The colour of the transmission fluid from the Lexus was pure black versus the reddish purple in January after 7 years! And the dreadful noise the thing makes when you need to try and move fast, leads me to believe that there's no way metal isn't getting shredded in there, on at least a microscopic level over time.
That's crazy about Smart - but Mercedes engineering if I've ever heard of it! On the other side of the spectrum from Mercedes... I watched someone stripping down the 2ZR-FXE (Prius engine/CT engine, Hybrid one) on YouTube... he couldn't get the oil dipstick pipe off, he hung the engine freely from a hoist just holding on to the dipstick housing / tube.... thinking he'd pull it off and the thing hung from it bizarrely!
I remember test driving a Smart car in 2017 at the Mercedes dealership in Belfast. Still blown away by the quality, and brown-nosing service the sales people give the largely elder viewers in there at the time. And the fact they seemingly had every Mecedes model on display indoors, in contrast to my Fiat dealer at the time who couldn't seem to get Panda's in! (you'd think the cars were endangered too!). They had a full on, real coffee bar (steaming machines and people in aprons). And from what I hear, they do things like buy your wife flowers etc when you come to buy or service your car. Crazy 'luxury' experience. Then there was the Smart part at the back, much less serious, more colourful and even the sales guy who came out seemed much more 'normal dealer'. Fun to test drive the Smart, strange turning around and having the window right behind your head. When I got in my 2005 Panda, and looked back, it felt like a bus with the room! It was the safety that put me off the Smart car, otherwise I liked the whole concept. But later on learnt the extent to which they're basically Renault Twingo's and that stubbed out all desire in ever getting one.
They do release an entertaining marketing stunt video every few years don't they though? The one where they crash a Smart into an S-Class, usually painted bright orange. To show how strong is it. Though I think the shock-going-through-your-body is the killer there, but nice to know the car itself, will stay in shape.. right?! haha