New Merc GLA on sale in Scotland 31 | 03 | 2014
SCOTTISH MERCEDES-BENZ dealers have started sales of the mew GLA-Class: prices start at £25,080 for the GLA 200CDI. Not surprisingly, grip is at the core of the new model, with its 4MATIC system providing traction in all conditions.
Interestingly then, Mercedes decided to debut the car 189-metres below ground within the vast Winsford Rock Salt Mine in Cheshire: the site supplies much of the gritting salt for our roads, providing grip and reassurance to Scotland’s drivers.
In a unique project to take the car as far off the beaten track as possible, four standard, road-going examples of the new GLA were lowered, nose first, into the mine before being driven through the broken terrain of a network of more than 130 miles of tunnels running beneath Cheshire in what is very much a working mine.
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Winsford, operated by Salt Union, is the UK’s largest rock salt mine and its oldest working mine – the mine stretches 5km east to west and 3km north to south. Mining operations since the 19th Century have left a void space of 23 million cubic metres
Combining the unique suspension setup of the new GLA, which aims to strike a balance between on- and off-road demands and the traction afforded by 4MATIC, the car thrived in the challenging conditions within the mine – its traction systems coping with the broken terrain and salt road tunnels with ease.
The Intelligent Light System (ILS) fitted to the cars meant the eight-metre high tunnels (most of which are completely dark) were lit up spectacularly.
The GLA was driven in the empty spaces left behind by the mining of salt – spaces now being filled by a thriving DeepStore document storage business. Organisations such as the National Archives now store millions of physical files deep below the ground in a secure and extremely dry environment – the mine naturally remains at a constant 14 degrees – making it ideal for such purposes.
The GLA joins the M-Class, G-Class and GL-Class in a thriving Mercedes-Benz SUV line-up.
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Jim McGill