Mercedes-Maybach 6 Cabriolet: Mercs' luxurious EV vision

Rob Hull
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Under the winged Mercedes Maybach 6 Cabriolet bonnet is a storage unit that holds dinner plates, flasks, cutlery, umbrellas and trolley bags. Photos / Mercedes-Benz

Love it or loathe it, there's no denying that Mercedes' latest creation will turn heads wherever it goes.

It's called the Vision Mercedes-Maybach 6 Cabriolet and it combines the luxury of a superyacht with dazzling super-coupe looks and a drop-top roof.

The four-wheeled cruise-liner concept was revealed this weekend at Pebble Beach as part of this year's Monterey Car Week in California.

For those of you who are clued-up on your Mercedes concepts, it might look a little familiar. That's because it's a roofless version of the Vision Maybach 6 luxury coupe concept launched at the same event last year.

Like it's roofed sibling, it will be propelled by an immensely powerful electric powertrain producing enough grunt for this four-wheeled barge to out-sprint most lightweight sports cars in a drag race from a set of traffic lights.

The German car maker described it as a 'sensual, emotionally appealing design with "innovative technical concept solutions" that "defines the ultimate in luxury of the future"'. 

We think it looks an updated version of Lady Penelope's FAB 1 from Thunderbirds.

What it undoubtedly is - looking at the dazzling images of the concept car - is inexplicably enormous.

Measuring in at 5.7 metres long and 2.1 metres wide, you'd struggle to find a parking space to put it in, let alone a garage. And despite the immensity of it, there's still only room for just two seats.

The massive body is incredibly sleek, though, featuring the same delightfully elegant lines as the original Maybach 6 concept.

The new Vision Mercedes-Maybach 6 Cabriolet also shares a similar chrome-finished grille and a set of glimmering 24-inch multi-spoke wheels.

But the big difference is the custom-made fabric top that - according to Mercedes - is interwoven with gold threads to epitomise the outlandishness of this boat-like concept.

It's complimented by a new sloped rear-end design that's been crafted to look like the deck of a superyacht. It's certainly succeeded in that task, producing a car that looks as though you'd need to dock somewhere instead of pull over at the side of the road.

Mercedes says the 550kW electric powertrain - made up of four compact electric motors powering each wheel - can sail to 100kph in under four seconds and has range of over 500 kilometers.

That's around 112 kilometers short of the Tesla Model S P100D that you can buy today, though the Maybach 6 Cabriolet can be anchored to a DC fast charger that will boost the range by 96 kilometers in just five minutes.

Inside, the cabin is lathered in crystal white nappa leather that's shaped in the same way as high-end Chesterfield furniture, while the wooden floor is another hint to its yachting inspiration.

Interior pictures also show a minimalist dashboard that contains three air vents and a blue fibre optics wrap-around panel with the sat-nav visuals incorporated into it.

The driver gets an instrument cluster made up of two round dials, though much of the information is fed via a pair of head-up displays that are projected onto the windscreen.

The eagle-eyed among you will spot the lack of buttons to adjust the temperature, radio and other setting inside the vehicle - that's because most of the features will be activated using a Concierge voice control system designed to understand natural speech.

And as a final flurry of extravagance, the double-hinged bonnet opens like a pair of wings and reveals a decked storage unit that holds a variety of items, from dinner plates, flasks and cutlery to a pair of umbrellas and a luggage set.

Being a concept, it's highly unlikely that the car will ever be put into production. Were it to go on sale, it would easily eclipse the $454,300 starting price for the Maybach S 650 Cabriolet launched last year.

Despite this, the electric powertrain and some of the design cues hint towards what Mercedes and Maybach models could be like in the future.

Are you taken by the boat-like looks? Or does the design make you feel sea sick?

-Daily Mail

 

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