With my cousin and sister-in-law both in town and wanting to take in Mumbai’s sights, I knew I’d need plenty of seats, so it was the seven-seater Mercedes EQB from our long-term fleet that I reached for. We’ve all used it before but that was on short trips around the office, where we have our charger. However, with my plan to go on leave the entire week and with no charger at home, I would have to work with public chargers to top up the EQB. Still, we were only going to travel within Mumbai, so I wasn’t too worried.
The first task was picking up my cousin and her family from the airport, and despite being on my side of the family, they all chose to travel with my wife and left me to ferry the luggage. Hmm... Anyhow, it meant that I got to try full-luggage mode with the EQB’s second and third rows folded flat. At 4,684mm in length, the EQB is pretty long, but that’s still shorter than a Toyota Innova. And with its bonnet stretching out a fair bit, I was worried about cabin volume. But it easily took in all of their gigantic bags; three extra-large kit bags, three large check-in suitcases and one cabin bag. And all this without having to load up well over the window line.
Next up was a kid-free night out, which meant we tried out the EQB with seven adults aboard and followed that up with ferrying all the kids too, after they also decided they needed a kid-only outing.
With all adults packed in, I have to say it wasn’t as comfy in both the second and third row, and what’s a real shame is the seats themselves are firm; we’ve pointed this out in our first drive review too. So comfy it is not. Don’t think of using it as a regular seven-seater, but for short distances when you end up having to ferry seven people, like to a party or something like that, it will suffice.
With the kids in, the space was fine; the older ones found the third row cramped while the smaller ones found it claustrophobic. This might be due to a combination of a low seat base, a small quarter glass area, large head restraints in the second row and the dark interior trim all around.
I had to charge the EQB twice over the course of that week and at both times I used a public charger. This highlighted some issues that still exist with EV charging infrastructure, the app showed a CCS2 fast charger, however, on getting there, I found it was the super rare CHAdeMO unit. This meant that I had to put it on the slow AC charger and it took 3 hours and 14 minutes to add 31 percent to the battery (41 to 72 percent). Slow, but we were at a mall, so no one really complained. I got an efficiency of 5.02km/kWh, which is roughly a 334km range. This isn’t bad really, especially considering most of these trips were with the car fully loaded. Previously with Hormazd, the EQB would return a steady 380-390km range; for reference, the claimed WLTP range is 423km.
Once the relatives were off, I did keep the EQB for a few more days for some regular commute, which, I have to say, it manages very well. Firstly, the torque is enjoyable as it isn’t dumped in one go like many EVs, but rolls out in a measured, strong fashion. And despite almost as wide as an Innova, it feels easy to manoeuvre in the tight confines of Mumbai. That’s thanks to light controls and a fairly high perch, which gives you a good view outside. Being an EV and thus automatic, it’s easy in traffic too. I think I’m going to hold onto it for a bit longer then. I also have a trip to Ikea coming up and I think I’d like to do luggage mode in style once more.
Also see:
Mercedes-Benz EQB long term review, 9,400km report
