A look back with a Mercedes engineer 25 years later
When the Mercedes A-Class flipped over 25 years ago, Dr. Christoph Böhm just started at Daimler. Since then everyone knows what the moose test is, and ESP was also on the map in one fell swoop. And Bohm? He is now a brake expert at the manufacturer. He conducts research into the security systems of the future.
When the Mercedes A-class flips on its side in the far north of Sweden, Christoph Böhm is in southern Germany. “I remember that day very well,” says the engineer. At that time he had only been working for Daimler for six days, he had just completed his studies. And then the unthinkable happens: testers from the Swedish car magazine ‘Teknikens Värld’ test the new A-class at the former Stockholm airport. The ‘Hamburger Abendblatt’ characterizes the compact model as the ‘boldest step in the history of Mercedes-Benz’.
After 960 days and 5 million test kilometers, things go wrong with the A-class
The development of the W168 takes 960 days from initial design to production-ready model, and the car has five million test kilometers under its wheels. The launch is preceded by an eighteen-month advertising offensive to get the general public used to the revolutionary model by Mercedes standards. But the revolution seems short-lived; on October 21, 1997, three days after its launch, the career of the new car already seems to end. When Swedish test editors simulate an evasive maneuver at a speed of 60 km/h, the A-class with five occupants on board flips on its side.
Robert Collin is behind the wheel, his co-driver Jonsson is injured, a passenger in the back seat goes into shock. The headline that subsequently appears in the Swedish magazine consists of only one word: ‘Disastrous’. It is also disastrous for Mercedes-Benz. “It came like a bolt from the blue,” says Böhm looking back. “During millions of test kilometers, no comparable incident has occurred.”
A passenger suffered injuries in the failed. moose test.
What? moose test?
Jürgen Hubbert (1939-2021), then a member of the Executive Board for passenger cars, is briefed at a Maybach event in Tokyo. Back in Germany, he forms a crisis team; sometimes as many as thirty people gather at the same time in the center right next to his office. The moose test? That does not ring a bell with the employees of the brand.
Immediately standard ESP on A-class
Hubbert offers his resignation, but CEO Jürgen Schrempp (now 78 years old) refuses. “Everyone agreed: this is about the future of the brand,” Hubbert told ‘Automobilwoche’ a few years ago. A week after the incident, on October 29, 1997, the manager gives a presentation to journalists from all over the world. He announces that Mercedes will equip the A-class with the new stability system ESP as standard with immediate effect. Mercedes-Benz introduced the system developed by Bosch two years earlier, as a worldwide first, as standard in the expensive S-class Coupé (C140). In the more regular C-class, it is only available at that time at a substantial additional cost. So now the new ‘Baby Benz’ gets it at no extra cost – startling! Daimler estimated at the time that this cost the company DM 100 million per year. “All 18,000 A-classes delivered so far were converted free of charge,” says Böhm.
Mercedes-Benz installs ESP as standard on the first A-class, it no longer goes on its side.
Production silent until February 1998, Niki Lauda tests A-class
Daimler initially shut down production in Rastatt and did not resume production until February 1998. Crisis communication works well: “Once the team had found the solution, we had to show that ESP works. To achieve this, we have put test drivers, including three-time Formula 1 world champion Niki Lauda, behind the wheel. They tried everything to get the A-class off balance.” In vain, because the W168 no longer turns on its side.
ESP broke through thanks to Mercedes A-class
At Mercedes-Benz they breathe a sigh of relief and almost every motorist immediately knows what the ‘Electronic Stability Program’ is capable of. “In the end, the A-class made sure that ESP broke through much faster,” says Böhm. Since November 2014, the system has even been mandatory for cars that are newly registered in the EU. Hardly anyone knows better what has happened from a technical point of view since the moose test troubles than engineer Böhm. He has been head of the “Development of brake control systems and driving dynamics functions” department since 2019 and can talk in great detail and with great passion about, for example, vacuum-independent, electromechanical brake boosters. But if you’re not an engineer, you only understand half of what he’s saying, that’s how complex the technology is in today’s cars.
Mercedes Benz
“Since the moose test, we have made great progress in developing braking control systems,” says Böhm. “Today, those systems are closely linked to more than a hundred vehicle functions.” What does that mean concretely? “Then we are talking about integrated control of the braking system and active rear-axle steering to off-road functions and a recuperation function for electric powertrains. If you’re driving with adaptive cruise control on and your car slows down, it’s controlled by the brake control system. Even if you are at a traffic light and the display shows the message ‘Hold,’ the brake control system will take care of that. When driving downhill, a downhill assist automatically reduces the car’s speed. How is that arranged? You guessed it, through the brake control system,” says brake expert Böhm. And what happened to the A-class? Mercedes-Benz has so far sold more than four million units of its compact model, spanning several generations. In 2021, it will account for about 17 percent of all Mercedes-Benz sales (including the B-class) and 323,000 new units will roll out of the showroom worldwide.
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– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl