STATUTE OF LIBERTY?
FORD’S PLUG-IN HYBRID ARRIVES TO PROVIDE FREEDOM FROM REGULAR SERVO VISITS
THE CURRENT Ford Escape launched here not quite a couple of years ago to build on the relative success of its predecessor. I always thought that it was unfairly ignored, as the old car had the grunt few in the segment had and led the way for sporty affordable SUVs with the STLine version. And had been hampered for a while by the terrible Kuga name before reverting to Escape.
We were promised the plug-in hybrid not that long after launch but it wasn’t until June 2022 that the PHEV arrived.
The PHEV drops the 183kW turbo four of the ICE ST-Line for a 2.5-litre Atkinson-cycle four-cylinder with an electric motor and a 14.4kWh lithiumion battery. With a combined power output of 167kW, power is down but there are the obvious benefits of electrification to soften the blow. Ford doesn’t give a torque figure, but it’s evidently reasonably solid.
You can choose between EV Auto (which is also the default), EV Now (which forces electric-only), EV Later and EV Charge (uses the engine to charge the battery).
Ford reckons you’ll get up to 56km in EV mode. In the past I’d have said that this was a bit of a dodgy number with experience telling me most PHEVs miss by 20 or even 30 percent. I picked the car up with a full battery and aimed it down the M2 Motorway to my home south of Sydney airport which is exactly 52km.
I kid you not, the engine kicked in for the first time just 900 metres from my front door, which is an epic achievement really because a good chunk of that run was at 100km/h and most of the rest of it at 80km/h. If I had taken the slower, less motorway-ey way home I’m sure it would have made it all the way on electrons.
Wheels’ Content Director Jez Spinks eked out 57km and he doesn’t spare the rod. So I’m optimistic that the battery range is basically bang-on for normal driving and supports my hypothesis that if you’re disciplined with the charging and have an average commute (between 15 and 30km per day) you’ll rarely feel the 2.5-litre kick into life.
Speaking of charging, the supplied charger will get you from
E on the dash (in truth, the battery is never fully empty) to full in six hours, so if you have a domestic 240volt outlet handy at work or home, it’s not especially difficult to keep up the charge.
Ford’s official 1.5L/100km on the combined cycle is obviously ridiculous (not Ford’s fault, the testing regime is meant for ICE, not PHEV), and it’s a fair way below the ST-Line’s 8.6L/100km figure. The last time I drove an ICE Escape, I got 11.2L/100km.
Something that initially mystified me was that Ford has chosen to attract the PHEV’s presumably sustainability-minded buyers with the sporty ST-Line specification, which brings the price to a solid $59,990 drive away. That’s quite a lot of money, but I guess if it was based on the Vignale, it would crack $70K, in part because the price difference between the FWD ST-Line and the ST-Line PHEV is over $16,000.
The ST-Line does leave the factory with a fairly decent specification, including 18-inch alloys, dual-zone climate control, a mix of fake leather and fake suede on the seats, wireless charging, an 8.0-inch touchscreen, digital dash, adaptive cruise control, ten B&O-branded speakers for the audio, keyless entry and start, powered driver’s seat, centre rear armrest, front and rear parking sensors and a space-saver spare.
Bizarrely, if you want LED headlights they’re part of the $1950 ST-Line Option Pack, which also has the electric tailgate and heated seats, which seems awfully generous for the money. Another pack, the $1500 Parking Pack adds auto parking, a forward-facing camera and the funny little door guards that flip out when you open the door and are themselves a marvel of engineering.
The price of that pack seems a little stiff, though.
With both of these fitted and
Rapid Red paint adding $695, the driveaway price – in NSW at least – of my Escape ST-Line PHEV came out at $63,885.
On the safety front, the Escape ships with six airbags, ABS, stability and traction controls, as well as forward AEB with pedestrian detection, forward collision warning, reverse cross-traffic alert, evasive steering assist, traffic sign recognition, blind-spot monitoring, lane-departure warning, lane-keep assist, driver impairment monitor and auto 000-dialling after a big enough crash if your phone is connected.
You also get three top-tether and two ISOFIX restraints.
We’ve got the Escape for three months. It will be in my hands for two of them before I hand it over for the final month to Jez Spinks while I take a holiday. In both households, though, it will be the car that we use most days, ferrying ourselves and/or our kids around, doing the shopping, the gym and a longer trip with a full charge before we leave to see what a full battery and tank’s range looks like.