meyersnole

I am trying to say any car is less efficient when you quick start, drive high speeds, etc. (Just like a gas powered vehicle). Here are a couple threads by larryh that will tell you exactly the cost: EV Dynamics Physics Experiment and if you have the time, there is a ton of great information in Cold Weather Observations The main point I was trying to make was this is not a Tesla with a huge battery. You can squeeze as much as 25-30 miles in ideal conditions with practice, but you can just as easily only get about 10-15 miles range from the same charge. This will depend on how you drive it and the climate. If you are looking for performance you might want to test drive the 2.0 liter ecoboost as a comparison.

Just beware that you will get increased performance and reduced range... consume more power from the gas tank and from battery. Just like standing on the accelerator has a negative affect on your MPG in any other car. Only in this case the battery only carries about 1/2 gallon (larryh could tell you how much... I am just ball parking) of gas equivalent energy when fully charged.

Absolutely no offense taken, I was just disappointed in myself that I did not give a clear answer.

This also got a nice write up on green car reports: http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1098485_ford-opens-electrified-vehicle-patents-adds-200-engineers-to-work-on-hybrids-electrics Nice to see Ford making the investment in the technology and help push the industry forward.

I probably could have stated my post better, I defer to Hybridbear's post where he states that as the battery is depleted the available power is diminished. I still think it is true that when you are in hybrid mode you will not get the same performance as you would with a fully charged battery (the topic of this thread).

mine locks into ev auto after I deplete. I try to stay in either EV Now or EV Later though, as I am usually more concerned about efficiency than performance. Always hate when I accidentally start the motor for performance reasons. Sometimes I press the peddle a little too hard, other times I am clueless why it starts... but it says for performance. It is my understanding though that the extra performance is only available when the battery is not in hybrid only mode, so yes you will not be able to access the extra acceleration once the battery is depleted. The engine is about 141 hp (129 pounds-feet of torque), and when the battery is available can bring that number to about 188 (and about 200 pounds-feet of torque)... so that is quite a noticeable bump when combining with the electric motor.

I like the 2016 version of the center panel. The number of times I have accidentally turned the climate system on or changed the channel on the radio is unmeasurable! Nice to see they added the physical buttons. Also would love to have dedicated seat heater buttons like I see there.

Motor Authority weighs in on the matter: Analyst Predicts Autonomous Cars Could Slash Car Sales

Hi larryh, I agree with 90% of this post... but just look at what has been happening at IBM with Watson and and Deep Blue before it to see that there has been very significant and rapid advancements in artificial intelligence. This will have a huge impact on the medical field in the very near future. Some of this is actually deployed. How many call trees have you dialed into where you talk to the computer? Personal assistants like Siri, Google Now, Cortana, Amazon Echo, ... it took a huge leap in understanding context to make these systems somewhat useful. Are they great yet, far from it... but they are getting better all the time and even somewhat practical at times. Google has been driving autonomously around its campus for some time and is about to hit more public streets, it was not that long ago that the government had the million (and 2 million) dollar challenge for American autonomous vehicles. So we might have the military to thank for this advancement in driving.

And this site says a direct competitor to Tesla: Court documents strongly suggest Apple is working on an electric car Will get interesting when prototypes start popping up. larryh brings up an excellent observation, if Apple is building it is probably not going after the market for the masses... it will try and out Tesla, Tesla. With their name recognition this could open electric vehicles to a whole new group of people that would not consider them before. I am really surprised how much Tesla was able to push this market. With all the money that Apple, Google, Facebook, etc have amassed it is interesting to see what they are doing with the capital. Google is changing cable TV and ISPs in the US (and is exploring shaking up wireless communications). Driverless cars coming to a street in California. Apple looking at this and wanting to join in? The next few years are going to be very interesting for the automobile enthusiast.

I think the point of the article is that the ownership of private vehicles will diminish to the point where the major car companies collapse. You would not need to buy a car anymore, just hail your automated taxi to take you where you want to go... in theory this would be cheaper than buying your own vehicle. Think public transit that is on your schedule rather than common and the flexibility of a taxi. Honestly, I can see this part of the argument pretty easily. However, once an idea like this starts to take off and threaten an industry I do not expect that industry to just watch it happen. This is why I think the timeline is all wrong. Of course there is not enough in that blog to even suggest where the dates are coming from, could be a study or just as easily plucked from thin air. Have not even googled the authors name to see if he is credible, just thought it was an interesting idea.

The idea of common use cars works well in city type driving... think taxi. Not sure how well it works if you are the district manager of a chain of stores in the South East and have a 3-5 state territory. Again, I think it naive to say that personal transportation will cease to exist in 15 years. I think you will see something like Chevron buying the rights to NiMh battery and limit the use to hybrid only type deal. Yes the EV car is now taking off, but there was a loss of 13-14 years in there due to this action. GM buying all the local transit companies in the 1940's is another example of money shifting the market. Transportation will change significantly over the next few decades, but probably in a way that we can not see today. This country also needs to gain the will to invest in a common infrastructure to move that quickly, and given the current political discourse I do not see a way to there from here.

Autonomous cars will destroy millions of jobs and reshape the US economy by 2025 http://qz.com/403628/autonomous-cars-will-destroy-millions-of-jobs-and-reshape-the-economy-by-2025/?utm_source=parWD It is just a blog, and parts of it seem very naive, but other parts seem worth some thought. Driverless cars do seem to be a game changer, but one would think that if it were to lead to the bankruptcy of major global corporations that the transition would not go as smoothly as the author predicts. Yes, disruptive technology can have a large affect on an industry but money talks and will limit and shape the future regardless of what the proper outcome should be -- demonstrated time and time again. Still an interesting read.

Green Car Reports had an article today on hydrogen car ownership. http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1098233_hyundai-tucson-fuel-cell-early-drivers-discuss-experiences-traveling-on-hydrogen?fbfanpage Couple of lines that caught my eye: There have already been more Hyundai Tucson Fuel Cell vehicles leased in the U.S. than any other hydrogen-powered vehicle. Through April, Hyundai has leased 68 of the small SUVs since last June, when the first one was delivered. That slightly exceeds the number of Honda FCX Clarity fuel-cell sedans leased from 2008 through April.

openair, I was referring to hydrogen cars not self driven cars. And I know I was overstating the status of the field as there are production versions of that car... just they are no where near as practical as electric or natural gas.

The irony of a Tesla driver, 7,104 cells parked in the garage... can't find 2 AAs to make the remote work! :hysterical:

Be careful to check that there are even changes in your area before you lay out money for an update. On my Acura I bought an update 2 years later that still did not include major road improvements that were there when I bought my car. Makes no sense given the price they charge but can not keep it up to date. Now, the Ford system might be different. I would still check to be certain though.

From my timeline today. Is The Elusive 'Ideal' Electric-Car Battery Hiding In Plain Sight? Nothing really earth shattering in the article, just a nice summation of where the battery tech is at and how Tesla's push to leverage existing technology (the same that Ford is using) might be the best approach. One bit of information I did gather was that IBM walked away from Li-Air this year. I did not hear that this approach was struggling. Good news is that battery prices continue to drop, and chemistry keeps improving range if only a little bit at a time.

shaggy did you check to make sure the settings were still right in bluetooth after the upgrade to iOS8? And per Hybridbear, turn the phone off and back on force the change. 1. Tap Settings > Bluetooth > SYNC* 2. Set Show Notifications to ON.

This makes sense then as I turn off my phone each night to conserve battery.

Try it again in a few days... for me it did not work right away, but it did later. I never did a phone reset, but I did do a MFT reset once to get it to work. Like I said, try it again in a day or two and see if it works...

Going back to Mariel's comment have you dropped by the dealer to ask if that is normal? Is the dealer far away, maybe do it when you get your first oil change? Or call them? Your right in that the number is only a guess, but it is nice to see that number move around to see how efficiently you are driving -- sudden drops can clue you in that you accidentally turned on the climate control or maybe hitting the accelerator too hard.

Hi timewellspent... please note that using this feature with the iPhone takes an additional step to set it up. Read more about it here: http://owner.ford.com/how-tos/sync-technology/myford-touch/phone-setup/how-to-allow-sync-to-receive-text-messages-from-your-iphone.html

Sorry openair, I did not mean any offense in my reply. If you comb through this forum, you will find many comments from me that state that the programming on the My Ford Touch side is very disappointing. I have very little hope that anything will be done about it now that they have stated a new direction for the system. I have experience in the software development industry and while understand how it made it out the door in this condition, I side with you expressing my disappointment. I just meant to convey this is not very important feature to me. I do not rely on text messages for anything... most of the information I get from them are informative or friends and family giving me grief. Most of the time it seems to work for me, and when it doesn't I just shrug it off (the grimilins comment). Please do not read anything more into that comment. My only purpose in replying in the first place is to confirm that I, too, have issues with the system. I just have not spent any time trying to figure out why. I am just happy that it is working at all (that took quite the effort initially -- including several system resets).

MotorTrend has jumped on this rumor in their June 2015 issue on page 21 in the MT Confidential column Said they initially dismissed the rumor but are now hearing that Apple has hired a team originally working on the HySeries Drive hydrogen fuel cell plug in concept at Ford circa 2007. So now maybe you add Apple to Toyota and Honda in the corner of hydrogen fuel cell is the future of alternative fuel transportation. I really do not not follow hydrogen developments at all, but I really wonder what they see that has greater potential than what we are seeing in the development of the battery? There has been significant development there over the last 10 years. The only thing I can really think of is that hydrogen might be easier to leverage existing infrastructure (all the existing gas stations) than to build out a new network. However, I would think that either shift will require a significant retooling. One last thing, why is Apple jumping into the automobile development in a technology that does not even seem to be in proof of concept phase? Money to burn?