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I love the aftermarket. They are the fringe chefs of the auto world. No content with the way something is made, they will take a classic dish-say, risotto – and then add crazy stuff to it like maple syrup and essence of deadly sea urchin. You might think, “What are you doing?? It was delicious the way it is!” But then chefRENNtech presents his 2012 Mercedes CLS63 AMG risotto and after a taste, you stop complaining. Because RENNtech has found that with a simple tune you can extract another 100 wheel horsepower. Yum.

I’m not that surprised the CLS has big power potential, because it has a big V-8 with two turbos feeding it air like it’s making foie gras. But I didn’t think you could get 100WHP out of a simple chip. AMG cars always respond well to mods, but this is ridiculous. The other day we were discussing which is a better idea, buying a CLS 550 and chipping it, or dropping significantly more money for the AMG. Well RENNtech dyno’d all of them, including a CLS63 AMG with the performance package, and one without. Check out the dyno below.

The blue line is a stock CLS63 AMG without the added Performance Package. Red line has the $7,500 Performance Package option ticked, raising power from 518HP/516tq to 550HP/590 tq. The Performance Package isn’t anything intense, it just raises boost from 14.5psi to 18.8. On the dyno, they put down 483WHP/478tq and 516WHP/544tq, respectively. So that means A, they’re both really fast and powerful and B, both are a little under-rated from the factory. Despite what your forum or 13 year old cousin has said, these cars are fast as hell. I know its 0-60 time (4.4) isn’t as fast as the Nissan R38 that had twin-supra motors and really strong guy pushing behind it, but in the real world the CLS63 AMG is fast as hell. I spent a week with one. The only place this car is slow is on the internet.

Then RENNtech starts throwing things in the pot, to satisfy crazy people like  your cousin or wealthy Russians. Or wealthy anyone, really. Their chip gives the CLS a little more of the boost it craves so much, and just like that, it is putting down 583WHP and 643 torques. These aren’t gains at the crank (those numbers are 669hp/734tq. Yes, that is a “7″), this is at the wheels. You know, the part that pushes on the ground? This brings the 0-60 time down to 3.4 seconds, and the 1/4 mile is gone in 11.3s (or 11.2 with DRs).