When I bought my silver '02 WRX, a friend accused me of buying "a poor man's Mercedes" -- and to be frank, the Platinum Silver color of the WRX line is pretty much identical to the Mercedes silver, though it seems to be a little more blue.

I scoffed at him, of course, and said that if Subaru was trying to make a budget Mercedes, they would have made it weigh more, left it as RWD and done up a nicer interior!

HOWEVER, going through a parking lot today, I DID find the poor man's Mercedes -- and it is one hell of a rip-off job. Absolutely shameless! Behold:

Mercedes C240 Sedan:



Hyundai Sonata:



Damn, they blocked my link to the image. Here's another one, but it isn't as good:



Man, some engineers at Hyundai owe some Germans lunch! I saw both cards side-by-side in the same parking lot, and they even have radio antennas and other trim in the same areas; the door handles are at the exact same height. That's got to be the worst copycat job I've seen in a long time...

 

Man I never realized that. Haha, that is a pretty bad copy.

 

Yes, and if you turn that Sonata around and look at the back end, behold! A Jaguar!

I'd be pretty pissed if I bought a brandy-dandy new Jaguar only to have people mistake it for a Hyundai...and to realize that the rear end of the Hyundai is a bit more stylish than the Jag...

And Mercedes, not the car it used to be for sure...they have definitely cheapened up the manufacturing process on those...now with cheap plastic interiors like every other car out there...and I couldn't live with myself if my expensive "German" car came labeled with the word "Chrysler" anywhere on it!

Will try to find pics of the rear end of these cars...

 

The base price $44,000 S-Type....

 

and the base price $13,000 Hyundai S-Type (S as in 'Sonata')...

All I'd have to say if I were driving the "unmistakenly styled S-Type" would be a great big DOH! whenever one of those Hyundai's passed me...

sorry, couldn't find 2 in the same color, but keep an eye out when you're out there on the road...very hard to distinguish the two when approaching to pass them...

 

Jaguar...

 

or Hyundai?

 

I think the fault is Jaguar's, not Hyundai's -- Jaguar's designs for the last four years have been boring, bland generic-looking cars just a few steps away from a Ford Taurus. A few weeks back I saw a classic '80s Xj8 pull up next to a 2004 Jag sedan at a stoplight, and you couldn't tell the two cars came from the same company. Jag lost their style the second they lost the V12.

 

I totally agree...seems Jaguar has gone the way of its Formula 1 team...blah...I bet their reliability is better than the 80's to 90's though!

As for Hyundai their quality is incredible for the price...they've really packed value into their cars (my grandmother traded in her old Mercedes for a new Sonata -- all around a really great package and for her a heck of a lot more reliable...time will tell though)...

 

they also have that 10 year / 100,000 mile warrenty too, that in it's self is a pretty good deal.

 

con someone say "de-badge" ?? i would

 

de-badge and then re-badge with mercedes emblems or whatever :banana:

 

or the best? its a good copy on the cheap

 

You do know that Ford owns Jaguar and Aston Martin.

 

That is absolutley correct, some of their cars even share many parts with Fords.