My new 2013 Ford Fusion Titanium Hybrid

[alpha754293]

Hi. I'm new here. I picked up my baby about two weeks ago and I've already clocked in over 1800 miles on it. (Yea, I'm a high mileage driver - currently on track for an estimated 40,000 miles this year).

 

It's white platinum, leather steering wheel, leather shift knob, Sony 12-speaker audio system, hybrid, with the moonroof, rear view camera, push button start, and premium floor mats.

 

I love it! And not only because I'm an engineer at Ford.

 

Current average fuel economy is sitting at 36.7 mpg (since I picked up the car from the dealership with a starting odometer of 188.4 miles - it was a dealer swap). Some people wouldn't have taken the car with that many miles on it. I honestly, don't really care because I don't think that it makes that much of a difference really.

 

It's not perfect, but it meets a lot of my requirements.

 

I was researching vehicles to buy for close to well...10 months by the time I actually bought it. I've test driven the 2013 VW Jetta Hybrid, and also the 2013 Toyota Prius as well.

 

I REALLY wanted the push button start, and also the rear view camera, and once the sales manager at my local dealership told me that without the nav SD card that it's just a passive system, I wanted the nav as well. I didn't originally want the moonroof either (nor the floor mats) but it was the only way that I would be able to get a car before May 24th. Originally, I had put in an order, but from my ability to access our internal systems, I figured that it wasn't going to be built in time.

 

So I got more car than I wanted, and I'm also paying more for it.

 

But I'm getting a LOT of good compliments on it, so it helps.

 

And the sales manager that I was working with was very nice. And remarkably honest too. None of that stereotypical car salesmen stunts. (Although I think that with my being an engineer for the company and also the fact that I have access to our internal systems which means that he were to have tried to pull stunts, I probably would have been able to sniff them out) so...it factored a lot into my not trying to negotiate the price down.

 

I'm still doing the fuel economy testing, but so far, it looks like that cuising at 69 mph (110 km/h), it's going to settle in around 36.4 mpg. (It ranges between that and 36.7 mpg). And that's with EcoCruise mode on. The absolute highest that I've hit so far is heading back to the office from lunch where I topped off at 145 mpg).

[CombsAuthor]

Awesome, welcome to the forum.

It will be interesting to read your posts as you will be putting more miles on per year than most average drivers.

[acdii]

Welcome, what kind of engineering do you do for Ford? It would be nice to have someone with an inside track when we have questions that cant be answered.

[alpha754293]

Awesome, welcome to the forum.

It will be interesting to read your posts as you will be putting more miles on per year than most average drivers.

 

Actually, the funny story about that was there was a guy that works with steering wheels and we had a company event (I'm always going to struggle a little with how much I can really talk about, so be forewarned that some of my posts might be a little bit "cryptic" due to non-disclosures - that it might read like there's info missing) - anyways - he asked how many miles I drive a year and he couldn't believe it.

 

So then I talked him through the different places that I drive to and the frequency and then it how it all quickly adds up.

 

At the current rate, there's a possibility that I might hit close to 6000-7000 miles by the end of the month (including my trip to Quebec City, QC and back which is about 2,400 km total (~1500 miles) during the U.S. Memorial Day weekend.)

[Aquineas]

Welcome! I can't wait to get mine (er, the wife's!)

[alpha754293]

Welcome, what kind of engineering do you do for Ford? It would be nice to have someone with an inside track when we have questions that cant be answered.

 

I'm in Global Core Weight Engineering (which probably doesn't mean anything for most people). Unfortunately, I am unable to provide an inside track because I am unauthorized to be a representative of the company here, but I DO want people to know that I listen, and that if there are bigger issues, I will try to refer you to the right people so that they can be taken care of through the appropriate channels. I know - I wished that I could be an inside track, but unfortunately, I can't and I'm not allowed to do that (which hopefully people here can understand).

 

But also know this - I drive a Ford as well. Just like you do. And my group is kind of uniquely positioned in the company that we're a really tiny group right now, but we have the potential to be quite far reaching and interface with people both up AND down the chain (although we don't do it willy-nilly either.) Trina at Ford, Eric at Ford (on Facebook) and also Rebecca-at-Ford (for SYNC/MyFord Touch related issues) are excellent resources I've found.

 

And I will also mention that while I can't be the voice of the company here; I will also mention that if I see something, I'll try to point people to it and go "read this" and hopefully that whatever it is, it will get resolved.

 

I do personally believe that our customer's opinion matter - whether we work for Ford or not. And that at the very least, I do want to people to know that there IS someone that's listening and that your concerns matter to me on a personal level. I think that the word-of-mouth of people thinking "hey, Ford cares" would be important. And while I might not be able to do much about all of the issues personally, or even be a representative voice for the company, but the honesty here tells us how we're doing better than anything else. Perhaps. Almost. or nearly almost. (Reading about what we're getting right/doing good helps us too - not just the bad stuff.)

 

It's for that reason why I HAVE to have the disclaimer in my signature.

[alpha754293]

Welcome! I can't wait to get mine (er, the wife's!)

 

to be honest - I wasn't LOOKING at the Titanium trim level when I was first looking at the Ford Fusion Hybrid. And initially, I was waiting for the official fuel economy numbers to be published (I've only been here for < 2 months) and after those came out, I was waiting for the crash safety ratings to be published by both NHTSA and IIHS. (As it turns out, the Fusion got an 'acceptable' rating on the really difficult small overlap crash test which kinda surprised me actually). Then the whole Consumer's Reports/EPA v. Hyundai/Kia thing came out and then it was EPA v. Ford so I was on hold about that too. But once I started working here, I was able to find out more about it (nothing which I can talk about publically unfortunately).

 

Here's a couple of sources about that:

http://www.caranddriver.com/features/why-is-the-epa-so-bad-at-estimating-hybrid-fuel-economy-feature

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2013/02/28/epa-gas-mileage-ford-cmax-fusion/1954967/

http://www.chron.com/cars/article/Why-is-the-EPA-so-bad-at-estimating-hybrid-fuel-4483222.php

 

And then I really wanted the push-button start which is ONLY available on the Titanium trim level, so I ended up with wayyyy more car than I had originally planned on getting. But after crunching the numbers too, I think that the difference was like $5000 (on a car that starts at $30k in Canada), which honestly, over 6 years, isn't TOO bad. I mean, yeah, $5k is a lot of money, but spread over 72 months, it's < $70/month. And you do get so much more car for that. So I found that it is worth it.

 

So if you've ordered the Titanium, I'm sure that you'll love it. And even if you didn't, it's still a really good car.

[neod192]

Welcome to the forum and great choice on the HyTi! I'm sure the employee discount didn't hurt either :) Looking forward to all the things you can't tell us. :yahoo: ! And yes, I do understand your position.

[corncobs]

Welcome to the forum and great choice on the HyTi! I'm sure the employee discount didn't hurt either :) Looking forward to all the things you can't tell us. :yahoo: ! And yes, I do understand your position.

That's a good one!

 

I think the majority on this forum are very reasonable people and even if we would really like to know a detail more here and there it's worth getting the insider in trouble. Unfortunately there are always ways to figure out the true identity of someone talking a little bit too much.

 

Welcome to the forum and enjoy your new toy; you sure picked a very comfortable car for winding up miles like you do.

[alpha754293]

That's a good one!

 

I think the majority on this forum are very reasonable people and even if we would really like to know a detail more here and there it's worth getting the insider in trouble. Unfortunately there are always ways to figure out the true identity of someone talking a little bit too much.

 

Welcome to the forum and enjoy your new toy; you sure picked a very comfortable car for winding up miles like you do.

 

Yeah...it really doesn't take much effort to figure out the real identity of someone these days.

 

I will say this though - I WISHED I could tell you. Because I like it when people are excited about stuff. And I personally disagree with the opinion that it might put us in an uncompetitive position (since normal lifecycle of vehicles are AT LEAST 5 years) so the probability of someone deciding that they're going to change their corporate business strategy because of "some post made by some dude on a forum somewhere on the internet" - mehhh.... But companies don't see that. I'm not really sure that they understand it either because if a company was purely reactive rather than proactive, then they're ALWAYS going to behind. They'll never be able to lead. Unless they just severely undersell their competition. Which works mostly in theory. (There are other larger, macro-economic problems with that.)

 

But mehhh...companies don't like information leaks.

 

if it were me - if the public is asking, it can get them REALLY excited and fired up about it LONG before the official marketing campaign can kick in. And if the recent rounds of elections have taught us anything - those internet, grassroots campaigns - they're quite a force to the reckoned with. And they can do a LOT of good for you as quickly as they can take you down. And I think that a LOT of people, in a LOT of places and media and companies, may not really quite understand that whole thing yet. Shame really.

 

But since I own a FFH myself - I can tell you about my first hand personal accounts and experiences outside of corporate. And those - it is what it is. And I personally aren't one of those people that's like "yeah...Ford's the best" by default only because I work there. Strength, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats - SWOT - knowing all of those is what makes me and us better. Public feedback from you guys (the good, the bad, and the ugly) is important.

 

But I will also say that some of the stuff that I write, might get scrubbed a little bit. lol...you know...to make sure that it keeps me outta the crosshairs. lol... ;) just sayin'

 

*edit*

yeah....I'm still getting settled into my seat. lol...trying to find the most comfortable position that I can sit in where I can drive for hours and hours on end.

Edited May 14, 2013 by alpha754293

[hybridbear]

But I will also say that some of the stuff that I write, might get scrubbed a little bit. lol...you know...to make sure that it keeps me outta the crosshairs. lol... ;) just sayin'

Welcome! It must be pretty cool to see projects that you work on being produced around the world on consumer products. While I was in college I had an internship with our local public transit organization in the system planning department and I still enjoy seeing the results of projects I worked on 6 years later.

 

We understand that you have to be very careful but we appreciate your contributions. Certainly no one here would want you to put your job at risk on the forum

[alpha754293]

Welcome! It must be pretty cool to see projects that you work on being produced around the world on consumer products. While I was in college I had an internship with our local public transit organization in the system planning department and I still enjoy seeing the results of projects I worked on 6 years later.

 

We understand that you have to be very careful but we appreciate your contributions. Certainly no one here would want you to put your job at risk on the forum

 

Thank you.

 

Actually, the cool thing was that my first engineering job outta college (nearly 3 years ago) was actually designing the gas pedal for the Ford Fusion. And now I'm driving one...that's the new part.

 

And the cool thing too is once stuff becomes announced/public knowledge, then I am much more able to talk about some of the stuff more openly - which is also really cool too.

[neod192]

 

Thank you.

 

Actually, the cool thing was that my first engineering job outta college (nearly 3 years ago) was actually designing the gas pedal for the Ford Fusion. And now I'm driving one...that's the new part.

 

And the cool thing too is once stuff becomes announced/public knowledge, then I am much more able to talk about some of the stuff more openly - which is also really cool too.

Do you know why they removed the aluminum covers from the Titanium Hybrid and Energi? Eric and Trina on FB haven't commented on that and it makes no sense! They reduced the MSRP by $100, so it's not the cost ... I'm curious to know if anyone knows why, even if you can't actually share why :)

 

The weird part is that they left them in the EB Titanium and they're bringing them back in the 2014 MY.

[alpha754293]

Do you know why they removed the aluminum covers from the Titanium Hybrid and Energi? Eric and Trina on FB haven't commented on that and it makes no sense! They reduced the MSRP by $100, so it's not the cost ... I'm curious to know if anyone knows why, even if you can't actually share why :)

 

The weird part is that they left them in the EB Titanium and they're bringing them back in the 2014 MY.

 

What aluminum covers? Are you talking about the pedals? What's EB Titanium?

 

I'm not really sure actually.

[hybridbear]

 

What aluminum covers? Are you talking about the pedals? What's EB Titanium?

 

I'm not really sure actually.

Yes, HyTi was advertised as having aluminum pedals, then Ford said the HyTi and Energi Titanium won't have them, only the EB Titanium (EB = EcoBoost). Now the 2014 order guide indicates that aluminum pedals will be on the HyTi next year. When Ford took aluminum pedals away from the HyTi they reduced the cost by $100 because of the change

[alpha754293]

Yes, HyTi was advertised as having aluminum pedals, then Ford said the HyTi and Energi Titanium won't have them, only the EB Titanium (EB = EcoBoost). Now the 2014 order guide indicates that aluminum pedals will be on the HyTi next year. When Ford took aluminum pedals away from the HyTi they reduced the cost by $100 because of the change

 

Hmmm.....interrresting...I'm gonna call my dealership and see what I can find out from them.

 

(haha...I nearly have my dealership on speed dial now...lol...)

 

hmm....apparently something had changed between October 26, 2012 and April 15, 2013 - someone somewhere made the decision to pull them out. Not really sure why though.

[fusionTX]

 

I'm still doing the fuel economy testing, but so far, it looks like that cuising at 69 mph (110 km/h), it's going to settle in around 36.4 mpg. (It ranges between that and 36.7 mpg). And that's with EcoCruise mode on. The absolute highest that I've hit so far is heading back to the office from lunch where I topped off at 145 mpg).

Congrats on your new car and welcome to the forum!

 

Recently, on a picture perfect Florida day, I was able to get 38 MPG on the east-west portion of trip and 40.5 MPG on the south-north portion, going at 68 MPH.

 

I chose 68 MPH, because that kept the RPMs at or slightly below 2000.

 

That is the best I have done on a highway trip at sustained speeds. I've also noticed that wind and weather can make a big difference in mileage. The same trip on a different day and in opposite directions yielded very poor mileage.

 

68 MPH seemed to my car's sweet spot this on this day.

[alpha754293]

Congrats on your new car and welcome to the forum!

 

Recently, on a picture perfect Florida day, I was able to get 38 MPG on the east-west portion of trip and 40.5 MPG on the south-north portion, going at 68 MPH.

 

I chose 68 MPH, because that kept the RPMs at or slightly below 2000.

 

That is the best I have done on a highway trip at sustained speeds. I've also noticed that wind and weather can make a big difference in mileage. The same trip on a different day and in opposite directions yielded very poor mileage.

 

68 MPH seemed to my car's sweet spot this on this day.

 

Yes. Wind, weather, grade, how many passengers you have, how much cargo you're carrying, and to some extents, whether the windows and/or moonroof (if you've got one) are open and the degree to which they're open - all make a difference.

 

There's a bit of a debate as to at what point is it better to run your A/C on low (well...it's actually just vent, A/C off, but climate on) vs. opening your windows - even a little bit and I've never ran the computational fluid dynamics simulations to find out the impact it has on drag, but you gotta figure that it's gotta be some. How much is the question and what's the relative impact between the baseline coefficient of drag (windows closed) vs. the permutations of windows open. (number and degree/% open).

 

From what I've found so far, it seems that climate on (vent) is better. It's also a LOT quieter.

 

The legal limit here in 70 mph. So with me staying at 69 mph (111 km/h) is pretty darn close without being too slow. And also up here, people routinely do 80-85 mph, so any slower than that, you're at risk to being rear ended. (People up here also don't exactly pay the most attention - like Sunday night, driving back - I saw this lady that was maybe like between 30-35, on her phone, presumably texting away, while weaving back and forth like she was drunk.)

 

I'm waiting for a nicer day and where the winds have died down some before I do another "speed/fuel economy test run" cuz there's a 16.4 mile stretch that's completely or nearly completely flat going through the county, so I can get good, decent fuel economy reading (doing one at 62 mph (100 km/h) and doing the return run at 74 mph (120 km/h)).

 

And that's kind of the tough thing about fuel economy because the best situation is to have no wind and stuff - but that's more like a lab condition, which almost never exists in real life, and then to be able to run the tests in a repeatable and reliable manner/fashion.

 

If you have a whole line of static anemometers parked on the shoulder of the highway, then you can normalize against wind speed and direction, but who has that kind of time and money to do that? (so you can "subtract" out those effects).

 

The engineer/scientist in me wants the perfect, highly controllable lab setting. The commuter in me is saying "who cares?" since it's the practical daily commute that ultimately is what I'm driving. And finding the balance, optimal solution between the two so that it's fair, repeatable, and reliable between the two is probably the biggest thing; one of the biggest challenges, a HUGE debate, probably one of the toughest problems that exists today and will be even more important in light of the more stringent fuel economy standards through model year 2025.

[hybridbear]

The engineer/scientist in me wants the perfect, highly controllable lab setting. The commuter in me is saying "who cares?" since it's the practical daily commute that ultimately is what I'm driving. And finding the balance, optimal solution between the two so that it's fair, repeatable, and reliable between the two is probably the biggest thing; one of the biggest challenges, a HUGE debate, probably one of the toughest problems that exists today and will be even more important in light of the more stringent fuel economy standards through model year 2025.

It will be great to hear your perspective as an engineer on the forum. I know you will bring a lot of value

[alpha754293]

It will be great to hear your perspective as an engineer on the forum. I know you will bring a lot of value

 

Thank you.

 

BTW...I didn't even know about the engineering test mode. lol...Just tried it right now. oh man...it's going to be bad cuz it's going to be such a HUGE driver distraction lol...

 

Also for those that are interested - if you have push-button start, push on the brakes like you normally would and start the car holding the left "ok" down. The dialog box for "ready to drive - press "ok"" will come up normally and just keep holding the left "ok" down. Then a little 'ET' is going to show up on the instrument cluster and have fun. But BE SAFE!!!

[BradS7535]

 

Thank you.

 

BTW...I didn't even know about the engineering test mode. lol...Just tried it right now. oh man...it's going to be bad cuz it's going to be such a HUGE driver distraction lol...

 

Also for those that are interested - if you have push-button start, push on the brakes like you normally would and start the car holding the left "ok" down. The dialog box for "ready to drive - press "ok"" will come up normally and just keep holding the left "ok" down. Then a little 'ET' is going to show up on the instrument cluster and have fun. But BE SAFE!!!

 

Oooo, can't wait to try this on my way home today!

 

Also, added my fuely to my signature, hopefully it shows up correctly.

[alpha754293]

So here's some new stats/data:

 

I ran the same 16.2-ish mile test where the "departure" trip was done at 62 mph (100 km/h) and the return trip was done at 74 mph (119 km/h) and here are the stats:W

 

Shortly after I had picked up the vehicle, I did the same run (actually the day after I had picked up my vehicle) so this was during the break-in period still and at 62 mph, it averaged 37.8 mpg (all data according to the trip computer) and the 74 mph return averaged 34.8 mpg.

 

I just ran it now (rolled over 2000 miles since I picked up the vehicle Fri Apr 26 (so like 2.5 weeks ago - yes...I'm still on track at ~ 800 miles/wk, 40k miles/year)) and on the 62 mph run, it averaged 38.2 mpg and the 74 mph run was like 35.9 mpg (it had JUST dropped from 36.0 right as I was exiting).

 

So it looks like that if I were to split the difference and cruise at 68 mph (109 km/h) - it oughta come in nearly right in between that at 37 mpg. Not the 47 mpg of course, but again, this isn't the highway fuel economy test (HWFET) either (where it TOPS OUT at 62 mph, rather than holding it there for miles and miles on end and in all realistic probability, very few people actually stick to the limit.) Heck there are surface/city streets outside of Detroit where the flow-of-traffic speed is between 55-65 mph and that's a SURFACE street (Mound Rd., Van Dyke, Dequindre, any of those from like 15 Mile all the way up to like 26 Mile) are all like that. You get a traffic light roughly every half-mile and if you time it right, you can hit all greens too.

 

That's 3 mpg shy of my target of hitting 40 mpg, but considering the size of the vehicle and it's still able to get that kind of mileage, it's still pretty damn good. And if you live in a big city, you'd be able to use the electric a LOT more!

 

And it is a VERY comfortable ride.

[alpha754293]

 

Oooo, can't wait to try this on my way home today!

 

Also, added my fuely to my signature, hopefully it shows up correctly.

 

Please DO be very careful though.

 

interestingly enough, it looks like that the cluster is actually reporting numbers that are lower - like my speedo was registering 111 km/h (69 mph) which is what the cruise is set at but the engineering test mode was only registering 109 km/h (68 mph). And my cluster fuel economy numbers is about 1 mpg less than what fuelly is calculating (although with fuelly, it really depends on how much fuel you put in - or how many clicks you let go by before you stop filling completely.)

[corncobs]

 

Please DO be very careful though.

 

interestingly enough, it looks like that the cluster is actually reporting numbers that are lower - like my speedo was registering 111 km/h (69 mph) which is what the cruise is set at but the engineering test mode was only registering 109 km/h (68 mph). And my cluster fuel economy numbers is about 1 mpg less than what fuelly is calculating (although with fuelly, it really depends on how much fuel you put in - or how many clicks you let go by before you stop filling completely.)

Do you have an idea in which units the instant fuel is being displayed? I tried the ET mode for the first time today and I was just trying to see if I can improve on my ICE efficiency. But the numbers didn't make sense ?

[fusionTX]

Is this ET mode in the manual? I keep hearing references to it, but no idea what its purpose is.