Well, I decided to do a road trip in my 2016 Ford CMax Hybrid so drove
from Victoria, BC, to Saskatchewan to see my brothers.
Man, that is a long way and I will never drive it again!
Round trip, I went 4260 kilometers and averaged 50.784 miles per gallon.
Interestingly, I got better mileage driving through the mountains than
I did in the prairies.
The car ran great, and the air conditioner was able to keep me cool,
even at 35 degrees celsius.
I must admit, the gas/electric drive system is fantastic! Ford did a great job.
The ECVT is also a great transmission for 99% of driving. The only "downfall"
I had was when I was going 140 kph, and wondered how much gas pedal was left.
So I stomped it down, and found I had at least half a pedal to go! But...
the engine revved up but I didn't go any faster, like you would in a standard
automatic transmission. You have to apply the gas slower to go faster.
A very small thing to have to do.
Unfortunately, I did get a rock crack in the windshield and it had to be replaced.
And one thing that surprised me for a while.... I was going downhill,
and the gas engine was off. Then it was on doing 4000 rpm! It took a bit to
realize the computer had turned it on to use as a brake to help maintain my speed.
But... what I didn't like was the constant roar from the road noise!
If you got headaches, you would have had a bad one at the end of the day.
For an example of what I mean, check out some clips from my dash cam...
This was on the 401 between Hope and Vancouver, BC, and is a particularly loud section.
It wasn't all as bad as this. If you listen after about a minute, this was what it
was like for most of the 4260 kilometers. John Denver is singing in the background...
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6qJLRNMW3pTdFppbTNkdnNVcXM/view?usp=sharing
Here's another video while on gravel with music in the background...
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6qJLRNMW3pTMDdLWk1kVWhXVkk/view?usp=sharing
On the last road home! Here, I turned the radio off so you hear just the road noise on
fairly smooth asphalt...
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6qJLRNMW3pTWDNlNjZKZ1RKVm8/view?usp=sharing
Like I said in a previous post...
On new or smooth pavement, the road noise is tolerable.
On rough or seal coated pavement it is loud to very loud.
On gravel, the noise is very loud to terrible.
I attached a wire to the back frame to get rid of static electricity,
and I could hear it when it moved!