Mercedes meets IWC watches: passion, performance & precision for Goodwood

One of the greatest pleasures for me as a blogger is watching high quality products being made and then trying them out. Memories of the passion and skills of those who produce such true quality items add enormously to the experience of using them. So it was on my recent trip to Switzerland and Germany to find out more about the partnership between Mercedes and IWC Schaffhausen Watches. We watched the legendary vintage Silver Arrows racing cars being prepared for the 74th Edition of the Goodwood Members' Meeting this weekend and also tried out both IWC watches and three Mercedes-AMG cars.

1954 Mercedes Monoposto being prepared for Goodwood in Stuttgart. Video GreyFoxBlog

IWC is official timing partner of the Goodwood event at which visitors will be treated to the sight of the Mercedes Silver Arrows, beautiful vintage racers from the fifties, roaring and ripping their way around the track. 

Engine of the Monoposto

On my visit the logic of the Mercedes/IWC partnership became obvious as we experienced the precision, quality and true passion that lay behind their products, whether watches or cars. If there's one thing I've learned in my years of blogging, it's that we often fail to look behind the label of a product and are blinded by a fashionable name to pay a lot for an item that is cheap and poor quality. 

To ensure that what you're buying is true quality, made with passion and precision, you need to see them being made or maintained.

Looking at modern, rather than vintage, Mercedes, we visited the AMG facility at Affalterbach, Germany. AMG started as an independent company which produced performance products for owners of Mercedes cars looking for more from their vehicles. AMG is now part of Mercedes. At Affalterbach we saw that each AMG engine is made by one man or woman - true to the racing pedigree of the brand, there is no assembly line approach here. 

A worker starts on a new engine at the AMG factory

Each worker starts with an engine block and follows it round the plant assembling it until it's complete. His or her name is then added and stays there as a mark of the maker's pride and confidence in the quality of the final product. Each part's barcode is scanned as it's added to the engine and can be tracked during its life in the car. The assembly is backed up by research and testing facilities that ensure that AMG cars are safe, fast, powerful and as environmentally-friendly as is possible. 

Each AMG engine is signed by its maker

An AMG engine on the test bed, its exhausts glowing red

This careful assembly process, which emphasises quality rather than just economy, echoes the approach taken by IWC to the design and assembly of their watches. I'll talk more about IWC in a future feature, but we saw enough to understand the nature of the relationship between the two companies.

Driving the AMG cars made available for us (four international journalists and bloggers) was an experience we'll never forget. We had an S-Class Coupé, C63 and AMG GT (right to left in the image above). All were AMG products. The GT only exists in its AMG version, while the S-Class and C63 are AMG variations of the Mercedes models on which they are based. However, they are as different as chalk and cheese, as AMG start afresh with suspension, chassis and engine, making them very different cars from their Mercedes cousins, designed for additional performance as well as comfort.

AMG GT with 3982cc V8 biturbo with 462 hp

The GT was a real pleasure to drive. Even in 'comfort' mode the 500bhp V8 engine burbled happily on the German Autobahn, its note rapidly rising to a powerful pulsating bass as power was applied, thrusting you back into the upholstery in a very satisfactory way. Backing off the throttle resulted in a lovely triple pop from the exhaust, proving the race pedigree of this wonderful car. This is a true gentleman's (and woman's) grand tourer - powerful, robust, comfortable, but with enough rawness to show that you're driving a machine with race pedigree.

All the cars oozed quality and strength. These are powerful motors, but each attracts a slightly different driver and is built with an attention to detail rarely seen to this extent on modern cars.

And returning to vintage Mercedes, the arrival at Goodwood this week of the beautiful Silver Arrows drives home (literally) how products made with care, precision, pride and with an emphasis on quality rather than economy last so well. The Monoposto pictured above is only slightly older than me, but is much more handsome, better maintained and much fitter. Similarly an IWC watch will outlast its owner of properly maintained and looked after.

Streamlined body enclosing the wheels, allowed for a while under F1 rules in the fifties

We also visited the Mercedes Museum, a vast, modern building beautifully designed by a Dutch architect which houses the huge collection in a very contemporary, purpose-built environment. Here we saw cars from the earliest nineteenth century to the latest Formula 1 pace car, naturally an AMG GT (images below).

Click to find out more about Mercedes, AMG and IWC Schaffhausen. For more about the Goodwood Members' Weekend #74MM, 19th to 20th March 2016, click here.

This trip was sponsored by IWC/Mercedes. 

Mercedes AMG and IWC Schaffhausen in harmony