Car News and Reviews Blog

As power loving petrolheads, Drive has a particular affinity for Mercedes’ performance arm, AMG. That being said, we’ve got nothing on our AMG obsessed guest columnist. Elvis Nomzaza gives us his take on five epic AMG engines, and AMG’s determination to melt as many rear tyre’s

=============
Article Content:

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

Rate this gallery:012345678910As power loving petrolheads, Drive has a particular affinity for Mercedes’ performance arm, AMG. That being said, we’ve got nothing on our AMG obsessed guest columnist. Elvis Nomzaza gives us his take on five epic AMG engines, and AMG’s determination to melt as many rear tyre’s as they can.

The world is, as we all know, a difficult place for the car at the moment. Fuel prices are rising, the global economy is suffering, and then there’s global warming (alleged global warming- sub ed). Nevertheless, the good people of AMG have taken all of this into consideration, and for the past 10 years, served up five different thumping powerplants, something no other manufacturer has done.

It all started in 1999 when DaimlerChrysler announced that they had bought AMG. The first product from this new, in-house, tuning company was the Mercedes C32 AMG V6 Kompressor. It delivered 260kW, a little more than the competitive M3 and Audi S4. Just as we were getting used to the blown V6 in the C Class however, AMG decided to release the E55 AMG. This had a huge V8, with a supercharger as big as my head, and better yet, it sounded like a warplane. Surely that’s as good as it gets I thought, but the madmen at AMG had other ideas.

The AMG 6L V12 of the SL65 Black

They decided the powerful Mercedes S600 wasn’t powerful enough. So they took a mighty 6L V12, added two turbochargers, and created the most powerful production car in the world. I think this was AMG’s way of trying to get us to heaven quicker than we would like to go (Isn’t that Porsche’s job with the Widowmaker?- sub ed). The V12 Biturbo developed 450kW and 1000Nm of torque, enough to move the moon. Again, I thought that had to be the peak.

Once again though, AMG had different ideas. They decided the Kompressor logo was no longer needed, and introduced the awe-inspiring 6.2L nat-asp V8. This engine revs like a motorbike and sounds like Barry White on steroids. It now produces 386kW, but in the flagship SLS AMG it develops 420kW. Unfortunately, AMG are killing off this powerplant thanks to Green Peace.

The new 5.5L Biturbo

 In conclusion, we now have the new 5.5L V8 Biturbo flying the AMG flag. Only time will tell how this engine can continue the legacy. AMG’s way has always been focussed on how best to fit a massive engine in the engine bay. The rest simply follows. This, for me, is magic, and they’ve captured that magic in every car they’ve made. Yes, dynamically they’re not as good as BMW’s M division, but I don’t care. AMG has the X factor.

Elvis Nomzaza

Incoming search terms:

———————