Laurel

Welcome Mark and Mary Ann. I've had my SEL for a week tomorrow. Smooth sailing so far, but I do have to pay attention to the gauges so that I know the car is running and I really have to remember to press the brake firmly when starting and just touch the start once and quickly. I had one little blip where I thought I had lost power steering when backing up in a parking lot. I had run into shop and hubby in the co-pilot seat put on accessory power to enter some nav. info while I was gone. When I turned on the car, it said it was ready to drive, but when I backed up I had no power steering. Hubby said that he had accidently hit the power start twice so he figured he buggered up some internal sequence. I turned the car off, sat for maybe two minutes and then started it again. All was fine then. I fine it pretty easy to forget how computer driven this car is and I tend to be impatient by nature --so I have to slow myself down so I don't bugger things by not paying attention. The only complaint that I have so far is that there is no light indicators on the gear shift to register with a light to indicate which gear you are in--you have to look at the dash to confirm instead of seeing the placement lit up. Hope to hear some of your stories too.

You should go and take a test drive. You're right that it likely is better to wait for the second generation of anything. We test drove the Kia Optima and I had to stoop down to get in and I whacked my head --so I scratched it off my list. With the C-Max you have wonderful head room for entry and the seats are nice and high and visibility is super. It is just so nice compared to all of the cars we test drove over the last 8 months. I think this one is something special.

And in likelihood Fuelly.com won't be getting reports from me even if I get 4.0 L per 100 kilometers--as I have zip in the way of interest in joining and keeping track over there. It's just not my area of interest. I want good mileage, style, and lots of technology and I have that. Lots of Prius' are taxis here in Vancouver and they make a dandy taxi ride, but not so dandy if you want the style and comfort of the C-Max as your personal vehicle. Happy to come here and brag about my car though <g>.

I think it way too early to worry much about the EPA ratings. We will all be checking in over the next few months with reports on mileage. From my perspective it is a huge learning curve learning to drive the hybrid and in particular the C-Max. I tend to think Ford's head engineer is correct thinking that the extra horse power may be affecting stats. Love the power, but can see how it will affect mileage as it is awesome. We have had our car a week tomorrow and I'm just getting the hang of keeping it in EV. Love the car, and don't have one iota of disappointment or worry about mileage stats. Test drove all models of the Prius several times and I just couldn't drum up one ounce of enthusiasm for any model. One drive in the C-Max and I was whipping out the check book. LOL

Welcome Julie. What model and colour did you order? We just go our SEL and it is Ice Storm and love it.

Interesting Cassidy and I'm pleased for you--as I think you were a little discouraged with the mileage awhile back.

I haven't heard of the Ford owner website. Is that a good thing to sign up on? Could you please post the url?

That was excellent time. Enjoy!

That is good news. Have fun with it--we are still having a good time with ours.

I guess so, but if you got the cloth seats and just had the leather taken off the wheel and put a cotton cover on the steering wheel wouldn't that work out? Cause you buy the car for all the features and not the steering wheel.

I have vegan friends and they feel the same as you. Good luck finding a car for your family. Might be worth having the leather taken off the steering wheel--as the C-Max is great.

Hi Don. I have the same car and colour. Yours will probably follow a similar route on the train that mine did--as I live Vancouver, B.C. Once it gets on the train, you will be able to track it with info that Scooter gave us. I tracked mine with his info. and it was fun to do. Your car needs to be on the train before you can do that, and you have to get your salesperson give you the visibility report so you can find the rail car number. What is with these sales people who don't know what information and forms to fill out? From order to delivery, mine took about 7 weeks and that included it having to be transferred onto a different rail car in Kent, Washington--as the rail car went unserviceable. You will love your car.

Oh brother that is awful! Can your dealer intervene somehow or even Ford?

You are not really supposed to have a fully charged battery because you want the electric motor to do as much work as possible--the internal programming tries to keep the battery at about half charge most of the time. If you use the brake assist down a long hill you will see the battery charge up to almost 100% and it will use the electric motor until it gets down to the normal range and then it will alternate between electric and gas. I found that with coasting versus sustained pressure I would only stay in EV for seconds as well. That is when I started playing around with sustained pressure on the gas and I find I can stay in EV much much longer. I only have about 300 kilometers on my car (180 miles). I think that pulsing up to speed and then dropping back a wee bit and using sustained pressure works great--BUT it can be hard to stay in EV due to traffic, stop signs, etc. I will be on a roll than some ass turns in front of me and I have to touch the brakes and start again<g>. Page 104 in the owner's manual talks about maintaining the battery in the mid range.

You will be very happy with the SEL. We got ours last Friday and think it is great.

Thanks for the update. All sounds good.

Thanks Mike B. --good explanation.

Thanks Rachel! Still can't stay home--out in Tip all of the time LOL.

Finally a photo of me and Tip. She is Ice Storm and Tip is short for The Ice Princess. I just love her!

I am still in the mode of showing off my car to friends. Just took a girl friend for a demo and showed her park assist. The whole concept is so freaky and unnerving. I lined up to a parking spot on a quiet street and pushed park assist. My goodness you have to have faith as the steering whirls around and the car parks itself itself with the little commands of brake, pull forward. It puts you in very tight spots--so tight you think you will take the front end of your car off. My friend started to laugh somewhat hysterically through the process. I asked what she thought after and she said, "that was great, but I have sweaty palms!" Still loving everything so far.

Why does the C-Max need the 12v battery?

That is great. We will all look forward to Spring. What a treat to have weather in the 70's in December--we have rain and it is about 5 C.

A while back nsteblay gave us excellent info on the pulse and glide i.e. this critical piece of info. "The trick to increasing mileage as much as possible is to be in EV mode. I was attempting to stay in EV mode as I was accelerating from stops or slow traffic by babying the gas pedal. What I've discovered is if you accelerate to your desired speed quickly (hopefully the speed limit :)) and then totally let up on the gas EV will kick in. Immediately after EV kicks in resume pushing on the gas peddle being careful not to engage the gas engine again. I then glide as long as I can in EV mode. I repeat this process whenever necessary." For us novices it is important to pay exact attention to the above paragraph. I had read through it before I got my car and had a really false concept in my head. Now that I have had my car for 4 days I understand what nsteblay means by pulse and glide. I thought it meant accelerating, let up the gas until car goes into EV, and then coast and not apply any pressure. If you screw it up like me and do that coasting, you immediately go out of EV. You have to maintain steady gentle pressure on the gas pedal--not too soft or too hard and then you stay in EV. So don't think glide means coasting.like I did. With the steady gentle pressure being oh so careful not to engage the engine then you stay in EV. I can drop .4 L per 100 kilometers on one 100 kilometer trip (or in American lingo an increase of 2 mpg gallon on a 60 mile trip) when doing it correctly. So no coasting. Probably you all knew that, but for me it was an epiphany to learn the steady gentle pressure technique.

Hey Scooter this is getting exciting! Won't be long now. When my car got to within 150 miles (and finally got onto a rail car without mechanical problems) it took less than 48 hours. I was out in Tip for most of the day. All is going well and my mileage is dropping fairly quickly as I break her in. I was thinking about how the terminology for us Canadians is so different i.e. I want my kph to decrease to 4.0 L per 100 kilometers and you Americans want yours to go up to 47 mpg. The measuring system is so different, but basically we all want consumption of gas down.

One kick to open mine, and one kick to close--works like a charm and is very handy.