jmckinley

I think I'd rather ride a bicycle than go through the agony of 45-25-45-25 for six hours. I've done 200 miles in 12 hours on a bicycle and didn't use any gasoline at all. I'm sure it was less tiresome than P&G for 12 hours. Probably less dangerous too.

I set the Eco Cruise and keep my foot off the go pedal. No Dorkmiling No drafting No grill covers 40 psi in the tires Lightly loaded, just the two of us. 10% alcohol in the gas A/C off, windows up Freshly washed and waxed Oil just changed at 6K. don't know what the dealer put in.

Matt, Now that is a useful comment. You're getting 40 average at a steady 70 mph but I never get close to 40 even instantaneous unless it is a good downhill so I definitely can't expect a 40+ mpg average. Perfectly flat road, headwind or tail wind, instantaneous consumption sits at approximately 37 mpg. I think something is wrong with my car, but the dealer checked it out and said everything is OK. I still think something isn't working right with my car.

I never expected to see 47 mpg at 70 mph, but 40 would be a reasonable expectation without resorting to Dorkmiling, drafting or other extreme measures. Difference in operating cost between 34 and 40 is not that significant, it's probably a matter of principle now. Certainly Ford is not lying about the EPA test results. But, and this is a big But, they had to of known that the C Max would not deliver anything close to 47 combined and would inevitably disappoint their customers. Simply pasting on the EPA rating and trying to blame the discrepancy on the EPA's out of date procedure was a bad idea and will in the long run cost them sales. If you want to see a good analysis of the EPA procedure vs real world, see this month's Car and Driver magazine. It's the best overview I've seen. The Synch and GPS stuff, however, is inexcusable. These systems are clearly not fully developed as delivered. My Synch pulled a "Routine Maintenance" reboot this morning, again right when I needed the GPS to do something. And the voice recognition? Forget about it - it will never work well.

Yesterday I drove 200 miles at 70 mph and got 34 mpg. My Chrysler minivan on the same road at the same speed gets 27 mpg. And it's a lot roomier! It was 70 degrees, the car was not loaded, it has over 6,000 miles and I was not running the A/C. I am not impressed. Don't tell me to drive slower-- It's dangerous on I-75. If I wanted to impede traffic, there are any number of cars that when driven slowly get good mileage and cost a heck of a lot less than the C-Max. And, by the way, the GPS decided there was no SD card exactly when I really needed it. Had to pull the card and reinsert and wait for reboot. Yes, I've had the 13-3-11 TSB done. I won't even get into the GPS' annoying habit of calling freeway exits "Slight Right Turn" and announcing them at the last possible moment or sometimes after you've passed the exit. Speaking of not impressed, I am not impressed by all the posted short trips with huge MPG's. There's a big hill outside of town and I can coast down it and get 90 mpg or I can drive on a flat road at 30 mph and get big numbers, but so what! I'd be interested in seeing some trip times to go with those big numbers so we can see what these guys are really up to.

After some complaining and questioning, the geek guy at my dealer went on a quest to get Ford to tell him the truth about 3.5.1. He was being told that it was not ready and cars were not shipping with it installed. I copied some of the posts from this forum and he went after Ford with that evidence. He called me back today and said he found someone in Ford who admitted that new cars were shipping with 3.5.1 but it is not ready for installation in 2012 build date cars. It was scheduled for March, but didn't make it. My guess is there is a hardware issue. The older cars somehow won't support the new software. He promised to let me know when 3.5.1 was ready. I told him I would most likely know before he does, thanks to this Forum.

Nope, this wasn't the salesman. It was the Tech guy whose whole job is to help customers with Synch and MFT problems. In fact, so far I've been introduced to three of these guys at this dealership. That should tell us all something. He called me this morning to give the spiel again (he hadn't read my email yet). I stopped him and suggested he take a look at the email. He did, and now he's pissed because Lord Motor Company hasn't told him the right story. He promised to dig into it with Ford (Like I said, he's pissed) and get back to me. He was headed to the lot to look at a new C Max they've only had a week or so.

Took my car in last week, dealer says update not available. Sent an email to the tech guy at the dealership and here was his answer: "............the current C-MAX's are still running on the system you have in yours. Hybrid and Electric models are being produced without the update because it's yet to be completed. I fired back a response with quotes from the several owners who do have the update including the screen shots that someone posted of the energy management screens. I suggested he go out to the lot and take a look at the new C Max sitting there. Apparently Lord Motor Company is jerking around its own people too.

My third Garmin, the GPS V, which I bought about 10 or 12 years ago, had a selectable feature called "Snap to Road". When that was turned on it was smart enough to know that you were probably on the road instead of driving through houses or in the ocean. $1,000 and the damn thing is worse than a 10 year old unit.

B Max has sliding rear doors. Also a little bigger than C Max, I think.

Definitely twitchy. Seems to be some hysteresis in the system, maybe friction, maybe screwy software. I'm not ready to drop this one on the service manager just yet. Don't want to overload his circuits.

There are at least four different sets of instructions on the Synch site. The one Plus 3 Golfer just posted actually works with my car. It's the first time I've seen this set of instructions.

Nope, that's the stuff I was talking about. It says to push the "Aux" button to load the file. Don't have an Aux button.

Does anyone know how to perform the Synch updates with a My Ford Touch vehicle? Ford's instructions are just wrong. In short, it says: Download the Status Checker to a USB drive. Stick the USB drive in your car. Press the AUX button and select SYNC line in.What frigging AUX button? Can't find it. Video screen shows a "USB In" selection but that doesn't work either.

Definitely Griot's Garage. And all their waxes and polishes. Can't beat them. But, as others said, why bother at this point. All I'm using is Griot's Speed Shine. It's all you need with a new car and if you use it every time you wash, you may never need to wax.

I've got an idea for the tee shirt logo: 47 MPG My Ass! or Stanley Simple Start Don't Leave Home Without One!

Hey Retired guy, you can forget towing this thing without a charge line back from the motorhome. Too much residual drain going on for that little bitty battery. An alternative is to use elanstri's suggestion to manually override the shifter interlock and put it in neutral without turning on the ignition. Seems to work well and it will eliminate most of the problem. Check the thread on Towing with a Motorhome for details. Of course there still is the problem with some cars where the battery runs down all the time just sitting in the garage. Jury is out on that one.

OK, I forgot. How do you find out what release date your car has? Took mine in yesterday, told dealer to do the TSB 13-3-11. Claimed they did, but I can't detect anything has changed.

Towed Max yesterday using alanstri's suggestion to manually override the shift interlock to get the trans in neutral without turning the ignition on. A word of caution here - you need to be very careful that you have actually placed it in neutral. With the ignition off, the dash indicator is dark so you have to find neutral by feel. Not rocket science, just pull the shifter back two clicks and it should work but there is a huge penalty for getting it wrong. Seemed to work just fine, although I only towed about ten miles. I was towing it to the dealership, by the way, for some routine service and to get the 12V battery replaced. They put in a new battery under warranty. I forgot to mention to the dealer that the car had run the battery down about 20 times while I was towing it on our trip through the Southeast. I don't feel guilty about this because I religiously followed the Owner's Manual every time I towed. If there is residual battery drain, Lord Motor Company should have warned me to either pull the appropriate fuse or run a charge line from the motor home. Most other flat towable cars include such a warning in their manuals. Service Manager did mention, however, that they were seeing an unusual rate of battery failures in new cars, not just the C Max.

Put it in drive and it went backwards. Took three restarts to get it to work right. This one is scary.

Bad news is, I spent Feb and March in the Southeast. Not much improvement in mileage while I was there. Lifetime Avg is 35, most tanks have been in the 34-36 range regardless of temperature. There is no hope if you get on an Interstate and try to run 65-70 to stay alive.

Dropped Max off at the dealer this morning with a Fix-It List: Perform first oil changeGPS sucks, often decides we are off road or in the ocean.Sometimes goes forward when reverse is selected.12 V battery is shot, won't hold charge for more than two days, only shows 12.1 V immediately after driving.Gas mileage sucks.Just got a call informing me that: They are implementing TSB 13-3-11 for GPS problem.Engineering knows about the reverse problem and is working on a fix, date TBD. (Trust Me, Check is in the Mail, I promise I won't ---- -- ---- -----, etc.)New battery ordered, will be in later today.Mechanic is checking the gas mileage (I can hardly wait to see the big improvement!)I thought about bringing up the one kick sometimes two kick rear hatch but decided to wait on that one. I was surprised when they suggested Tire Rotation. I checked the owner's manual and sure enough, it says rotate tires at every oil change. Dealer only charges $14.95 which is a bargain so I went for it. Probably a good idea since I've driven it 6,000 miles and towed it 3,300 miles.

You better get the Group 96 battery. The little original equipment one won't handle much more load. In fact, in a lot of people's cars, it won't handle the stock stuff for very long.

Not true in the case of the C Max. It has no reverse gear, instead it runs the motor backward to reverse. Saves weight and complication of another gear.

Make sure the metal keys are in your remote if you're getting an SEL. Some people haven't gotten them and if the battery dies, you can't get in the car without the metal key. Try to make sure the NAV system has the latest software and the latest maps. Typically car makers try to pawn off old maps then you have to cough up $100 for up to date maps.