HotPotato

The stock wheels have very low aerodynamic drag. Lighter wheels would likely have a more-open, aerodynamically inferior profile, canceling out the fuel economy gain of the lighter wheel. You might get slightly better acceleration from a dead stop with a lighter or smaller diameter wheel, but...hard to imagine it's worth doing.

Last I checked, the only two things you can't add to the SE are the power driver seat and fog lights. That's it. Everything else -- yes, including the power lift gate -- is available on the SE. Fog lights can be added in the aftermarket if you can't live without them. Source: build & price tool on the Ford website, which also has a finder to locate the nearest car equipped as you like. You may not find many thusly equipped, though. "Loaded with everything except leather" is probably not a popular spec.

"I figure McDonalds isn't going out of business anytime soon, so if they need millions of burgers, they can either make use of the entire product or not." Speaking as an animal lover and former vegetarian - My thoughts EXACTLY. I don't think many cattle are being killed specifically for their hides; I think it's a byproduct of meat production that's happening anyway. If pleather is petroleum-based with toxic byproducts, and leather is a natural product that would otherwise be wasted, a case could even be made that leather is more responsible than pleather. That said, I'm sure Ford could have come up with pleather that feels better and costs less than the real but low-grade leather on the wheel, and it wouldn't offend some people. I have ZERO sympathy for the SEL seat material argument tho. You can easily option up an SE to be an SEL with everything but the leather seats and fog lights, and if this matters to you, it's not much effort to find or order one so equipped. Ford is trying to keep it simple for buyers: one model is basic and can be optioned as desired; the other comes standard with what the market considers to be luxury features, and to the mass market leather=luxury. It will not surprise you that this same discussion happens in reverse in Prius world, where dealers have Katzkin leather seat kits at the ready.

I don't expect the battery would be a problem... factory upgrade stereo is either 390 watts or 100, depending who you ask, and mine will be 180.

The stock stereo is okay in the SE -- JUST okay -- but I've been dancing around an upgrade for some time. Last night I ordered an Alpine KTP-445U amplifier and JL Audio C3 convertible component speakers. Frankly I'm nervous whether the amp will screw anything up: Has anybody found a wiring harness by Metra, etc. that plugs into our existing harness so we don't have to cut a bunch of wires? The C-max does not exist in any installer database I could find. Does our radio circuit have at least a 15 amp fuse? (I think 20 is typical for Ford but not certain in our case.) The KTP-445U is a super-efficient digital amp that can share the radio's power wire rather than requiring an amp kit, as long as this is the case.Will the car's active noise cancellation still work, or will the amp mean the out-of-phase sound is too loud and thus increases road noise instead of canceling it? Will the lady that lives in my dashboard retain a normal speaking voice, or will she shout at me? Will my car's blessed exemption from the 12volt battery problems continue, or will adding draw to the system strain it to where it malfunctions? Will cutting wires in the wiring harness to install the amp, threaten my warranty?The cost of the equipment...and installation, in the extremely likely event I leave it to a professional...is daunting enough even before all that...

I got the one without the cable attachment. It's cheaper, I already had a spare cable, it won't be obsolete when I upgrade to a newer phone with a different connector, and it's actually easier to stick a cable in each time than to align the phone with a fixed connector -- I've had both kinds.

<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="asb" data-cid="13180" data-time="1364200117"><p> I think this is a great idea, and I thought of it for myself as well. But I don't have an iPhone and my phone does not function as well as an iPhone. I tried all this out with rentals before buying. <br /> <br /> If I were able to afford a phone that functioned this well, I certainly wouldn't buy a car that duplicated all the services.</p></blockquote> ASB, many non-smartphones offer a Navigator turn-by-turn nav service through the carrier (Verizon etc.). Works great! Uses arrows & text instead of maps. Costs a couple bucks per use, or you can subscribe. Or, you can subscribe to Ford's Sync Services and get directions from them - same deal, voice+text+arrows but on your car's center screen instead of your phone screen. You don't need a data plan; Ford built a dial-up modem into the car that automatically downloads data over your phone's voice connection! Takes a few minutes rather than a few seconds, but works great!

<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="ThatAutGuy" data-cid="12351" data-time="1363331032"><p> Please post some pics - I have a c-max with SMF, and I'm thinking about getting the Proclip mounts, but would like an idea of what it actually looks like in the car.</p></blockquote> OK, ThatAutGuy, here you go. Anyone wondering how to mount their smartphone close at hand ought to check out ProClip's setup for the C-Max. I'm using their dash mount and it works great to keep my iPhone always close at hand for navigation etc. When using the Maps app, the next-turn directions are easily in sight at the top of the screen. When I want to talk to Siri (to find a gas station, specify an address I want directions to, dictate a text message, etc.) I just push the Home button to summon her over the car's Bluetooth connection. You need not give up any functionality just because you didn't spring for the nav.

I'd be up for it. Not sure how to PM on this site you to give you my info though?

Yeah, dtorres, I went around a few times about that one too. Ultimately figured I'd save the $, stick with SMF and do a Proclip mount for my iphone. It works great -- the phone's home button falls right to hand, so I can talk to Siri any time to ask for navigation directions, dictate text messages etc. Gotta post pix of that when I can borrow someone else's phone to take a pic of my phone in its mount. :) I'm hoping an upgraded pair of tweeters will bring my stock stereo up to snuff. It's not bad at all, just not all I'd like it to be.

Update... 3500 mi on the car now. Lifetime avg has jumped to 36.5 mpg. That's a 2 mpg jump, woot! :) Lots of people ask about the car. I tell them the same thing that the more recent road tests say: it's a fantastic 37 mpg car and I love it. There's no shame in that. Few hybrids drive this well, few non-hybrids get this sort of MPG (especially in the city). Ford has nailed the sweet spot, and if the sweet spot gets 37 mpg, they should be honest and say so. I realize Joe Enthusiast's C-Max gets better MPG when he cruises the slow lane like he's out of gas, overinflates his tires like 4 blimps, tailgates 18-wheelers like a hooker at a truck stop, and risks his warranty by blocking his grill with a cover made of genuine whale foreskin...but a '67 VW bug gets infinity MPG when you put it in neutral and roll it downhill with the engine off, and that's about equally safe and equally relevant to the average C-Max driver's experience. ;)

I have the SE with the base "Sync with MyFord" (SMF) setup, instead of MyFord Touch (MFT). There are pluses and minuses to both. Pluses of SMF: 1. Does not crash like MFT (rarely will forget how to do something within the first 60 seconds of startup, but self-recovers). 2. Responds faster than MFT. 3. Clock maintains correct time unlike MFT. 4. Screen is in a safer line-of-sight location than MFT -- at the base of the windshield so you can keep your eyes on the road. 5. Only SMF offers AppLink to integrate selected smartphone apps into Sync -- which is FANTASTIC if you like Pandora radio as I do. Minuses of SMF: 1. The menus are still awful and unintuitive -- you're just cursing while pressing softkeys instead of cursing while pressing the screen. So you'll likely end up using voice commands...and MFT recognizes more voice commands than SMF does (though still nothing remotely approaching natural language recognition). 2. Sync Services are free for 3 years with MFT, but cost $60 a year with SMF if you want to subscribe. 3. With MFT, not only do you get a bigger screen, but also your right-hand instrument panel screen can show more things than with SMF -- like keeping your Sync Services turn by turn directions visible all the time. 4. SMF does not offer the option to upgrade to Sony audio. The base 6 speaker system offered with both SMF and MFT is OK, but the Sony upgrade for MFT sounds better. So I guess it's kind of a draw...but if I had to do it again with more money to spend this time, I'd go MFT with Sony.

I have wondered the same thing!

The idea of AppLink is to use Sync voice commands (and the car's control pads) to control smartphone apps, "so you can keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road," as Ford likes to say. The phone's screen goes blank (other than a dark gray Sync logo). The car's MyFord screen (a smaller, non-touchable version of your MFT screen) picks up the artist info, etc. instead, so even if you do want to look, it's safer (big letters, and no pop-over ads). You can pull the Sync voice paddle and use voice commands (or the car's buttons) to do things like skip, thumb-up/down, create new station, etc. You can send the audio over either Bluetooth Audio or USB. With an iPhone, you manually start Pandora on the phone; plug the phone into USB; pull the voice paddle and say Mobile Apps > Pandora, and you're off. Apparently with Android you don't have to start it manually or be plugged in or be limited to just one Applink app running at a time. Boo Apple. Here's a list of commands: http://support.ford.com/sync-technology/pandora-for-sync-applink-sync#reload

<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="RachelnLa" data-cid="11128" data-time="1362337593"><p> I found speaking slowly and clearly works. It helps that I am the only one in the car speaking to her. She don't like my language. I have to speak hers hahahaha</p></blockquote> I find I have to wait until the display says "Listening" before I start to speak. Otherwise I think my first syllable or so is cut off, and the lady who lives in my dashboard can't understand. By the way, she needs a name...

Siri works though. Hold the iPhone's Home button as usual, and you're talking to her over the car's Bluetooth connection. So that's nice eg for dictating a text and a recipient.

AppLinking Pandora works flawlessly in the non-MFT cars (SE), which don't have any more processing power. Then again, maybe the idea is to show album art on the MFT ones.

Has anybody looked into or completed speaker upgrades for their SE? The C-Max isn't in Crutchfield's database yet. Are any of the speakers in our SE true coaxials? Seems like at least the little speakers at the base of the windshield ought to be, but given how far I have to crank the treble up, I doubt it. I'm curious what coax and/or tweeter options would work there. Any idea about speaker size in the doors, at least the fronts? Anyone try adding an aftermarket all-in-one sub (underseat or rear)?

<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="dtorres" data-cid="7405" data-time="1359210627"><p> If you switch the screen to the right of the speedometer to nav display instead of the efficiency leaves the next turn directions are on that screen.</p></blockquote> I don't think that works on the SE without MFT. My SE (without MFT) shows only Leaves or Compass. Please advise if you have figured out a way to change that -- it would make Services useful.

To play it over Bluetooth: Pull the voice paddle and say "Bluetooth Audio." You can do this even if you are charging it over USB. To play it over USB: Plug it into the USB jack. Pull the voice paddle and say "USB." You can then control playback either from the phone or by using Sync voice commands. (I'm sure you can find the Bluetooth Audio and USB options in a menu somewhere too, I just find voice commands easier.) Re the other comment, I have an iphone and I've had no problems. However, Apple apparently didn't comply with some industry standards, which cripples some features vs. using an Android smartphone. For instance, if you have an SE, the Applink feature (which lets you control certain smartphone apps with voice commands) only works if the app is already started and the phone is plugged into USB. Similarly, text message readout/reply on the SEL doesn't work properly with the iPhone.

Mine had the exact same defect on delivery. Weird, I assumed it was a fluke. Dealer fixed it easily (you might check to be sure they get the part in first -- I had to go back a second time because the part was back-ordered and not delivered timely for my first appointment).

Awards went to Mazda's SkyActiv technology and to Ford's C-Max Energi. Article here: http://ens-newswire.com/2013/02/04/green-car-awards-go-to-mazda-ford/

Heard a C-Max ad on the radio -- first ad I have ever seen or heard for the car -- on the local "modern rock" station in my California central-coast town. The ad consisted of a "real life owner" talking about how driving the car makes her feel smart, and how she likes showing off the gee-whiz features. I think Ford may want to change the name on this car -- you have to see the name written out in order to understand it, which you can't do in a radio ad or when telling someone about your car. The trick is simply to get someone into the car, and then it kinda sells itself. Last week I gave my boss a ride home in my C-Max for several days while his BMW X3 was in the shop, and he liked my C-Max so much that this weekend he bought an identical one! The X3 is now for sale...

Ditto. Plus: Lighting around the ignition switch Switchblade style key for SE too Better stereo for SE 3-year free Services subscription for non-MFT buyers too A single command to get a list of commands that is identical across ALL features in Sync Tighter turning radius