Ford CEO Alan Mulally has made the politically correct decision for his return trip to Washington DC this week and is skipping the company jet. In fact, he's skipping the airport altogether and hitting the road in an Escape Hybrid. It seems like it would have been better to grab one of the brand new Fusion Hybrids, but no one in Washington should be too upset at the choice of the Escape. The last one we tested for AutoblogGreen averaged 33 mpg. Perhaps he'll even take one of the prototype plug-in hybrid versions, although that wouldn't make much sense for the nine-hour drive. In our reader poll you actually opted for the Fusion by a wide margin, followed by the Fiesta and Mustang. The Escape came in at a respectable fourth.
The grass, they say, is always greener on the other side of the fence. Though that often appears to be the case, most of the time it isn't. Dearborn's new "One Ford" initiative promises that we'll soon be able to stop gazing longingly across the ocean at what the company offers overseas buyers, as Ford endeavors to integrate its global product line-up into one cohesive range for every market around the world. In the case of the new Fiesta, that's a good thing. Less so with regards to the Kuga.
Conspiracy theorists have long insisted that automakers could push their vehicles to achieve better fuel economy, and as it turns out, they were right. Of course, it isn't as easy as flipping a magic MPG switch, but automakers are making incremental gains on vehicles even between redesigns. Techniques like changing gear ratios, lowering revs at highway speed and using lower rolling resistance tires are helping drive up efficiency a few percentage points at a time. For example, the 2009 Cobalt XFE (above) achieves 37 mpg on the highway compared to 36 mpg for the 2008 model with minimal aero and mechanical changes. Ford made similar changes to the 2009 Escape, enabling the Blue Oval's smallest crossover to hit 28 mpg in 2WD four-banger guise. Honda achieved similar incremental improvements when it introduced cylinder deactivation on the 2008 Odyssey. Chrysler will show 1 mpg improvement on the 2009 Avenger and Sebring four-cylinder model, which will bring the Pentastar's midsize sedans to 31 mpg. While everyone seems to be sitting on the car buying sidelines until some unbelievably fuel efficient vehicle comes along with great looks and a low price tag, the reality is that these baby steps are what we should expect. There are some some bigger jumps on the horizon, like the Chevy Cruze that promises 45 mpg on the highway and diesel offerings like the Jetta TDI and oil-burning Accord. For the next few years, however, expect automakers to pick the low hanging fruit of high gas mileage first.
The car-buying public has put its collective foot down and demanded fuel-efficient vehicles, and automakers are likely to do anything to answer customer demand. That may include reinventing the wheel, as more automakers look into incorporating low rolling resistance tires into non-hybrid vehicles. The high-pressure rubber can return fuel economy improvements of 1-2 mpg in most instances, giving automakers that use them a leg up on the competition when comparing EPA data. The new four-cylinder 2009 Ford Escape eked out an additional 1 mpg with the new tires, giving the CUV 21 mpg in the city and 27 mpg on the highway. Michelin estimates that low rolling resistance tires can save $300 in fuel costs at $4 per gallon over the life of tire, which is fairly substantial.
There are drawbacks to low-rolling resistance tires, too. They're more expensive than standard rubber, the ride isn't quite as comfortable, and the tires cause longer braking distances. In fact, Consumer Reports gave the Escape a lower rating because it had such poor stop times. The bottom line is that customers are looking for improved economy at all costs. Since low rolling resistance tires improve fuel economy, the cars that have them and achieve superior fuel economy as a result will be more attractive to mpg-conscious buyers.
The Blue Oval has gifted the U.S. Department of Energy a one-of-a-kind vehicle: a plug-in Escape Hybrid that can run on E85, has a 30-mile range on pure electric power at up to 40 mph, and gets 88 mpg in the city and 50 mpg on the highway. Yes, you read that correctly. But you might want to read it again.
The Escape uses a 4-cylinder engine assisted by a 10kW lithium-ion battery pack made by Johnson Controls/Saft. In pure electric mode, the battery pack runs until it is 70-percent depleted, and then the gasoline engine kicks in. The vehicle's emissions are estimated to be 60-percent less than that of a traditional gas vehicle, and that could climb all the way to 90-percent less if the car used cellulosic ethanol.
This is one of 20 vehicles that Ford is giving to government and research bodies in order to help push the growth and penetration of hybrid vehicles. Mark Fields, Ford's president of the Americas, said "There's no silver bullet solution, so we're pursuing multiple technology paths – recognizing that commercial viability is an essential component for success." And we say hear hear, well done, and it's about time...
The 2008 redesign of the Ford Escape and Mercury Mariner wasn't the clean-sheet redesign Ford would like people to believe. In fact, only the parts visible to the naked eye were "all new." Aside from the body and interior, the working bits that make the badge-engineered duo go were almost entirely carried over from the 2007 models. Fortunately for Ford, that oversight didn't seem to hurt sales, which increased by about ten-percent over their predecessors in a market that's down overall. For 2009, all the hardware under the skin has been either replaced or significantly refreshed. And that's a good thing.
The old 2.3-liter four-pot has been superseded by a 2.5-liter unit, while the classic 3.0-liter Duratec V6 gets a major overhaul. Both engines receive a substantial boost in power and an all new six-speed gearbox to transmit it to the wheels. The driver's working environment also becomes a more pleasant place thanks to structural improvements to the body and Ford's next-generation navigation system with Sirius Travel Link. We got a chance to play with all of the 2009 Escape variants on a rainy spring morning, so read on after the jump for our impressions.
One of the cool features that Ford is introducing for the 2009 model year is its updated navigation system with Sirius Travel Link. When we went out to drive the updated 2009 Ford Escape this week, Ford's chief technology spokes-model Alan Hall gave us a guided tour of the system. The next generation nav unit takes the traditional touch screen GPS unit and integrates it with the popular SYNC system that debuted last year, while adding real time downloadable information from Sirius and a 10GB jukebox. The Sirius system provides information such as live weather maps overlaid on the navigation data, current fuel prices, movie listings and more.
With the jukebox, you can insert an audio CD and automatically rip it to the internal hard drive like you can in the Cadillac CTS. The full Gracenote CDDB database is incorporated so that the meta-data can be automatically added. The screen can even display the album artwork. The system can even play DVDs with the video only being visible on the front seat screen when the car is in park. As soon as the transmission is shifted into gear, it only plays the audio track. If you pull up a restaurant listing, it can automatically dial your bluetooth phone through the SYNC system. Like SYNC, the whole system can be controlled by voice commands so you don't have to take your hands off the wheel. The new setup will be on most 2009 Fords, with bigger vehicles like the new Flex and the MKS getting an 8-inch touch screen while the smaller Escape makes do with a 6.5" inch screen. Ford will be charging $1,995 for the full system including SYNC, the nav system, Travel Link and the jukebox. Check out a pair of video run-throughs of the system
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As AutoblogGreen points out, Ford will soon be facing tough competition in the compact hybrid CUV segment with the introduction of the Saturn Vue two-mode hybrid. What better time, then, to update the Ford Escape Hybrid and Mercury Mariner Hybrid for 2009? The big news is the addition of a new 2.5L four-cylinder to replace the old 2.3L engine. Not only is the new engine larger, but it also adds variable valve timing on the intake to boost power by 17 up to 170 horsepower. The 2.5L also serves as the new base engine for the standard Escape and Mariner, but uses the Atkinson cycle in the hybrid models. Ford's hybrid CUVs also get a new six-speed automatic, aerodynamic upgrades and new 16-inch low-rolling resistance tires from Michelin. All of these improvements add up to a one mpg gain in fuel economy, plus more power and usability. Ford hasn't released official fuel economy numbers for the 2009 Escape Hybrid, but it should achieve around 33 mpg combined and likewise for the new Mercury Mariner Hybrid.
