My daily commute is hell. Somerset West to Mouille Point in Cape Town is never easy at peak hour. It is a constant battle of dodging taxis, fighting past impossibly slow-moving traffic and the frustration caused by the traffic department making a scene. Then I haven’t even mentioned the constant threats of violence from protestors, miscreants and road ragers. When you factor in all of this, plus the mileage and fuel costs, it puts a damper on the simply joy of driving.
So a while ago I decided to make life more interesting for myself. I’ve turned my commute into an experiment of sorts. Not only to see if I can survive this on a daily basis, but to see if I could do it for free!
Obviously, doing the commute completely for free is impossible, so let me explain exactly what I mean. My theory is, that I should be able to commute without paying for anything other than fuel. If I buy a car at the right price, drive it for a maximum of 6 months and then sell it, I should be able to get my money back. No maintenance costs, no depreciation, no tyres.
I have a list of requirements for my daily
Given my budget and the fact that I obviously need specific cars I have a list of requirements. Cars that are not too mileage sensitive in terms of their price. I need older cars with a little bit of mileage on them already. It doesn’t need to be exciting or thrilling to drive. It needs to be frugal, comfortable and an “easy seller”.
Enter my latest daily driver. A 2011 Mercedes-Benz C200 with just under 150 000km on the clock. I had been looking for either one of these or a 3-series BMW for a while, when this car popped up at the local Mercedes main dealer. It was priced fairly keenly, especially if you consider its condition! I could scarcely believe that this car had done this kind of mileage. Looking at the interior, it looks brand new.
It’s very comfortable on the highway and the turbo-charged 1800cc, although not a ball of fire, is certainly more than enough for daily duties. With the 7-Speed Mercedes ‘box it even has fairly long legs for highway cruising. At 120kph it turns over at just 2250 RPM. Even in traffic, it still returns very impressive fuel economy of around 7.7 L/100km. This particular car is even well-specced with sat nav, hard drive music player, Bluetooth, Satellite navigation, an excellent sound system and Merc’s comical Linguitronic voice recognition system.
The good news doesn’t stop there either! Because I bought from a reputable dealer, they replaced the tyres for me. They fixed a few minor scratches and paint chips. Best of all, thanks to the Consumer Protection Act, I have a 6-month warranty on all the major components! So even buying out of plan isn’t as scary as it sounds.
excellent isolation from the traffic around you
As a daily the C-Class is wonderful. It is a very relaxed cruiser and offers excellent isolation from the traffic around you. It just does everything right. If I had to criticize something, I would say the gearbox in its normal “eco” mode is a little lazy. Then again, I suppose that is what eco mode is supposed to do. The engine also makes a very uninteresting noise. It’s quiet when cruising and almost silent in most situations. However, under load, from around 2500 to 3500 RPM it makes the most horrible grunting induction noise I’ve ever heard from an engine. Over 3500 RPM the noise character changes and actually becomes fairly normal 4-cylinder noise.
Other than the noise, the engine is actually a peach! The turbo spools very quickly and the engine rarely feels like there is any lag. For a relatively small capacity, the forced induction obviously helps to give the car a very muscular and torquey feel. Even from low revs it really pulls very strongly and it rarely needs to drop a cog to overtake. Unfortunately that means you spend much of your time in that rev range where the engine grunts at you under load.
sell the daily right now at a profit
Value for money, I genuinely think this car is hard to beat. At sub-R200k, this is a lot of car for the money. I bought it at the right price too, because a quick look through Autotrader and Gumtree reveals I could actually sell it right now at a profit. So in theory, my hypothesis of driving it for six months and then selling it for the same price, might just hold true.
Time will tell, so watch this space.
I do miss the days when I could drive cars like THIS as my daily though.