AMG powers on in performance stakes

INCREASINGLY powerful standard Mercedes-Benz models and buyer demand mean that the company's AMG hot-rod division will continue to drive up the performance stakes.

Company managing director Domingos Piedade told GoAuto that the twin pressures meant AMG, as well as BMW's M-division and Audi's quattro, would have to keep building faster and more imposing machinery.

He was speaking during an Australian visit soon after the reveal of the Australia-bound (in 2004) bi-turbo 6.0-litre V12 CL 65 AMG at the Geneva motor show, that car boasting a mammoth 450kW and stunning 1000Nm.

And that is not necessarily the limit. Mr Piedade even admitted that engine was originally developed with 1200Nm but was detuned in the interests of drivetrain durability.

Both BMW and Audi's performance divisions are enthusiastically taking to the fight, with the former planning a V10 M5 and the latter a turbocharged V10 RS 6.

"If the standard cars go on a performance fight, it's absolutely logical that the performance divisions of each of these manufacturers will go also," Mr Piedade said.

"We cannot invent the spare wheel or hot water, it has been invented already, so we just have to follow whatever our big brothers do.

"Look at BMW, look at Audi, look at Mercedes-Benz, where do they come from, where are they now? There are standard Mercedes now with 500 horsepower. Five years ago we would have been executed in the middle of Stuttgart if we had that sort of idea.

"That is happening most probably because the market is asking for it. If the trend of the markets is going in this direction, you have to do." Such is the market response that AMG estimates sales in excess of 19,000 in 2003 on top of the 18,300 record set in 2002. And that's despite September 11, the Iraqi war and various economic malaises.

But Mr Piedade warned that AMG would only go so far in pursuit of supremacy, although he was unwilling to actually nominate a performance ceiling.

"At the moment the ceiling will be dictated by the market ... The question is does it make sense, and so far everything we have done makes sense and we want to stay on this track." Mr Piedade suggested more differentiation between AMG and standard Mercedes-Benz passenger cars was a possibility.

"The standard cars are catching up. They are pushing us to be more creative, which is a challenge for us," he said.

"Maybe not crazy modifications, but some peculiar modifications which will be more traditional for AMG than for the standard cars.

"If we see that it's needed, we do that."