Common engineering has produced uncommon performance from the impressive hybrid
The road from Stinson Beach to the top of Mount Tamalpais is a narrow, twisting, dipping, heaving, unpredictable ribbon of off-camber asphalt that tests the mettle of car, driver, and, especially, passenger.
Ford Escape chief engineer Eric Loeffler, riding shotgun in a 2013 Escape SE, seems unfazed. I’m taking the SUV to the edges of its performance envelope, revving the 1.6-litre turbo four to its 6375-rpm redline, diving into corners, braking without equivocation, and creating my own racing line where the road opens up into broad sweepers. In other words, driving exactly like 99 per cent of Escape owners will never drive. But Loeffler needs to get to San Francisco so he can catch a flight to China, where he’s working on the Escape’s twin, the Kuga, which will be sold there for the first time.
In the midst of this sunny, late-afternoon drive, a memory surfaces of a similar one, on the same Marin County roads, in the first Ford Escape, when I joined the chorus of reviewers who ordained the Escape, the new gold standard for driving dynamics among small SUVs.
The worthiness of that original Escape, which got only one significant update in 12 model years, bore fruit for Ford both in sales and image. Ford sold more than two million of them, including an incredible 254,293 in 2011, its best year ever. The Escape also became Ford’s first hybrid, at a time when America was falling in love with the Toyota Prius.
Driving dynamics
The completely redone 2013 Escape ably fills its predecessor’s big shoes, partly because it’s based on Ford’s excellent, global C1 platform, which also underpins the Focus. So the basic ingredients of good driving dynamics are there: crisp steering, responsive brakes (the same ones that will be used in the highperformance Focus ST), and a chassis tuned both for comfort and athleticism. The Escape is the first US Ford to use the new 1.6-litre EcoBoost engine, which makes 178 hp and 184 lb-ft of torque and provides 33 mpg on the highway, besting the old front-wheel-drive Escape Hybrid’s rating by 2 mpg.
The Hybrid won’t return. “We will do other variants on the C1 platform with hybrid and electric powertrains,” explains Loeffler. For its part, the 1.6-litre sounds great at high revs and delivers strong, linear power. The optional 2.0-litre is also full of high-revving character and churns out 240 hp and 270 lb-ft of torque. No one will miss the V-6. Some drivers might won- der, though, why there are no shift paddles, or at least why the manual shift function is so difficult to use: it’s a toggle switch on the side of the gear lever.
Volume seller that the Escape is, Ford felt obliged to offer a price-leader, front-wheeldrive base model, the $23,295 (Dh85,493) S. It’s saddled with a mildly tweaked version of the old 2.5-litre four (168 hp and 170 lb-ft of torque). The Escape is also offered as the $25,895 SE and the $28,695 SEL, which can be equipped with either Eco- Boost engine, and the $31,195 Titanium, which gets only the 2.0-litre. Those three models are all available with front— or all-wheel drive. All engines use a six-speed automatic—not, thankfully, the Focus’s inferior dual-clutch gearbox.
The Escape rides well, whether it’s on the SE’s 17-inch wheels or the Titanium model’s 19-inchers. This is a particular point of pride for Loeffler, who claims that Ford now tries to create a common DNA across models and even trim levels. So an Escape with a more powerful engine and larger tyres should ride and handle similarly to one with a less powerful engine and smaller tyres. Similarly, a Focus owner should find that the Escape feels familiar from behind the wheel. Of course, this sort of engineering commonality has been the norm at carmakers like BMW for eons.
The Vertrek concept that debuted at the 2011 Detroit auto show was supposed to portend a stunning new production Escape, but what we ended up with is an overstyled, under-
Cargo space
At the top of that centre stack is a redesigned MyFord Touch system. It’s better than the much-maligned old version, but it remains fussy and finicky, even if the screen itself is bright and crisp, with attractive fonts. The optional sport seats are superb, and the standard seats, which lack the sport seats’ aggressive bolstering, are also good. The front seatbacks are shaped to provide more rear knee room, rear leg and foot room are generous, and the rear seatbacks recline.
There’s 34.3 cubic feet of cargo space and 68.1 cubic feet with the second row folded. Approach the vehicle’s rear hatch with your hands full, kick your foot under the rear bumper, and an optional motion-detection system unlocks and raises the tailgate. Active park assist and blind-spot detection, practically unheard of in this class, are available.
Despite our quibbles with the Escape, Loeffler and his team are rightfully proud of it. Unlike the Edge or the Explorer, neither of which you can imagine playing on the global stage, the 2013 Escape is far more impressive, and it is one of the best new Fords of the past five years.