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I think I have a bit of a secret crush on the new Mondeo, I've started to see a few of them on the roads now and to me they seem to be a strikingly good looking car. I think it's that they have the right proportions to suit the Aston Martin grill, much more so than any other Fords. Or is it just me?
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>> three cylinder 1.0 litre EcoBoost gives you all the power you’d expect
No thanks!
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Now look, Paul. You've gone and woken the progressophobes.
Don't worry, I'll distract them with a can of Castrol and some barley sugars.
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>> three cylinder 1.0 litre EcoBoost
I have never driven something like that, but surely it must struggle?
Has anybody here actually driven one?
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Drove a new Focus in 1.0 eco boost form a few weeks ago. Went, much to my surprise, like the proverbial quick thing. Very nippy indeed.
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Does it feel like a revvy, gutless thing?
And what happens if you load up on passengers and/or luggage?
Last edited by: No FM2R on Tue 9 Jun 15 at 21:04
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Petrol turbos these days are seldom over-revvy or gutless - unlike many of the supposedly miraculous 16-valve engines of the 1990s, which were impossibly flat below 4,000 rpm.
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It feels like a gutless thing that fulfils all your preconceptions as you pull away, but if you are prepared to be firmer with the pedal it responds well. I suspect this will make the famed mpg drop from a promised eighty five gazillion to a real life six and a quarter.
No luggage, but three adults. 'Twas only a test drive, so not more than about half an hour, but pulled strongly overtaking on the A14 and leapt away nicely from roundabouts and so on.
This may well be entirely different in a Mondeo, obviously.
Last edited by: Crankcase on Tue 9 Jun 15 at 21:09
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I suspect this will make the famed mpg drop...
Of course it will, but that's true of any car; unless it has gravity to assist, any kinetic energy has to be converted from the chemical energy in the tank. A 1.0-litre engine doesn't burn less petrol when accelerating hard than a 2.0 (at least if it has a turbo to deliver an equivalent mass of air); but it does burn less when it's idling or trundling, and that's the mode in which most engines spend most of their time. The engineering achievement is in having the top-end performance without the low-end waste.
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>> The engineering achievement is in having the top-end performance without the low-end waste.
>>
Agreed - but I don't believe that Ford have managed it (and I am not anti-Ford, quite the opposite)
Here are some MPG figures from a certain website, which like all figures need to be treated with caution, but are a better starting point than me just making bland assertions.
Ford Focus
Model (Real MPG), % of claimed
1.0T EcoBoost 100 (40.7), 68%
1.6 (38.6), 80%
1.6 TDCi 115 (51.5), 77%
2.0 TDCi (46.6), 81%
These are a representative sample - I am not trying to pick only those data which tend to back up my argument.
It seems to me that in the real world these small, turbo boosted engines just don't cut it - YET.
I have an open mind as to whether they will improve sufficiently in the future to justify all the fancy plumbing.
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I've read in car magazines that these "small" engines are indeed surprisingly nippy, but that the fuel economy is very poor (even given the usual expectations that you won't get near the official figures).
What sort of MPG did you get, and what SHOULD you get (officially)
Last edited by: Londoner on Tue 9 Jun 15 at 21:09
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>>these "small" engines are indeed surprisingly nippy, but that the fuel economy is very poor
That's what I found with 3 cylinder Colt. I enjoyed driving the thing but I didn't enjoy the fuel consumption when driven swiftly.
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My only issue with the new one is it looks so much like the old one, especially from behind. Same mistake Vauxhall made going from Cavalier Mk3 to Vectra imo.
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Seems not to have done Audi and BMW any harm.
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True. But if I was hypothetical Mondeo man and was about to get a new company car I'd want the neighbours to notice without having to tell them.
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>> True. But if I was hypothetical Mondeo man and was about to get a new
>> company car I'd want the neighbours to notice without having to tell them.
Don't want to be a Mondeo man? how about being a vignale man?
vignale.ford.co.uk/en-GB/
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If Vignale catches on, will we see other makers trying the same Instant Heritage trick? If so, what name will they attach to it? How about...
...Renault: Gordini?
...Toyota: no need - done it already with Lexus
...Vauxhall: Argos?
...Nissan: Datsun?
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Vauxhall - Opel surely?
And then there's Mercedes - Maybach :p
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>> If Vignale catches on,
It wont. Do ford seriously think people are going to pay 36k plus for a car that looks like a car they can get 16k cheaper?
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Indeed. Aston Martin trod this path with the Toyota IQ, renaming it a Cygnet and selling at three times the price of a straight IQ.
Then they stopped after the giddy heights of a 4000 unit annual target resulted in sales of less than 150.
uk.reuters.com/article/2013/10/08/uk-britain-astonmartin-idUKBRE9970IF20131008
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>> Indeed. Aston Martin trod this path with the Toyota IQ, renaming it a Cygnet and
>> selling at three times the price of a straight IQ.
>>
IIRC Not as simple as you put it. It was some sort of plan to reduce the average MPG figures for ALL cars made by AML.
The story is here
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_iQ
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Doomed from the beginning.
Where was the £20k of added value?
Bald men drive Aston Martins so they feel like James Bond.
A bald man in a Cygnet looks like James Last (rip)
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...plan to reduce the average MPG figures for ALL cars made by AML.
Reduce?
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...I'd want the neighbours to notice...
And we're back to our residual values discussion of a couple of nights ago. Ford and GM seek to embarrass owners of last year's model into buying this year's; Audi and BMW try to avoid it. Is it any wonder a three-year-old A3 is worth twice as much as a three-year-old Astra?
Grilles are the worst of it, and Ford is the worst offender. In the last 20 years we've had Ovals with Everything, New Edge, the amorphous bloat of the late-2000s Focus and Mondeo, now this cod-Aston Martin nonsense. Granted, it looks least heinous on the Mondeo, but that's hardly a recommendation.
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>> Seems not to have done Audi and BMW any harm.
>>
Oi! My Audi looks pretty distinctive, thank you very much, especially with the "go-faster" spoiler deployed!
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Is that the "I'm speeding" indicator?
Last edited by: Old Navy on Tue 9 Jun 15 at 22:41
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>> Is that the "I'm speeding" indicator?
>>
Well, in automatic mode it only deploys at 85 mph.
However, there is a button on the dash that deploys it manually.
"I pushed the button, officer, honest . . . "
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I've driven a Focus with that engine, and it coped fine. Reliability on the other hand...
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=18230
I'm not sure I actually like the look of the new Mondeo - bar the grille it somehow seems blander than the previous version? Though is available in a nice metallic red :)
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With these new generation engines, it's a question of managing your expectations.
Expect 1.0 fuel economy and it is going to be a heck of a disappointment. But if you expect 125PS petrol engine economy, it will be a pleasant surprise.
I suspect the issue with the Mondeo will be 125PS dragging 1500kg. Regardless of engine capacity and the method of delivering the power, the numbers are going to mean it's a bit of a slug.
The same engine in the lighter Fiesta hits 60 in just over 9 seconds, and even in mag reviews with track work returns well over 40 mpg. You wouldn't have got much more than half that from a 105PS 1.8 XR2i under similar circumstances, and might have seen 40+ mpg downhill with a tail wind at 40 mph.
Last edited by: DP on Wed 10 Jun 15 at 15:24
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40+ real mpg from a petrol Focus isn't too shabby IMO.
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In crude terms I think the extra large disparity between the official figures and what most people achieve with these small capacity forced induction petrol engines is to do with the accessibility of the power.
Comparing with what somebody called the gutless 16 valve naturally aspirated 4 cylinder petrol engines of the 90s (when 2 litres got you 115-135 bhp), you had really to make those engines spin to get anything like the rated power out of them, but very few people drive like that. At 2500rpm they might have been capable of a quarter of the rated output (half the maximum torque x half the maximum rpm).
The 1.0 125ps ecoboost has a flat torque curve from 1400-4500 rpm. Roughly twice the power will be available on full throttle at 2500 rpm compared with the old NA engines. Anybody with an insensitive foot is not going to get anywhere near the official figures because they are likely to be accelerating more quickly, using more fuel than is necessary or they would have done had it necessitated holding the gears to higher rpm.
I am astonished at how well the boss's Popemobile goes with its 1.2TSI /105PS engine - but we are so far averaging just under 39mpg vs. the official combined figure of 49, and it is very easy to enjoy the acceleration a little more and push it down to the low 30's.
Her previous car, a 110bhp Civic 1.6 auto, would do 36mpg driven gently - not quite as good as the Roomster, but not far off.
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Had quite a few of the 1.0 Focus's and I quite like them. All have returned 48 - 52 driven enthusiastically, but mostly on motorway duties - probably optimistic trip, but even so 45 MPG from petrol focus is fine by me.
I like the low rpm / torque profile they offer
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On mostly a motorway run at the weekend I got over 44mpg from my 1.4TFSI ACT engined A3. That's nowhere near the official figure but I was doing 80mph or thereabouts at times (indicated) and did some accelerating of course.
Compared to the 170PS diesel Passat CC GT... not bad. The best I got on the same run was about 48mpg in the Passat. A bigger, heavier car. And a manual and not DSG.
The 1.4TFSI engine is impressive in my opinion. Not sure how a 1.0l 3-cylinder engine would compare.
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For company car drivers the small engines are a mistake if they do not meet the indicated MPG because fuel reimbursement rates are based on engine sizes and this could leave the driver out of pocket.
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Depends on the scheme for claiming back miles. The system we operate means I pay back for private miles (usually all miles) driven with fuel purchased with the fuel card. I know how to make sure I am not out of pocket.
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"In crude terms I think the extra large disparity between the official figures and what most people achieve with these small capacity forced induction petrol engines is to do with the accessibility of the power."
[[Lots of good stuff snipped to save space]]
Thank You Manatee. I had some thoughts along those lines, but all very incomplete and hazy.
Your explanation cleared things up for me.
Last edited by: Londoner on Thu 11 Jun 15 at 00:15
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In 1998 when contemplating my next car I quite liked the idea of the Golf GTI 1.8T. Not really a GTI but I was mindful of taxation based on emissions and not actual miles driven for company car drivers. I think it was about 189 or 190 g/km of CO2 but irrelevant because it was stolen within 6 months. The eventual replacement was a Passat with the same engine.... 192g/km of CO2 I seem to recall.
Colleagues were miffed about changes to taxation for BIK rates when it happened. I'd been planning for it the year before I got the Golf!
The 1.4TFSI/TSI engine is more flexible than the old 1.8T. Not surprise there. But the official rating is 109g/km for CO2 and it does more mpg in the real world.
I'd call it progress.
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Ford - The New Mondeo - bathtub tom
