So as I write this Trucky Verde is with the guys at TBR garage still getting the transmission rebuilt after its failure during my trip down to GNRS. I had to return the Mustang Convert rental after driving it around LA Sunday and then home to Sacramento Luckily I have been able to get a loaner to drive while she is being rehabilitated.
What am I driving you might ask? Quite possibly the most forgettable, unknown and undercover vehicle ever to wear a Ford Badge. A Ford C max. What the hell is a Ford C Max you ask? Exactly!
I am convinced if you asked three out of five long time ford sales people what a C Max was they’d squint their eyes cross their arms and wrack their brains trying to decide if it was something they’d ever heard of. Probably while actually leaning on one at the time. Unsurprisingly this badge didn't last long, from 2003 to 2019.
As I am writing this I’m looking at it, sitting in my driveway. Having driven it now for over a week and I am still not sure what it is. Is it a minivan? I mean no, not really. It has conventional doors, no third row and not bad but not a remarkable amount of luggage space either. Is it a hatch back? Well, Ford built the C Max on the Focus platform so you've got a decent argument if you think so. Also the C max was even briefly badged as a Focus Max. It does after all have a one piece rear hatch instead of a trunk but… no, no thats not right either. In fact its shape is so ubiquitous I am all but positive if you de badged it and robbed a bank on video even folks at the plant that built it wouldn’t be sure just what it was.
Now when it comes to choosing a daily or a back up ride, I dont think anonymity is necessarily a bad thing. Hear me out, theres certainly something to be said for keeping a low profile. For example, what if you are someone famous or possibly wanted by the law? A Ford C max makes perfect sense and buying one of these and investing in some tint would be as low key as it gets. I am convinced if I had parked it in a mall or busy shopping center parking lot I may have never found it again. Or perhaps, if I was lucky, I might have just found a previously lost one, driven that one home, leaving mine for the next C Max owner to discover and take home. To beat a dead horse It looks like… well… every damned thing else on the market these days. A non descript jelly beanish, Kinda Mini van like, Small SUV adjacent blob. Think, a Telsa model 3 or model Y esque looking shape.
Let's start with the good. Getting in to the C Max, yes it’s on the smaller side. The doors aren’t very long so as a bigger guy, I have to kind of squish up to get in. Once I am in thought it's pretty roomy. Even though to be comfortable my seating position puts my shoulder inline with the b pillar. Keep in mind though for me thats pretty normal in any car this size. So I can't hold that against it. The C Max with its minivan looks has a ton of headroom. I almost wonder if the person who designed it had a hat fetish. Once inside it has sort of a highroof transit van feel. And short of an actual high roof full size van, I have never been in another vehicle especially of the mid sized variety that had more headroom. Even with its massive sunroof which I rather like, theres plenty of room above your melon. I am 6’6 so I was a fan of this byproduct of Fords design. I am not sure if this was across the board but the model I had had black interior from the belt line down and a tannish, color from there up. While I normally find this annoying and cheap feeling in most cars in the C Max it’s not terrible and conspires with the roofline to make the C Max feel even bigger.
After returning the Mustang I was a bit Leary of having another Ford keyless experience. There were several times I thought I had turned the Mustang off only to find the radio still playing and the dash and interior lights still on. Even more worrisome I found the Mustang would unlock on its own even when I was pretty far away from it. The C Max system seemed a bit more refined despite being older. I did like that the doors would unlock but not until I touched the drivers door handle. Kind of nice.
As Ive said Ad nauseam, the C Max has some heavy mini van vibes and on a Costco shopping run the rear storage area is pretty decent. It doesn't have the basement like dip in the back that most Mini Vans seem to have in the rear but it's still pretty roomy. On this trip I discovered that CostCO had a deal on their microwavable instant rice bowl things I love so I scooped six or seven cases each about the size of two big shoe boxes stuck together. The C max swelled all of them with ease and everything else as well. Had I been driving Trucky Verde the back seat of my crew would have been mostly full with just the Rice alone. So Id say the C max is deceptively good cargo wise. Shockingly though I think my favorite feature of the C Max is a gauge on the dash that indicates your frugality. In the interest of ending with some positivity I'll get into that more later.
Finally the bad.
The Ford C max like many new vehicles for some reason is yet another vehicle whose dash seems to be designed specifically to prevent after market stereo installation. I am not sure why so many manufacturers seem to be doing this. Maybe it's another way to force planned obsolescence? I find this very annoying, weird shaped dashes and radio shapes that make swapping in an after market stereo and therefore adding new features and technology down the road impossible or at least more difficult that needs be. I am a pretty basic guy I dont need or want a lot of "tech" in my vehicles so being able to upgrade my stereo as I have in Trucky Verde giving me access to things like Apples Car Play makes all the difference in the world to me. Also let's be real, Car manufacturers rarely get the stock stereos right. They also compound their failure by packing a bunch of extra "vehicle specific" features in that makes swapping in something new all but impossible. I didnt even bother using the C Max built in stereo, rather electing to just pop in my EarPods and use my phone directly.
More bad. Unlike every vehicle I have ever experienced ever as a hybrid theres no Combustion engine starting up initially. Get in, hit the start button and things light up on the dash and fans for the HVAC come on but nothing else. It's unnerving for me putting something in gear that doesn’t feel, well, on. After backing out of the driveway and going down the street maybe 35-40 feet the motor comes on and because of the delay it sets off my internal alarms, as an out of nowhere vibration and sound of the motor is suddenly there. Every time I drive it and this happens I instantly feel hyper aware as if something might be catastrophically wrong. I cant help mushing my biscuits deeper into the seat trying to increase my sensitivity, actively feeling and listening for possible issues. It’s extremely frustrating.
Driving the hybrid with the engine coming on and off and on of its own accord and the hyper awareness it creates. That alone would be enough of a reason for me to pass on the possibility of adding one to my fleet. Who knows, I might get used to it over time but after a week so far at least, I still find it annoying. That said since getting it I have probably driven more conservatively and carefully than I ever have. Why? No not because of its lack of power or far from enjoyable engine sounds. Its all about the leafies. Theres a little screen on the right of the dash that literally has leafs as in from a bush or tree, that along with stylized vines, appear and grow as you drive within whatever Fords determined “good” algorithm. As I am sure you have guessed the more aggressive you drive the leaves fall off and the branches or vines disappear. This is nothing short of genius. Turning driving good into a game had me working over time looking for opportunities to coast and staying in lanes that allow me to drive at speeds sometimes even below what’s posted. Looking down at the dash when I’ve no choice but to drive up a hill and seeing my leafies drop off and blow away became almost embarrassingly upsetting to me. I couldn’t help but focus even more on the way down the next hill modulating the “gas” pedal as much as possible and breaking as little as I can to maximize efficiencies.
I am not exactly sure what the rhyme or reason behind growing and losing the leafies is. I found many times when I felt I was being extremely frugal in my driving but by going up a hill or simply pulling away from a stop light would cause the immediate loss of foliage. In short I felt like I was often wrongly penalized for topography. Even so I cant argue with the results, I dont think I have ever burned so little fuel or tried so hard to maximize milage. I am not sure if this is something the Mach E has or if Ford has maintained the leafies idea on its other hybrids but I really hope so. I found myself and my kids watching intently and getting a measurable amount of satisfaction at getting the little bastards to grow. Gamifying driving conservatively is a brilliant idea and one that makes a ton of sense. Even My kids seem to enjoy and congratulate me when the screen is full of them also give them an excuse to harass me when they are falling off or gone altogether. So in closing, while I haven’t exactly enjoyed the C Max I did find it adequate. Decently roomy, decently comfortable and inoffensive as could be. A forgettable appliance of an experience if there ever was one, I did however….very much enjoy the leafies.
James
The Lowered HMFIC
Comentários