreenbooga]

Your B doesn't use much more fuel than my Brabus-I'm gonna go test an A-Class.

[Nextourer]

one year already?

[mimota]

A year already for your Bee. I can see how you have written so many positive things about this car. Broadway MB give me one for a few days while they did some warranty work. I loved it. It handled beautifully, the visibility was great, lots of storage and great gas mileage.

[MikeT]

Yes it's been pretty good with a couple of minor issues that were warranty items...starts first time, every time, that's all that really matters to me as far as reliability goes, in the end!

[MikeT]

So on December 24th of this year, the 10,000 mark will be exceeded for Canadian model B Classes.The old smart 450 cdi got up to 10,239, so that record will be broken by the B in January or early February. The B is not quite selling as fast as the old smart did, but it's not very far behind. The first B 200s were imported here in the summer of 2005, a year after the smart 450s started arriving.

[Nextourer]

sweet! I hope demand continues to be strong. We need smaller, fuel efficient cars that aren't "cheap" and yet still affordable.

[smartzuuk]

Keep 'em selling, we need some good used ones out there.....

[MikeT]

With the actual winter weather we are being treated to plus our visit over the next three days to Vancouver, my lifetime FE has been hovering right around 7.35 L/100 km, but I expect to see the spritmonitor icon go to 7.4 again next week

[Nextourer]

oye. Yeah all the wheel spinning and rocking is doing crap to the fuel mileage.

[MikeT]

Heh heh, it's down to 7.3 again! Good car.

[MikeT]

The number of B Classes in Canada has now eclipsed the number of smart 450 cdi cars that were imported here.It took a few months more than it did for the 450 to get to the level of 10,239+. Seems to still be selling OK.....

[MikeT]

Well.If you think that replacing a low beam light bulb in a 450 smart is hard, let me introduce you to its evil cousin, the B 200.My RF headlight low beam (DRL, sound familiar?) blew out tonight at 42,000 km (of course just past the free from dealer bulb phase) and although the back of the light is easy enough to get to, the bulb holder is a nightmare to re-attach. I spent 40 minutes with the air full of ear curdling language trying to get it on and usually it would only connect on one of the two retainer wire hooks, and when that happened, it was nearly impossible to get the retainer off again.I eventually did though.The left front is even "better": the heated washer fluid tank has to be removed first, to gain access to the same scene as greets you on the right front!

[deezle]

What is it with MB that they don't consider making these maintenance things easily accessible when they design them?

[Duck]

Designers/engineers can't do everything. It is really hard to make sure every possible situation is covered when you have a timeline, budget, and people screaming at you for not finishing a design or the drawing package on time. The hardest part about being a designer is that "You can't please everyone."-Iain

[MikeT]

I can understand that, but it would also be nice if the "fast-moving parts" could be made more accessible as a part of the design brief. A clutch needn't be changable in 20 minutes, but a headlight bulb ought to be easy to RE&RE, like an oil or air filter.Maybe next time I'll be faster.

[Duck]

If I ever design a car, I'll be sure to make the headlights easy to change. -Iain

[MikeT]

Well I take some of it back. I am a little bit stupid sometimes, eh?The thing that became apparent tonight on the drive home is that the bulb was not seated properly....in fact, with a mirror at home I confirmed that the H-7 bulb is not located in the seat with the main tongue sticking up vertically as on the smart; rather, it is canted to one side.So after removing it (with GREAT difficulty - the wire retainer was brutal to get off) and seating it properly, the wire retainer went back on like a hand in a glove.Next time it'll be better!

[deezle]

I suspect factory LED headlights will be commonplace soon.

[MikeT]

LOL, I was reading the first posts in this old thread and I actually said the car would only be used between 5000 and 10,000 km a year. WRONG! Try 27,000. Two of my three kids are driving now......which explains a lot. Even if they take the smart, I have to use the B 200.

[MikeT]

Well, time for another update. The arrival of the white smart has given the B 200 a respite, to the point where it has only been 3500 km in the past 3.5 months! Once Sean gets his N license, all bets are off (though the green smart is supposed to be shared...).And on other B Class news, the 14,000th B Class imported to Canada (and a few more) will be arriving in Halifax next week. Over the period it has been sold here in Canada, it has sold about as well as the smart 450 and 451 (combined: a little over 18,000 and imported for one more year than the B Class).There should be another two model years of this car, so probably another 4-6000 may come our way. It just might squeak past the 20,000 level, but I doubt it will quite make it unless sales pick up generally.Total production of the B Class to date is about 500,000.

[smartzuuk]

2 more model years, and then?what of the A?

[MikeT]

2 years and then we get a low-boy B Class that will have a Renault floorpan.Too bad the A isn't offered here, I still say.

[deezle]

Got any photos of the next gen B prototypes?

[MikeT]

negative

[MikeT]

I've seen VERY few B-class Mercedes on the road---they're not exactly in demand.

As of next weekend there will be 15,047 B Classes in Canada. That is about 3000 fewer than the smarts that are here now, but to be fair, the smart has been sold here for a year longer than the B Class! The B Class seems to be a popular car in Canada, considering MBUSA didn't want the big hatchback. Over 650,000 have been made to date.