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Testing has never been free... sometimes you get a return on your investment, other times, not so much. The price of failure is therefore higher than the price of success, but it's not a waste of money, as you always learn someting. Too bad I can't see what I'm typing... can't see how I can post a reply... the internal pop-up ads are going to kill this forum for me! HAve fun, Frank

FWIW, I saw no change in the mileage/temperature trend when switching to snows last winter, but some improvement when I took them off, I suspect due to driving style more than tire RR. I show data for two routes, but I didn't drive the back roads much last winter as the ICE ran constantly for heat at low speed, eliminating the advantage. I got better mileage on the highway... Have fun, Frank

I find EV+ very useful, as my home is at the bottom of a hill, and work is on an ancestral lake bed. EV+ lets me get to the top of the hill with minimal charge left, so the car sits overnight at a consistent SOC, and I can cruise around the plant looking for parking spots knowing the trip mileage is only going to improve. The down side is that I pass the Ford dealer on my daily commute. After service appointments, EV+ shows up when I really want to run ICE at 1.5 bar to charge the battery entering a long flat stretch. You can't run ICE at 1.5 bar with EV+ engaged, and can't glide very far with low SOC... takes a couple weeks to forget. Have fun, Frank

Interesting report... but inconsisent with my experience. I found the ES/AS to be a rather quiet tire approaching the limit, and the car's handling is neutral at that point, as FWD drivetrains go. Unfortunately, it's not possible to explore suspension behaviour at cornering limits in car's with RSC (roll stability control). The car intervenes when it senses the tires sliding, applying the brakes when the driver wants them least. It's the one thing I hate about my C-Max. Have fun, Frank, whose inital tire wear data says "they'll last 40K."

Sometimes, Brother Mike, data sucks... but it doesn't lie! Reality is what it is. Thanks for the effort! Frank

I went for 215/60-16 X-ice 3's, based on prior experience with the X-ice line, size availability, and steel wheel pricing at Tire Rack. It was ~$1K for the set, mounted and balanced on Ford steel wheels. Add in FWD traction and excellent visibility in snow storms, and you have one of the best winter cars I've driven. The Yokohama iceGUARD is not available in a size that fits the C-Max... 1433 max load capacity is not negotiable, which pushes you into 18's with 3x the speedo error of the 215/60-16's. Otherwise, they look like a good tread design, so with a hydrophilic compound, I expect they'd perform very well. Conversely, I'll question their claim of low RR, based on tread depth, 12/32s vs. 9.5/32 for X-ice (thicker tread means higher rolling resistance). Have fun, Frank

Just picked up the car after they did the seat back recall, and thanks to this thread, checked my seat heater... no heat for me either... And not as simple as a technician error. I drove back and they check things out, and found a high resistance heater element, which they ordered for warranty replacement. As we were verifying the cold drivers' seat, I checked the passenger seat, and it got warm, eventually, when set to 5. Whenever the parts come in, I'm going to do a quick temp rise comparison... since I rarely have passegers, that heater's rarely used. Porter's an October 2012 build, so I suspect a bad batch of heater elements, and will see if the new drivers' side elements heat up a lot faster than the passenger side does. HAve fun, Frank

It's not hard to baffle non-techincal people with technical topics... we could all use more STEM education! That said, let me behave like a technical person for a moment, and address the assumptions that go into a statement like: "This same process occurs in tires inflated with air as the oxygen attacks the rubber molecules, working from the inside out, until the oxygen, and its destructive properties, permeates the tire structure and ultimately the tread." Assumptions: Tire diameter: 26" Tire width: 9" Rim diameter: 17 Air density: 1.2-1.3 kg/m^3 O2 density: 1.3-1.4 kg/m^3 Carbon density: 2.26 kg/m^3 Tire Internal Volume - subtract 1" from width and 2" from diameter pi x (tire ID^2-rim OD^2) x width = 7213 in^3 = 118.2L = 0.1182 m^3 Internal pressure assumed to be 3x atmospheric (!45 psi), so volume of gas is 3x tire internal volume = 0.3546 m^3 So a tire at 20C has 1.3 x .355 = 0.461 kg of air, and 0.036 kg, 92.2 gm, of O2. Now, from chemistry, 1 mole of a gas is it's atomic mass expressed in grams, so... Oxygen has an atomic mass of 16, so for O2, it's 32... we have 2.9 moles of O2 in the tire. That will react with 2.9 mole of carbon © to form CO, or more likely, 1.44 mole of C to form CO2. I mole of carbon is 12 grams, so 1.44 mole is 17.3 gm. At worst, the oxygen in a tire can only react with about 17 grams of carbon. If a tire weighs 22 lb, 10 kg, this is 0.017% of the tire mass, which I consider insignificant. There is some benefit, however, from removing water vapor... but not from removing O2. HAve fun, Frank

With plastic perhaps... paper bags do one thing no plastic bag can - stand up. Plastic, on the other hand, allows me to carry as much as I can carry, once I corral everything back into bags! Frank

With a side-by-side, you have some interesting options... one classic use for old refridgerators is converting them to smokers. Then you could have beer with your BBQ or BBQ with your beer, whichever you prefer! Frank

$3.679/gal is about my average for 87 octane at BJ's Wholesale, until winter gas cut in a couple weeks ago. I'd say you live closer to the refinery, but El Segundo was once "the second" largest oil producer in the US, so Jus has us both beat. HAve fun, Frank PS about time you broke 900 - 66 traffic lights!!

Yep; this is me! I hit a bump and the dash lit up as if I truly broke somehting. Turns out I did; now I need a new restraints control module, before they can do the 14S04 retrofit. A short is just thie kind of thing that explains it! Frank

I must be special... 12M02 - SYNC WITH MYFORD/MYLINCOLN TOUCH - WARRANTY EXTENSION COVERING ACCESSORY PROTOCO L INTERFACE MODULE (APIM) 14C03 - FRONT SEAT BACK FRAME REPLACEMENT 14S04 - REPROGRAM RESTRAINTS CONTROL MODULE 14B03 - FUEL ECONOMY CUSTOMER SATISFACTION 14E02 - POWERTRAIN CONTROL MODULE REPROGRAMMING 14S21 - RESTRAINTS CONTROL MODULE REPLACEMENT Granted, 12M02 is warranty extension, and I got my 14B03 check... but my restrains control module died along with traction control, so they have to replace parts before doing those, and YES I have a bad seat back. My service appt. is Oct. 2, and I will check seat heaters before and after! It'll be interesting to see what I get for a loaner car... HAve fun,Frank

We're second owners, and we received the $475 check directly this time. We owned the car at the time of the first rebate, but the ownership transfer hadn't reached Ford so they sent the check to my deceased Father-in-law's estate. (We inherited ours.) Have fun, Frank

Thanks for the discussion! In fact, warranty is the major issue. $40 in parts with potential warranty issues vs. $1K+, as I recall, to retrofit the OEM and retain unquestionable warranty coverage. Hose 22 is the one you'd want, all right, assuming enough room to fit the heater head and cord... As to circulation... I don't see a need for more than passive circulation in a 2L engine. By placing the heater low in the cooling system, with no air pockets between it and the water jacket, you're guaranteed a high bouyancy gradient in the water. The thermostat's not involved as there's no bulk flow in the hose. It's' more of a hot water flowing up the upper half of the hose into the jacket, and cold water returning on the bottom half. No need for high flow rates, and no heating of the radiator, just the engine water jacket. (I once lost an alternator pulley on the road, taking out the water pump, and made it home ~180 miles at highway speeds on thermal gradient circulation alone.) Plus, with 600W immersed, you'll transfer a lot of energy quickly, unlike a low-power pan heater. Thermostatic protection prevents local boiling... and we're already handicapping the cooling system with grill blocks. There might be a reduction in cooling system capacity due to the flow intrusion, but I'm confident in the car's excess capacity relative to my driving needs. I suspect unblocking grills would add back more than this takes away. I also suspect that warranty issues are as much a matter of your relationship with the dealer's service management as any thing else. To my mind, you'd need to have an engine temperature-related failure for warranty to come into play, but not everyone looks at things rationally. I may be in good shape on this front, as the dealer's been great to date, to the point of doing an oil change on the alignment rack due to concerns of damaging my side skirts with a conventional lift... still have to look into that one! HAve fun, Frank

The big ones have a circulation pump, but I'm considering one of the passive hose heaters, which are also lower power (600W). For them, I'm just seeing a heating element in the water flow (the units are directional from what I gather), and will assume the vendor has designed it for reliable use in this application, thus the overtemp thermostat. The one caveat in the installation instruction is to place it where the radiator hose is tilted upward, and after any bends that might harbor an air pocket. Both are just good practice, but bear repeating. Thanks for checking it out! Have fun, Frank

It's getting cold, so time to get serious about this. I've looked at the oil pan heaters, including Paul's pics, and with apologies to Paul, it's a sub-optimal solution compared with anything that heats coolant. I finally found what I wanted by searchingr "circulation heaters." Here's a couple manufacturer options: http://www.fivestarmanufacturing.com/kat_s http://phillipsandtemro.com/catalog/index.asp The first link (Kat's) has a nice summary of automotive drivetrain heaters. Scroll down to radiator hose to see what I'm considering. On the second link, look in the 2014 catalog, starting on page 77, for a different product line that does the same thing. Not surprisingly, Prius owners have already been here, albeit perhaps for different reasons. The third post has some heat-rise data indicating a quick rise, about 12F/hour, for a small unit, albeit on a 45F day. May be different at -10F... all the units have overtemp thermostats, so it's possible he maxed out at a 33F rise, but being coolant, that's the temp of the entire engine, not just the oil. So... what do you all think? HAve fun, Frank

My condolensces on your GoPro, but your story is almost as good as the old Timex commercial where John Cameron Swayze stands on a sand bar while a boat slides up the sand to reveal a watch on the keel... "Takes a licking but keeps on ticking!" Given their application, GoPro probably has documented lots of these kind of things. I mounted mine ($70 dashcam) on a monopod and drove a chase car for this reason; you'll recall the upside-down video... What you report from your tuft test is consistent with my observations: - attached, non-tubulent flow down the glass, at much lower velocity than roof or sides - detached, turbulent flow below wiper level, basically tail light-to-tail light, down to the bumper I still see an opportunity separating these flows, or moving their confluence farther back in the wake. Have fun, Frnak

You can see the UK heritage in the service doc... left side is the short split in the rear seat in several of the pictures.

What do you think happens when you ride it? There's no way I can cinch a strap as tight as Mother Earth already does! I wouldn't worry... Frank

Worth the effort as long as you follow a Kamm-back approach: - extend the roofline using the aero template - fill in the sides so you create a longer body, not a spoiler You may recall the tuft test showed reasonable airflow above the tail light level. Air on the glass was attached and low speed so there's little retarding force up high. I don't see anything to fix above this level, which is why I liked your prior efforts to make a break here. Note that Paul Jones recent efforts have been directed lower; rear wheel deflectors and whell well skirts. That said, Kamm-backs are a popular and effective aerodynamic approach, so I will follow with interest! HAve fun, Frnak

Well stated. Maps right into the "conscioius/competent" matrix for learning. Frank

Much as I hate to admit it, I'm using Martha Stewart! No, not the style maven, just one of her products, a cloth drawer... These are 5-sided, fabric-covered-cardboard boxes with bottom insert to hold them open. I found it's very stable behind the console if you cut a shallow "V" in one end of the insert to accomodate the console. Small enough that a plastic shopping bag works as a liner for the messy stuff, but large enough for containers during road trips. It'll fit with the seats down if you ask nicely, and will not come up on it's own if you cut the insert properly. At this price, I got 4 hoping for a collapsible trunk organizer... didn't work. Have fun, Frank

Some comments... Useful resources: - etis will tell you a lot of what's on the Monroney sticker, and pending service and safety recalls. My favorite bit is the "click here for more information." - Support @ Ford will need the number of a cell phone you use in the car, then it'll call you to say how if feels (vehicle health report). Also a good place to download a searchable owners' manual. And if you want to plot the altitude changes along routes... GPSVis. (Used with Googel maps) HAve fun, Frank

The car does all the work of pulse and glide, all the driver need do is back off cresting a hill but charge the battery going up it. I'm almost looking forward to Winter this year... can't believe I said that... to see how much better I can do this time around. Heater(s) planned, but it's still the first year (my baseline period started last Labor Day). My son's flying in tomorrow and we have tickets to the Buffalo Bills game on Saturday. I plan to fill the tank on the way to the stadium and let him drive to see how much is the car and how much the driver... my last NFL game was the Eagles c. 1970 at the University of Pennsylvania stadium, so I suspect he knows the route and NFL game procedures far better than his old man. I'll just pay the bills, to see the Bills. Have fun, Frank