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Trip Report: 2,000 Miles in my Focus Ti - Good, Bad, and Ugly

6K views 32 replies 21 participants last post by  ChrisRyan 
#1 ·
Over the past week or so the wife and I took my Focus on a serious road trip, logging just under 2,000 miles. There are quite a few things worth discussing, some of which would be equally at home in other threads - such as MFT issues, but I wanted to keep everything together in one location. So, here goes...

The Route:


Overall Thoughts

  • THE GOOD [8D]
    • Let's fact it, this car is fun to drive - I had a blast in the twisties in Upstate NY, VT, and NH
    • MPGs were pretty good and occasionally great. All told, I managed 37.6 MPG (hand-calculated) over the length of the trip, which was 90% hwy / 10% city
    • The car is very comfortable. We drove over 600 miles one day (NYC to Ohio) and I really wasn't sore anywhere except my left elbow - I really wish Ford used more padding on the door armrest!
    • A/C did a great job in the hot weather - having the Auto system was great for a long trip like this
    • Park Assist superbly parked itself in downtown Manchester, NH - the first time I've used it in a crowded city (see Photo #1)
  • THE BAD [:(]
    • Even with the 12B37 update, there was some occasional jerkiness when shifting - including some serious thunks at both slow and highway speeds. It definitely seems to be worse when the car's been driving a while / warmed up.
    • The MPG meter in my car is noticeably (and repeatedly) off from my hand-calculated MPGs. I've been tracking it with every tank since April and, over that time, it averages a nearly 10% error.
  • THE UGLY [scream]
    • Oh MFT, we have such a love/hate relationship. When you're good, you're kind of awesome. But when you act up... [:(!]
    • 3x Nav SD Card Faults (which kills my USB/iPod and Nav, at least temporarily until it re-recognizes the SD card and reboots - see Photo #2)
    • 3x complete MFT crashes, i.e. the all-too-familiar 'Performing Scheduled System Maintenance' screen
    • Completely lost BT Audio pairing (but not Phone?) with my phone - and, of course, you can't re-pair until you're stopped - so I lost all streaming audio for a couple hours since I didn't want to pull off the highway just to re-pair my phone... (see Photo #3)
    • USB/iPod suddenly stopped responding to Fwd/Next Track functionality; it won't shuffle or go to the next song either - it simply repeats the same song over and over and over...
    • For the first time since I've owned the car, BT Audio stopped showing the Rew/Play/Fwd buttons on the Entertainment screen and instead displayed a "Bluetooth Audio Stream Detected" message (see Photo #4)

MPG (hand-calc'ed) for the Trip:
Tank #1 ... 294 miles ... 35.4 MPG* ... 100% Hwy ... 93 Octane - Speedway (*see Note #1 below - and Photo #5)
Tank #2 ... 486 miles ... 45.0 MPG ... 90% Hwy .... 93 Octane - Shell (see Photo #6)
Tank #3 ... 277 miles ... 34.3 MPG ... 80% Hwy .... 87 Octane - Gulf Oil
Tank #4 ... 328 miles ... 35.2 MPG ... 80% Hwy .... 87 Octane - Shell
Tank #5 ... 418 miles ... 36.8 MPG ... 100% Hwy ... 87 Octane - Exxon
Tank #6 ... 116 miles ... 36.1 MPG ... 90% Hwy .... 87 Octane - Shell

Note #1 - On the first tank, the pump said it filled 8.3 gallons even though the tank was only half-empty. Normally I'd just assume the gauge doesn't read in a completely linear fashion - except the other 5 tanks on the trip took exactly how much fuel you'd expect relative to the fuel gauge reading, I suspect that the pump may have been mis-calibrated. I'm going to call the gas station / county weights and measures department to investigate. Had the fill been about 1.5 gal less (which would agree much more closely with the MPG and miles driven) then it would've been around 43 MPG for that leg.

Note #2 - As far as I know, every station I filled up at was selling E10 (non-pure) gas.

Note #3 - Temperatures were in the 80-100 deg F range for the entire trip. We had a slight tailwind (5-10 MPH) on the first tank and a headwind (5-15 MPH) on the last couple of tanks. Tanks 2-5 included some mountain highway driving. Cruise was set to 65 MPH for the vast majority of the trip; highway speed generally varied from 55-70 when off cruise due to congestion, passing, etc.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photo #1 - Impressive Self-Parking Job in Manchester, NH


Photo #2 - Nav SD Card Fault


Photo #3 - Lost BT Audio Pairing (... but Phone Functionality Still Paired?!)


Photo #4 - Missing Fwd/Play/Rew Controls on BT Audio


Photo #5 - Distance to E Immediately After First Fuel-Up (Start of Tank #2)


Photo #6 - Awesome MPGs on Tank #2 (Photos Taken with Just Under 1/2 Tank Remaining)


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Final Thoughts:
  • Overall, it was an enjoyable trip. The ride was smooth and quiet and the car handled well in both the flat and hilly parts of the trip.
  • MPGs were as good as or better than the EPA specs. I don't have enough data points to come to a real conclusion, but it does seem as though running Premium / 93 Octane may result in a noticeable bump in MPGs. Not sure if that effect would be as pronounced in cooler temperatures?
  • MFT still needs a lot of work. Multiple complete crashes and reboots during a one-week trip certainly suggest that v3.0.2. is far, far from the 'performance upgrade' Ford advertised it to be. I love the Nav when it's working, but it's equally frustrating to have to pull my phone out and look up addresses on Google Maps because it's 5x-10x faster (and less distracting) than going through a bunch of Sync voice prompts.

Ok, that's my novel. Time to let all you Fanatics chime in...

[popcorn] [ffrocks]
 
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#3 ·
That's such a shame about MFT. I avoided it because of all the issues I read about here when researching different cars, but no one who paid the amount of money you all have should have to put up with that.

Brilliant idea, poor execution. Hopefully, they'll clear it up soon.
 
#4 ·
Glad your trip was safe! MFT is the only non +1 in this car(I have a manual tranny). However, I had a Kenwood eXcelon 6960 in my Corvette. It would NAV glitch, drop my BT phone, lose the iPod, took forever to load the album art from the iPod, etc. MFT has been far less glitchy then the Kenwood so far. I do have a Garmin nuvi2555LMT for nav in my Ti, so that is never an issue.

Good observations. I am finding my experience very similar. I would definitely buy this same car again.
 
#5 ·
Starting to really stress about MFT. I have a 2013 ST ordered with option package ST3 which includes Nav and MFT. I really want the package for the HID's and black leather seats, but unfortunately you can't get those without MFT. I have a real problem with "technology" that has this many problems being included on cars. Nevermind texting and driving, I wonder how many people have crashed or nearly crashed trying to change a song on the radio etc.
 
#6 ·
I think you may be over-analyzing at this point. MFT issues are an annoyance at their worst. While I agree that they should not be happening in the first place, IMHO they do not detract from the overall enjoyment of this vehicle. The ST should be at least 57.5% more enjoyable straight out of the box, you may not notice it even has a radio for the first week.
 
#7 ·
I'm having the same exact issue with my iPod/sync and when I disconnect the iPod it plays all my songs from the one song that the sync was repeating til I hit shuffle on the iPod again. I checked the 3 iPods we have and the system does it to all of them.

Also from your story I am glad I avoided the MFT and the auto tranny which seems to be pretty problematic for a good percentage of owners.
 
#8 ·
FWIW, I still like the tranny overall - it just occasionally does things that leave you wondering what the heck just happened. In particular, I can recall at least two times when I pressed the gas and nothing happened for an uncomfortably long time while oncoming traffic was getting closer by the millisecond.

And, as I mentioned, I still like MFT overall - it has a lot of great features. Ford just needs to figure out this programming (especially so you can truly wipe the system - it's clear from my experience and others' that, even when a dealer 'wipes' it, some information is always retained) and enable a true, fresh install. I really think that'll solve most of the problems. I just hope they do so sooner rather than later.
 
#14 ·
Ditto for Rochester!

Sounds like a great ride and time though, MFT problems aside. So much to love about driving this car that if they could just fix this system, it would be damn near the perfect road trip car! Excellent work on the documentation.
 
#11 ·
TiPilot,
Nice job and even though you had some problems, it seems to me it was a great trip. [woot]

About the Park Assist, I encourage you to not let the car to go all the way in R, you can brake and put it in D and it will continue its parking job too. I say these because you might find yoursel in a situation where the tires will be too close to the curb and you don't want that. [thumb]
 
#12 ·
TiPilot,
Nice job and even though you had some problems, it seems to me it was a great trip. [woot]
Yup, it was definitely a fun trip. Saw lots of great sights, ate lots of great food, and drank plenty of great beer! [cheers]







 
#16 ·
Wow, thanks for such a detailed writeup on your trip! The thing that interested me the most, though, was the large spike in MPG when you were running 93 octane. Now, I know that there is already a HUGE thread debating this already, so I am just making the observation. Although, I might just have to try a tank of 93 on my next fill to see how my Focus likes it. [hihi] Again, thanks for all of the information and pictures (especially). [woot]
 
#17 ·
Yeah, some of those threads are what piqued my interest. I figured that 2,000 nearly-all-highway miles in a short time span would be an ideal time to test it out. Unfortunately, that possibly screwed-up pump after the first tank threw a bit of a wrench into everything.

Still... as I mentioned in the one note, based upon where the fuel gauge was when I filled up and its consistency during the rest of the trip I'm inclined to think that I actually used about 6.8 gal as opposed to the 8.3 the pump ticked off. If that's true, then my two tanks on 93 would be 43.0 and 45.0 MPG.

I know I need more data before I can say anything one way or another, but it's interesting. Taking the rest of the trip on 87 into account, it looks like I managed 36-37 MPG on those tanks. So, using the least-beneficial-$-wise case...

- If it's a $0.30 to $0.40 difference per gallon (which comes out to +12% assuming Regular's $3.40/gal)
- The difference in MPG is +16% (37.0 vs 43.0 for nearly 100% highway miles)

...then filling up with Premium would still make sense.

Like I said, it's certainly not conclusive at this point but I'd definitely recommend giving it a shot for a tank or two and seeing how your car fares.
 
#18 ·
A few things to consider. Tank 0 not listed may not have been filled to the top. Also the fact that tank 2 had the highest gas mileage makes me think that the suspect tank #1 was filled higher than the rest. A large factor when topping off the tank to the brim. Isn't the pump. If you fill up with the filler neck on your car on the lower end of a hill you will get much less gas in the tank. Could have been you pulled up to tank #1 with the filler on the top of a hill. Even a small slope with cause more of a differnence than you would think.
 
#21 ·
I'm as consistent as possible with all fill-ups. Always until it hits the auto-shutoff, then top off to the second auto-shutoff. It's not perfect, but that's as best as you can do when you're using various gas stations. As far as I can recall, every station used on the trip had level concrete at the pump.

I didn't list it, but I ran the tank nearly empty before the first fill (Tank #0) in order to make sure it was nearly all Premium. Fuel gauge was on E and it took 11 gal so it was pretty close to a full fill.
 
#25 ·
Note - I'm cross-posting this in a couple applicable threads.
____________________________________________________

Took a trip up to MI this weekend. Impressive mileage once again. [woot]

It was about 20% city (by time) or 10% city (by miles) so let's call it 85% highway, 15% city.

Total of 492.2 miles on the tank; I had about 0.6 gallons left when I filled up. Yeah, cutting it close - anyway... that comes out to 41.8 MPG. Was running Shell V-Power 93 Octane.

Half the miles were in serious rain and/or a strong headwind and I noticed (watching the MPG meter) both caused a performance hit, as you may expect.

After 11.5K miles and a few long road trips I'm starting to come to the conclusion that I realize a measurable MPG boost on 93 Octane whenever I'm running all/mostly highway. When it's my more-usual 50/50 city highway split, I'm not sure that there's an MPG benefit from running premium.

One final note - MPG meter in car indicated 39.8, actual was 41.8. Pretty much in line with the 5% variation I usually see. What I do find interesting, though, is that the car more often underestimates when I run premium and overestimates when I'm running regular. [scratch]

Miles at fill-up:


Distance to E after fill-up:
 
#26 ·
Note - I'm cross-posting this in a couple applicable threads.
____________________________________________________

Took a trip up to MI this weekend. Impressive mileage once again. [woot]

It was about 20% city (by time) or 10% city (by miles) so let's call it 85% highway, 15% city.

Total of 492.2 miles on the tank; I had about 0.6 gallons left when I filled up. Yeah, cutting it close - anyway... that comes out to 41.8 MPG. Was running Shell V-Power 93 Octane.

Half the miles were in serious rain and/or a strong headwind and I noticed (watching the MPG meter) both caused a performance hit, as you may expect.

After 11.5K miles and a few long road trips I'm starting to come to the conclusion that I realize a measurable MPG boost on 93 Octane whenever I'm running all/mostly highway. When it's my more-usual 50/50 city highway split, I'm not sure that there's an MPG benefit from running premium.

One final note - MPG meter in car indicated 39.8, actual was 41.8. Pretty much in line with the 5% variation I usually see. What I do find interesting, though, is that the car more often underestimates when I run premium and overestimates when I'm running regular. [scratch]
I noticed that trend during my octane tests as well. I also agree with the open road use of 93 delivering a benefit. For my everyday commute, not an appreciable difference to justify the extra expense.
 
#28 ·
I can attest to that. My son and I drove a 250 mile roundtrip from the Detroit area down into Ohio and then back. When he drove he set the cruise at 65 MPH because he is on a learning permit and was comfy there (by the way he really liked the little speed readout over the cruise indicator). The FE meter said he was getting 41.0 MPG. When I was driving I set the cruise at 72 MPH (still getting passed by everyone and their Grandma) and I was getting 38.3 MPG. I imagine 79 - 80 MPH and you will be down in the 34-35 MPG area.
 
#30 ·
I wanted to touch on some of the issues you were having with the Bluetooth. This is not MFT issue per se, but more of a bluetooth connection issue. I have other devices that connect through bluetooth on other devices and it also drops once in a while.

So far I have 4300km on my new 2012 Titanium and I am beyond pleased with Sync and everything else with the car, so far no issues reported. No reboots, no connection issues (except bluetooth on a rare occasion)
 
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