While the warning light in the dash will be shaped like a cup of coffee, the technology in the 2013 Ford Explorer may be a lot more valuable. Ford is introducing new lane keeping technologies, including a system that can help detect drowsy drivers, to help them stay alert and in their lane.
The innovative Lane Keeping System has three unique features designed to help drivers stay in control behind the wheel: Driver Alert System, Lane Keeping System and Lane Keeping Aid.
Many of us can remember a time, seemingly not that long ago, when wearing a seatbelt was optional, and maybe people even mocked you for clicking yourself in. A friend recalled how when she and her sister would travel with their dad in his sports car, she would sit on her sister’s lap in the front passenger seat. Funnily enough, he worked for an automaker, so her family was one of the first on the block to enforce seatbelt usage. Talk about your mixed messages.
At Ford, there are no mixed messages – safety is a top priority. And while a seatbelt may seem like a simplistic concept, Ford has taken things up a notch, to the tune of breaking new ground. “Ford is the first in the world to bring the second-row inflatable seatbelt into production,” said Dr. Srini Sundararajan, Ford Safety Technical Leader for Research and Innovation.
We’ll admit that when iTunes, Word or any of our computer software alerts us to an update, we tend to hit “agree” to said update and not always read what it’s about. For all we know, we might have agreed to wear hot pants and a monocle to the office. So, we know that some of you might also be tempted to go on autopilot when you hear the Ford SYNC® system has a free update and either not pay attention to the details or simply ignore it. But here’s why you shouldn’t.
The update – known by the frills-free name G1 V3.2.2 and tailored for owners of select SYNC-equipped 2011 and early-release 2012 vehicles – will allow more SYNC users to have text messages read aloud while driving. The big kahuna here is the Message Access Profile Bluetooth standard, which you might recognize by its more common term, MAP, which is custom made for the auto hands-free environment. It outlines a set of features and procedures used to exchange email, SMS and MMS between devices. Here, we mean SYNC and the smartphone.
While you still have a few weeks to wait to see the new Ford Escape, we thought you might find this bit of trivia interesting: The next Ford Escape uses 25 recycled 20-ounce plastic bottles in the carpeting of each vehicle. It’s also the first time Ford has used this type of carpeting in an SUV.
“It’s a good use of recycled product and keeps it out of landfills,” said Laura Sinclair, a materials engineer for Ford and mother of two young boys.
Ah, to be a fly on the wall when Ford, GM, Audi, BMW, Daimler, Porsche and Volkswagen decided to have a sit-down – maybe somewhere off the radar, like the Olive Garden? – to discuss electric vehicles in the United States and Europe. Would they agree on things? Would the conversation veer off into discussing technologies coming in future vehicles? Would Porsche order the Never Ending Pasta Bowl?
No one is revealing any of those details, but we know what did successfully come out of the powwow was an agreement to support an international standardized approach to charging EVs. In short, EVs from those seven automakers can share fast charging stations.
It’s easy to be cynical about Yellowstone National Park. Sometimes – perhaps for most visitors – the place comes off a lot like Disneyland. After all, most folks drive from one part of the park to another on the “grand loop,” a 140-mile road system that allows visitors to pop in and out of their cars to take in a view or, most often, snap pictures of wildlife that has grown so used to homo sapiens that they – the animals, not the humans – show no hesitancy about crossing roads or grazing within a few feet of the awestruck tourists.
On the other hand, the fact that folks who cannot get into the wilderness easily can still see animals in the wild is pretty cool. I lost my cynicism about Yellowstone when I met a 65 year-old Michigan woman who had lost the use of her legs. For her, the opportunity to sit in her car with binoculars and watch bison, pronghorn antelope and elk do their thing was, in her words, “a blessing.”
Greetings from the Pahaska Teepee lodge, the last place to grab a room and a meal before you get to Wyoming’s eastern entrance to Yellowstone National Park. After a nine hour drive from Boulder, Colorado, it feels good to stretch my legs out on my cabin’s queen-sized bed. And even better to wash down a respectable buffalo meat quesadilla from the lodge’s grill with the Moose Drool Brown Ale I picked on my way through Cody, about 50 miles to the east.
Moose Drool and a buffalo quesadilla – not a bad way to launch three weeks of backpacking, hiking, cycling and mountain biking in Wyoming, Montana and Colorado.
Odd building materials in vehicles may sound quirky and clever, but the process is nothing new, and is all about doing good for the environment.
For example, did you know recycled blue jeans – the cotton, that is – are used in the 2012 Ford Focus as sound absorption to keep the interior quiet? Or that whenever possible, Ford has used soy foam for seat cushions, castor oil foam in instrument panels and even recycled carpet on cylinder head covers? Therefore, when we mention there might soon be coconut in your Ford, it shouldn’t seem all that nutty.
Although it’s not set to be revealed to the public until November 2011 at Los Angeles Auto Show, we have the inside scoop on one major change that’s putting the “new” in the new Ford Escape. It’s all about the EcoBoost® – the Escape will offer the most options of that engine ever in a Ford SUV, with, count ‘em, two four-cylinders: the 2.0-liter and a new-to-the-U.S. 1.6-liter.
Also available will be the 2.5-liter Ti-VCT four-cylinder. The 1.6-liter, by the way? It’s expected to get higher highway fuel economy than even the Escape Hybrid, which is EPA-estimated at 31 mpg.
What if all you had to do was order a brochure, watch a video or buy that Ford vehicle you’ve been eyeballing to help raise money for the school of your choice? It’s reality – Ford has teamed up with General Mills on Box Tops for Education (BTFE), and is the first automaker to partner on this initiative. BTFE began in 1996, and in the past 15 years, more than 90,000 schools have earned over $400 million, including more than $59 million last school year.
And a two-month program called Ford Drives Box Tops has been launched, with a goal of generating $1 million to support schools throughout the U.S.