Readers’ Motors
Robin Evans’s Ford Mondeo.
In the June 2018 issue of CM, I wrote about my Skoda Superb TSI. As it approached 70,000 miles, a replacement was needed and I decided that a diesel would be better due to my 100-miles-per-day commute. I looked at the Superb Mk2 and Mk3 diesels, but the Mk2 was too much like my old car and the Mk3 was expensive in a un-skoda-like way.
I thought the latest Ford Mondeo was styled very nicely and had some good reviews. When I started to look, the Zetec or Titanium trim levels seemed quite straightforward. However, the various option packs made things quite confusing and prices varied a lot.
Luckily, when I bought the Skoda, the dealer group was a family company and I had maintained contact with it. The dealer sent me pictures of a March 2015 Mondeo Titanium 2.0 TDCI estate with the Powershift automatic transmission. It was in a very smart looking gunmetal grey metallic and had the full Sport pack option of a black grille, bodykit and 19in alloys. It also had leather seats that were electrically-adjusted and heated, active LED headlights and an uprated Sony infotainment system with sat-nav, Bluetooth connectivity, DAB radio and surround sound. I would have liked the mileage to have been a little lower, but 34,000 miles for a three-year-old car wasn’t too bad and the price was good!
I headed to Bradford for a look. The test-drive went well – it has 180bhp and a lot more torque than the petrol Skoda – so I drove back to the dealership knowing I had found the replacement. There were only a couple of issues: the first one was that front parking sensors are optional and had not been specified on this car, the other was that one of the rear tyres had been replaced recently, which left a nearly-new unknown brand on one side and a half-worn Goodyear on the other. The dealer agreed to fit front parking sensors and two new branded rear tyres as part of the deal.
I ended up using the Mondeo a lot more than I intended and the mileage is now up to 68,000. During that time, the computer tells me the average mpg is 47.8. It has passed its MOT (which advised that the rear discs were corroded) and I’ve replaced the front
tyres (235/40/19 – pretty expensive) and had a service – including replacement of the rear discs and pads. The car has run faultlessly and barely requires any oil top-ups between services.
On the road, it is powerful, quiet and extremely comfortable, and it handles really well for an estate. There were two things that took me a little while to get used to. First was the windscreen wipers – the blades are huge (28 inch) and they both sit on top of each other at the bottom of the windscreen. The driver’s one sweeps right-to-left as in any other car I’ve driven over the last 30 years, but the passenger one sweeps left-to-right. This just seems odd at first, but you quickly get used to it and it clears a lot more of the screen than a conventional set-up. The second thing are the active LED headlights – they are simply fantastic, but the first time I drove on a dark road, the high beam came on automatically and my first thought was: “What’s happening? I haven’t touched anything!” It’s another thing you get used to.
One of the few issues I’ve had with Mondeo is that, during the winter, we were staying with friends in the South East and woke up to snow. We managed to dig out the Mondeo and get moving, but on the first slight incline there was no traction at all and we were stuck in the middle of the road. Luckily, a man with a shovel and some salt helped us reach the main road and we eventually got home, but I don’t think the 19in wheel option and snow mix well!
The only other issue I had was a stone cracking the windscreen. This was efficiently replaced by Autoglass through my insurers, but was not a straightforward job. As my car has lane control function, automatic wipers, lights and active high beam, the sensors have to be recalibrated after a windscreen change. Luckily, on the Mondeo, the technician does this live via a test-drive once the windscreen is fitted, but if you don’t have windscreen cover it would be a very expensive job.
I’ve very much enjoyed owning this Mondeo. However, the increasing mileage is beginning to affect its trade-in value, so I have my wife’s permission to change it. I have returned to my dealer and will hopefully find a replacement very soon.