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Before marketers hijacked them, before BMW slapped them on an awkward hatchback, and long before you could buy a Mitsubishi Outlander GT, the letters “GT” defined a very specific type of automobile. A grand tourer, or gran turismo, was
a swift, athletic car that placed equal priority on upscale trimmings,
long-distance comfort, and imposing styling. A GT was the driving
connoisseur’s road-trip machine, tailor-made for a holiday through the
Alps or a blast across the United States. Today, GT is merely an
ambiguous term that’s about as meaningful as the letters S, LTZ, or SEL.
Add the 2013 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT coupe and roadster to the long list of cars that have used and abused the GT tag (the Pontiac Aztek GT!).
Sure, the gullwing version of this high-zoot Mercedes is purpose built
to vanquish miles in high fashion, but the SLS GT does not do comfort.
The 2011 SLS AMG was a hard-hitting, stiff-legged road rocket; its replacement is even more raucous and brutal.
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Stiff and Stiffer
We never accused the outgoing car of being soft or flabby, but someone
must have thought it too sedate to be AMG’s calling card. On top of
increasing the spring and damping rates on the GT, the engineers in
Affalterbach eliminated the Comfort setting for the adjustable shocks.
The SLS GT now offers Sport and Sport Plus modes—you can also call them
stiff and stiffer. Either setting makes for a tedious ride over anything
but fresh-laid asphalt. The SLS slaps at expansion joints, pounds on
potholes, and thunks over heaves in a tantrum that you’d expect from a
Lamborghini, not a Mercedes.
At the track, though, the SLS is everything you’d expect of a
$200,000-plus car designed from the ground up by power-drunk AMG. We
tested an SLS AMG GT coupe and roadster in back-to-back weeks, with the
two cars posting nearly identical measurables. On the skidpad, the
roadster’s lateral acceleration of 0.98 g matched our best performance
with a 2011 model. Braking distances from 70 mph to 0 were also in line
with our past results. The coupe, equipped with the optional
carbon-ceramic brakes, posted a stopping distance of 159 feet; the
roadster, with standard iron discs, came to a halt in 156 feet. The
numbers are a real-world reminder that carbon-ceramic brakes are
intended to combat fade and reduce weight, not shorten stopping
distances.
Bark and Snarl
In upgrading its flagship to GT spec, AMG increased the output of the
hellacious 6.2-liter V-8 to 583 horsepower (up by 20), keeping torque at
479 lb-ft. There’s a sweeter, more percussive exhaust note with enough
bark and snarl to convince you that this hunk of aluminum is in an
active battle against forced induction to protect its naturally
aspirated, big-displacement livelihood. AMG wisely left the
transmission’s Comfort setting intact, and the SLS is still content to
dawdle along at 2000 rpm and handle additional throttle requests with
big low-end torque rather than a downshift. Rotate the knob to a more
aggressive setting, or shift for yourself, though, and the SLS becomes
as feisty and urgent as an Italian exotic.
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We weren’t able to match our best 3.5-second 0-to-60 time achieved with
the old SLS, nor were we able to hit Mercedes’ claimed 3.6-second time
for both gullwing and roadster. Instead, we saw 3.7 and 3.8 seconds to
60 mph in our two testers, although we don’t doubt Mercedes’ claims. As
with the outgoing SLS, the launch-control program still won’t extract
the quickest times. You have to lightly brake-torque the engine and
flatten the right pedal with the dual-clutch transmission in manual
mode. Keep the throttle flat past 125 mph, and you’ll clear the
quarter-mile in fewer than 12 seconds.
The SLS AMG GT isn’t a better performer than the car that came before
it, but it is a tangibly different car. More than ever, the SLS turns
away from the three-pointed star on the hood to pledge allegiance to the
AMG crest embossed on its gear selector. Call it angry, luxurious,
fast, striking, or timeless. Just don’t try to call it a true GT.
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