Mercedes-Benz E Class All-Terrain review

As we said, there’s no petrol and no hybrid. Merc seems to think this is an old school car and will have old school buyers. They’re probably right. The All-Terrain is a car for the country set. The well-heeled country set, because in the UK at least it’s only available with the 400d engine.

The big straight-six diesel, which is also available in a load of other Mercs, is a meaty thing. With 340bhp and 516lb ft of torque from nothing (OK, 1,200rpm), it’s more than powerful enough to shove the All-Terrain along at a fair old rate of knots, or – more likely - make short shrift of towing a horsebox out of a wet field.

We’d go so far as to say it’s unreasonably rapid. A normal E-Class estate equipped with this engine does 0-62mph in 5.1 seconds, for heaven’s sake. The All-Terrain adds 0.3 seconds to that, but still. Blimey. The top speed is a limited 155mph, and you’re looking at 168g/km of CO2 and 36.2mpg. That said, over 1,000 miles of admittedly mainly motorway driving, we say 41mpg. Which is very impressive.

Personally I think Merc should grow a pair and bring the E220d into Britain as well. This uses the all-new OM654 2.0-litre turbo diesel, developing 191bhp, 295lb ft at 1600rpm, which is good for 54.3mpg (on the old NEDC cycle) and 137g/km of CO2. It would also usefully lower the entry ticket by a hefty sum.

Both engines are beautiful cruisers and, yeah, money no object you’d have the 400d. It’s gutsy and oozes torque, has an answer no matter what the situation, is hushed, refined and even sounds halfway interesting. The old 350d diesel V6 was good, but this one is just so much better.

You have to extend the 220d more often, using almost everything it has rather than simply surfing the 400d’s torque wave. But it’s the more responsive unit, the more efficient and it’s just as hushed at a cruise.

But hey-ho. They’re diesels, they do the job and they do it well. Both are equipped with the nine-speed automatic gearbox which does a fine job of making you unaware just how busy it’s keeping itself.

Is it good to drive? Yes, it’s terrific, but not in the way you’re thinking. The phrase to bear in mind here is fitness for purpose. So imagine the sort of person who’s going to be driving it. Put yourself in their shoes. Got that? Right, then you’ll be as delighted as we are that the All-Terrain has none of a hot hatch’s crispness, corners no more than cleanly and competently and places barely any emphasis on handling dexterity.

Sure, it’s capable alright, but the only reason you’d go nudging an apex is if you wanted to see how the suspension coped with a little light off-roading. What it is, though, is properly soothing. The relatively tall-walled 245/45 tyres and softer, longer travel suspension give it a lovely gait. You don’t push it hard, because it doesn’t like that and somehow encourages you to adopt its pace of life.

Occasionally one of the big, heavy wheels will reveal just how big and heavy it is by shuddering over a fat expansion joint, but that’s it. Settled, quiet and refined, the All-Terrain drives very contentedly. That’s the word that best describes it, in fact: contented.

So it wafts about the place, suspension sighing with the surface, your cares buffed away in supple silence. And it’ll off-road, too. Way better than you’d ever imagine – but that’s always the case with anything kitted out with generous ground clearance and halfway-decent tyres. Even taking that into account, the All-Terrain is impressive. Pop the mode switch into All-Terrain and the suspension can be raised another 20mm (for the full 156mm clearance) at speeds up to 22mph for a spot of heavy duty rock-crawling.