Distance: 49 km
Location: Ottawa
Date: November 2-4, 2022
My car got hit by an uninsured pickup truck driver who did not carry his driver’s license, so my insurance company covered the cost of a rental car with Enterprise while I got a replacement bumper.
Up front: The driver’s seat had 8-way power adjustment and the telescoping steering wheel offers a decent amount of movement to get into a comfortable driving position. The seats go really high to help even the shortest drivers see over the front.
The perforated leather seats are a secure fit for my body but they are not completely covered in leather. Reach down to the sides of the seat and you’ll feel cheap cloth hiding where you don’t see it. The squidgy plastics are a nice touch even on places on the dashboard that you won’t reach to feel.
The controls are easy to use and the steering wheel has all the basics you’d expect from a mid-range mass-market crossover. Volume, cruise control, phone, and information screen controls are all easy to learn. However, at nearly $40,000, I would have expected a two-tier centre console to help with organization and a sun visor strap to keep toll cards handy.
In the back: The bench seats are designed for maximum versatility, not maximum comfort. Being a compact family crossover, kids won’t complain in the back, but a more ergonomic contour certainly wouldn’t hurt. The seats are easy to fold down with a side lever to create more cargo space, but there is a half-inch lip that could make loading long and heavy objects a challenge.
It’s not a small car, but not long enough for two adult passengers in the front and two bicycles in the back. The passenger would have to make big sacrifices in the legroom department to get those bikes in without taking the wheels off.
Driving: Fine around the city, but lacking in power for cross-country road trips. If you’re only looking to buy a city runabout, the fuel economy is great, acceleration from red lights won’t disappoint you, and anything at 100km/h or less feels natural, but look elsewhere if you need to regularly do hours-long trips. The turbo 4-cylinder petrol engine has plenty of pep but won’t enjoy speeding across the mid-west at Texas speeds.
I found the windshield wipers an annoyance in the drizzle. The speed at which the wipers travel vary depending on the setting you select. In light rain, they move excruciatingly slow across the windscreen, obstructing your view of the road for longer than necessary. Ford should make sure that the wipers move as quickly away from view as possible regardless of how fast the wipe cycles are.
