reedmother

The protocol is this: when you turn off the engine by pushing the button, be sure your foot is off the brake.

Update - I just traded the car in for a 2016 c-max energi. I didn't want to wait around for the next thing to go wrong - and they have got great incentives right now. We usually don't trade and sell cars ourselves, but this one had way too long a service record for me to sell to anyone. The new one is great, except the seats are not as firm!!

I told our dealer that I've lost faith in this car and could I trade up to a 2016 c-max SEL. Yep, I can. All I have to do is give them my car and $18,000. What a deal! And, that's with about $5k in Ford incentives! Yikes. When I protested, he said "well, these cars don't keep their value"......I guess they don't want my car either - though I had gotten multiple messages on my answering machine a few months back telling me they had a shortage of used cars and wanted me to come up. (what a bunch of baloney)

we bought the car in January of 2013, so 3 years is up.

my car has been to the Ford dealer many times - and they have "fixed" the clock many times. I don't think it's up to me to tell them what firmware to use.

Once again, my c-max has let me down. The last time was having to replace all the brake and rotor pads at 24K. Now, it's a broken spring at 33K. My car guy cannot believe it. He called around asking about the warranty, but of course, it's not covered. My husband and I are going to take this to Ford. The first year everything went wrong with this car. It stranded me twice, the AC did not work, it's been recall after recall. Not to mention that the clock only tells us the right time for about 2 weeks.

HI guys - I neglected to check back in. Yes, I bought the car new, so we can forget all about rolling the odometer back. Also, I did have 2 opinions about the brakes. First the dealer told me and they were going to do the work, but the warranty was up, so I took it to my cheaper, reliable guy in town. He was dumbfounded by the state of the brakes. He did some more checking to see if some warranty somewhere would cover at least part of it, but no luck. It's a mystery to me. I'm not a big braker. We live in a town in Vermont that has one stop light - and that's 8 miles from my home.....

My guy at the garage could not believe the state of my brakes. The front is metal on metal. It's a 2013 with 24K on it. Need new rotors and pads all around. This car is starting to get on my nerves. The clock can't keep time, it has more recalls than ever, it stranded me twice. I wonder what is next.....

Just got back from another trip to the dealer to deal with recalls and computer re-programming. The clock 'lost' the time within 10 minutes of leaving the parking lot. Most of time the clock stays right at least a month before I need to re-set it :)

My c-max has died on me like that two times! It's like my dog - I love her, but she has some very bad habits..... http://fordcmaxhybridforum.com/topic/2916-car-died-on-the-way-to-airport/

I don't know what they did the first time. Some hocus pocus about re-progamming something or other. They have the records there.

This happened to me in September, 2013. Car died on the interstate on the way to the airport that time. Well, it did it again today. I was just getting off the interstate and it gave one big jolt then the same message came on: "Find a safe place to stop". This car has 11,000 miles on it. (2013 SEL) Both times if was was interstate driving with the AC on. I don't use the interstate or the AC that much here in Vermont. I called roadside assistance, my husband and the dealer. Roadside sent a tow truck, my husband picked me up and the dealer will drive down a loaner to my house. They have been great, by the way - Twin State Ford of St. Johnsbury, VT. It's the car I've lost faith in. The first time this happened I kept trying to it drive again, but that didn't work. This time, I decided to try it again after it had sat for 15 minutes and it didn't give me the message again. I only drove about 1/4 mile to test it out. But, I didn't dare keep going with it, so back to the shop it will go, where they will run all kinds of "diagnostics" with it. There are updates to install I'm sure. Maybe they will even fix the clock! Oh yeah, mine was the car that came installed with AC that didn't work originally. That was ordeal to get fixed. They had to buy some $3000 machine to even diagnose the problem. I talked to the General Manager and told him I can't have this happen. I love everything about the car except the clock not working and it's turning radius - and the breaking down problem. Should I demand another one? Or should I jump ship and get a cheap Focus?

No, they didn't replace anything. Just re-programmed it. I could look again at the print-out, but I think I finally threw it away :)

I just talked to the service guy to get a better sense of what went wrong. He says it was a computer problem dealing with the engine. The computer told the engine to turn off!! Yikes. And, I hate to report this guys, but he said it had happened to one other person they sold a c-max to. Keep in mind, this is St. Johnsbury, VT. Not exactly, a super high volume city.

the repair form was gobbley gook.......

I'm back home now and the car was fixed by my dealer and the other recalls and updates were done at the same time. The dealer dealt with towing the car and also delivered it back to my house. So...they were great. I was reading my original post. When I say that the battery was drained, I mean I could turn the car on, but the internal combustion engine would not come on. Only the electric part of the car was working. So for a couple tries, I was able to drive a couple hundred feet at a slow pace, but soon there was no electricity left in the battery. One weird thing is that they had fixed the clock several months ago with a sync update and 3 days before the car died the clock had gone wacky again. Also, my car was the one that came with nonworking AC, which I didn't discover until the first hot day. The day the car died was 90 and I had the AC on full blast. I didn't use the AC that much this summer since it wasn't that hot. So......did the AC working hard also have something to do with the problem? I'd like to know the details of exactly what caused it and not just "we re-programmed it"

Get this. My c-max died on interstate 91 in Vermont. I was on my own, headed down to catch the bus to Logan to go to Seattle. Traveling on my own is never very relaxing and making all the connections drives me a bit nuts. So.... the car gives me a message to "find a safe place to stop immediately". Oh shit. I stopped, shut off the engine and tried driving - to no avail. The message came on again and I could see that the engine was not coming on. The battery was completely drained. I ended up abandoning the car and hitch-hiking. Luckily a great guy picked me up and got me to the bus on time. I left messages with the husband to deal with Ford. So, here I am on the west coast and the news is that they had to "re-program" it. Great. Oh, c--max, I love you, but if this ever happens again, I'm going to be very disappointed.

easier said than done.

I found a read-out that doesn't say that. Keep fiddling.

I've always just had the leaves on the right side. I don't pay attention to them, but they look nice.

I used to drive a Camry hybrid, that my husband now drives, and I did the same thing. Had one eye on the EV mode gauge most of the time - and would creep into the driveway or post office just to get it to an even 45 mpg before I stopped or some damn thing like that. I just wish the EPA mpg was 44, then we could all relax :)

We got an SEL with no extras. Mainly because of the Smart key! Once you have a smart key, you can't go back. Our other cars have had them. So, we ended up getting our first car with leather seats. I'd say this C-Max has the most comfortable driver's seat I've ever had. Love the power and lumbar.

I'm sick of driving and constantly looking at my gauges. I'm giving it up!! Cold turkey! My little information screen now just has miles to go before fill-up (boring, I know) 47 average mpg can't be achieved, so it's fruitless to keep obsessing about it. I've got 4K on the car. Had it 6 months. I was up to 44 average mpg, then the dealer did an oil change, and I haven't been able to average more than 42 mpg. Same driver, same roads and I haven't been using AC yet. So I surrender! I'm just going to enjoy the car.......and not think about when it's in EV mode anymore. It drives nicely and I don't put gas in it very often, so this should free up some space in my brain for other things. Kind of liberating.

Hey, it's me. The originator of this post. My saga is almost over. They've had my car for a week. Just talked with the guy this morning and the AC malfunction had nothing to do with the compressor. It was leaking freon, but it took them awhile to find the source of the leak- and had to order a part - and they say it will be done today. I've had a 2013 Focus as a loaner. Interesting to see that the Focus with 3K miles gets 37 mpg vs. the C-max with 4K is averaging 44. Remember, same driver, same roads. How come the Focus achieves the EPA estimate, but the C-max doesn't? Also, by the way, they fixed the clock which turned out was related to some recall involving the Sync system.

Interesting Pomtrey. My guys said they had to order some special piece of diagnostic equipment. That was over 2 weeks ago. Finally had to call to ask them what was up. I'm losing my smiley face.