B25Nut

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Won‘t it cover the BLIS light if you put it in the upper left?
Yes, so I'll try it just to the right of the BLIS. If I don't like that it will go in the lower left, although I prefer not to cover that area. I feel the rectangular convex mirrors give an image that is more easily interpreted by the brain.
 
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ARK

ARK

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Some more thoughts from driving this past week:

On Thursday I had to drive across town in Los Angeles for work. I left late in the morning and traffic was light. This let me explore higher speeds on the Mach-E on some pretty empty freeways. The motors seemingly have an endless supply of power. The car just kept pulling, pulling, pulling. At no speed did I feel like the car was lacking in power, even at 100. At any speed, the Mach-E could seemingly go even faster without much effort, I never had to get heavy on the throttle.

Power aside, the Mach-E was extremely well-composed at speed - I did not feel instability in the least. The fact that the electric motors are so quiet and the cabin is so deeply sound-insulated makes it easy to drive fast.

I came back home during rush hour over surface streets. I did not feel nearly as exhausted as I usually do after having to drive through traffic like that. Over some poorly maintained areas of roads in central Los Angeles, the ride remained very comfortable. Once again, I appreciated the noise insulation as it kept the outside world from intruding the cabin. The seats were also very comfortable throughout.

I also spent more time in Unbridled mode on the way home to further test the built-in one pedal driving. I thought it worked better in the stop-and-go traffic inherent to driving on surface streets. I still don’t much like it for when I am free to drive fast.

It’s interesting, someone decided that heavy regen should be built into Unbridled mode and the least regen should be in Whisper. I wonder if it should be the opposite. The small adjustments to the throttle to control regen-braking would seem to be better suited for the sedate driving in Whisper. It’s when I am driving more aggressively, as someone would be more likely to do in Unbridled, where I think subtle adjustments to the throttle don’t work that well.

To that end, I hope Ford adds a custom drive mode to the Mach-E. I would love to take Unbridled, tweek it to allow for full-coasting, and crank up the propulsion sound so that the volume is more in line with an ICE Mustang. At least for now, I am happiest in Engaged for most driving situations.
 

B25Nut

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This is what a $4 mirror does. One of it's biggest advantages is showing the oncoming traffic when entering a highway from a cloverleaf onramp.

Ford Mustang Mach-E Impressions on my Premium SR AWD Mach-E (w/ some comparison to my Mustang GT Coupe) 1630364805494
 
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I got my Mach-E Wednesday night and wanted to share my impressions on this very special car.

I originally made a reservation the morning after the reveal in November 2019. I was extremely excited but wanted to sleep on it before putting down a deposit. I was not otherwise in the market for a new car. I have a 2006 Mustang GT and 2013 Chevy Equinox, with the Mach-E replacing the latter. If the Mach-E didn’t exist, I’d have been happy keeping the Equinox for a few more years before seeing what was on the electric market.

What drew me to the Mach-E was that it looked like a Mustang, was shaped like an SUV, and was all electric. I like following the automotive industry and from all the vehicles I would come across that I could afford, I always kept coming to the same conclusion that the Mustang was the best car for me - sporty, comfortable, good looking, and fast. But I also wanted to have an SUV and an electric vehicle, so when the Mach-E was announced it combined these three things in an unexpected but really exciting way. The Mach-E would be the yin to my Mustang GT’s yang.

Looks are subjective, I won’t dwell on that beyond saying I think it looks striking and am very satisfied with the way it turned out. My Mach-E is Rapid Red with the Premium line and it is a great combo. The black trim with the Premium accents the red in a really sporty way, just like I hoped it would. I think the Mach-E has a very athletic stance that is even more apparent in person.

In terms of driving dynamics, it does not disappoint. The standard range AWD is pleasingly quick and I haven’t even had the chance to floor it yet. I will say though I enjoy accelerating on my Mustang GT more. I think the commotion and noise that comes with a roaring V8 is lost with EVs. However, the propulsion sound from Unbridled is great and makes up for much of this. I am glad Ford put in the time and effort to get this right.

As an aside, I think it’s why I have a hard time thinking of Teslas as sporty no matter how quick they are - supreme silence and sportiness don’t mix in my opinion. Outside the EV context, I think that’s why BMW and the other German marques became pioneers in supplementing engine sound in their vehicles’ cabins when emissions requirements started to rain on their inline six parade.

Anyway, I’ve been driving in Engaged because it seems Unbridled forces you into one pedal driving even when that setting is otherwise off. This is unfortunate as 1PD is as lame as I suspected it would be (come at me). When I want to slow down, if my foot’s not on the accelerator and if its not on the brake because the car is de facto braking via regen, that means my foot is hovering over the pedals, and if my foot is hovering over the pedals it means I am mimicking what I do in stop and go traffic which is exactly where I don’t want to be. So, I’ve been in Engaged and only wish I could crank up that masterly crafted propulsion sound to the level it is in Unbridled, if not higher. Previously, I thought the Audi E-Tron had the best propulsion sound. It’s now in second place as far as I’m concerned.

I live in a hilly area with lots of twisting roads. Here too the Mach-E does not disappoint. It’s an agile vehicle by any measure. I think you’d need to find yourself in a sport sedan or something more athletic to do better. That this is an SUV speaks volumes.

You don’t feel the weight either in most situations. I will say driving fast downhill and hitting the brakes is where you do feel it. Clearly this is where any car would be at it’s worst in terms of braking performance. But its been my impression that there is a bigger gap here between the Mach Es braking performance in let’s say flat road aggressive braking vs downhill aggressive braking, compared to my Mustang and Equinox. It seems to be because of the weight. In all other situations, I cannot feel that I am driving a very hefty EV.

The interior is a very nice place to be. The screens are crisp, the surface materials high end, and that B&O soundbar is gorgeous. Something I have not seen mentioned elsewhere, the sun visors have a built in extender. This is great and something I loved about my Equinox. If you are driving and the sun is behind the car but on the left, this will keep the back of your neck from getting a tan.

Something else I have not seen mentioned elsewhere, the Mach-E is a great car to drive with the windows down - the wind buffeting is pretty low, much lower than my Equinox or most cars I’ve driven. An exception is the Mustang, it’s so low on that car I sometimes enjoy driving with the windows all the way down on the freeway. I think a big part of it is how far back the windows extend on the vehicle - the windows should go further back than your ears to minimize buffeting. This is easy on a coupe like the Mustang with its two giant doors, but harder to do on a four door. If Ford put specific effort into this on the Mach-E it plainly paid off. I greatly enjoy driving with the windows down and prefer to do this when I can in lieu of using the A/C.

The light Active-X seats I have are very comfortable. Something I noticed, they seemed to get warmer than other vinyl seats I’ve been in, felt more like leather in this way (yes, the seat heater is off). My Mustang has vinyl inserts with leather sides, it feels noticeably cooler. As does my cloth Equinox but that’s true of any cloth vehicle. Hopefully the seats don’t feel warm like this in hotter weather, though I am particularly glad I did not go with the dark interior in light of this.

I put this in another thread, but I was astonished how quiet the Mach-E was at speed. At 90mph, there was very little cabin noise. At those speeds, being a BEV doesn’t mean a whole lot because much of the noise is from wind and tires. The low noise in the cabin seemed comparable to me to big German luxury sedans. Clearly Ford put a lot of effort in sound deadening and I think they knocked it way out of the park.

This leads to my last thing about my Mach-E, my one big disappointment. That’s the buzzing noise coming from the driver display. I posted about this in some other threads, but I really hope Ford declares that its non-spec and fixes it.

The driver display is buzzing just like those old monitors from the 90s and early 2000s would. It is loud and it is an abrasive tone. You hear it with the HVAC on, you hear it with the radio on, you still hear it at an annoying volume with the windows cracked when you aren’t driving too fast.

It’s plainly not some EV noise the car is making. It is straight cheap monitor whine. I held off on sharing my thoughts for a few days after I got my Mach-E with the hope that I was overreacting or imagining the extent of it. I am not, and it is just as obnoxious as you’d imagine a buzzing old monitor would be if one suddenly appeared on your passenger seat in your current car while you were stuck in rush hour traffic, day after day after day.

If my Mustang GT was going to be my loud and abrasive car that I drove hard on the weekends, the Mach-E was going to be my choice when I wanted serenity, for example like after a long workday or when going to a traffic-choked part of town. From my perspective, what good is it to have a plush ride, very little tire noise, minuscule wind noise, and a silent EV powertrain if you are forever hearing bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz inside the cabin. I don’t always want to have the radio up and can’t always have the windows down.

I’m hoping Ford can fix this. If not, I’ll obviously have to live with it but it is so significant of a comfort issue that to me it will change the Mach-E from being a great car to one that is merely pretty good.

On this my dealer has been great. The person I have been working with said he put in some sort of query with Ford engineering and is waiting to hear back.

Actually I’ve been very happy with my dealer in the last few months when I was assigned someone new. Previously, I felt there wasn’t any communication and was pretty disappointed, but the last couple of months, the dealership consolidated their Mach-E program with one person. This is at Sunrise Ford in Los Angeles. If anyone is considering ordering in LA, I’d highly recommend getting in touch with Sean Butts, their Mach-E coordinator - I can PM his contact info if you ask. He is extremely responsive over email.

He also told me that the dealership has 72 Mach-E orders. There are bound to be some cancellations. I think he’d be a good person to talk to if you are hoping to grab one off the lot in SoCal. As a bonus, he also told me he is handling all of the Bronco orders for Sunrise Ford LA if you need someone for that.

I’m a little embarrassed to say I don’t have a ton of pictures yet, but here is one I am pretty fond of
Ford Mustang Mach-E Impressions on my Premium SR AWD Mach-E (w/ some comparison to my Mustang GT Coupe) 1630364805494
Great report, loved the detail. Fix that damn buzzing noise Ford or else...
 
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