By the looks of these images, one could say that beside the name, this facelift won’t change much for the Mercedes-Benz SLK roadster. That could be true but, on the other hand, it could also be that the photographed car wasn’t wearing all the changed body parts but was just an early prototype devised for testing the platform.
I don’t mean to imply that the current SLK is not a pretty car, but I sincerely hope Mercedes-Benz will change more than just the rear of the car just for the sake of seeing the designers at work some more – their latest creations have been nothing short of stunning.
The current SLK is almost four years old being introduced back in 2011 at the Geneva Motor Show. According to the new naming nomenclature, the smaller roadster of the family will be called the SLC, in order to better reflect the car’s connection with the Mercedes-Benz C-Class.
According to worldcarfans.com website, the car was being tested by AMG personel which means that there will either be a SLC AMG Sport, or a fully-fledged SLC 55 AMG. Or both.
In case this turns out to be true, the AMG version will surely ditch the naturally aspirated 5.5 liter V8 engine and go for the 4.0 liter turbo V8 found in the AMG GT and C63 AMG. Whether it will still have the same amount of power remains to be seen but, at the same time, matters very little: no matter the output, it will surely turn the SLC into a rocket of a car.
Which brings us back to the design. If it weren’t for all the recent facelifts (CLS springs into mind), we’d be a little nervous looking at these images – the car looks exactly the same as the current model even from the front, where facelifts are usually easiest to spot. But it’s nigh on impossible to think that Mercedes-Benz won’t align the new SLC facelift to the current Mercedes front end with the dotted and more vertical grille. This thought is what makes us sleep softly, confident Mercedes knows what it’s doing and won’t disappoint. Amen.
Photo credit and source: worldcarfans.com
