The Not-So-Great Escape

At the end of last year, I was done paying for my Fusion and I knew for my next car, I wanted to get an SUV-ish type thing.  I'm not a tall guy so I wanted something where I could sit a little higher and also something with all wheel drive since there's a bit of snow in the winter.  I loved my Fusion so much that I thought I'd stick with Ford.  I bought a 2018 Ford Escape.

My Mom talked me into getting the Titanium, something I didn't really care about.  It's supposed to be Ford's high end Escape but they should state what the high end is because it's buggy as shit.  It drives fine but it's all the other things, like the electronics that make this car a wary drive.  Everything's a sensor, and on top of it, being run off software.  Red flag anyone?  Speaking of the sensors, they're incredibly inconsistent.



2018 Ford Escape: Works best when in Park and turned off

Here's an example: yesterday I was woken up to a car horn going off in the parking lot.  I thought, who's the jerk?  Well, that jerk was me.  The horn goes off at random.  It's happened a couple of other times too which makes it easy to troubleshoot.  I can't wait for the day when the car won't turn over because the battery is drained from the horn going off willy-nilly.

Even when I got it in November, one of the selling features is the remote start.  They never mentioned that it's hit or miss.  I could be less than ten feet away, try the remote start but it doesn't turn over the first time.  That's a great feature for the winter.  Apparently, it was fixed with a software update.  That's when I thought Fuck (sorry about the language).  My day job has a bit to do with computers so I know how reliable software can be.  Now I'm going to be stuck with this buggy vehicle for the next 4 years?  Everyday will be a nervous adventure until I trade this PC with wheels in.  What random glitch will happen next?

Some mornings, the moon roof is retracted all the way, some mornings it's the way I left it (half drawn).  The trunk door doesn't open when you kick your foot underneath it like it's advertised to do.  Sometimes the windshield wipers do three wipes and a pause, sometimes it's just one.  If the windshield wipers aren't going to work, what else won't?

After talking to a friend that worked at Ford when they were designing the 2018s, it seems to be the engineers that work on the car are fine, it's the cheap labour that make up the software engineers that are the problem.  You know how Windows Updates, especially for Windows 10 aren't very good?  If Windows updates aren't very good, how about some proprietary software for your vehicle?  I don't get the warm and fuzzies driving the car.  Shit, I haven't even tried the parking assist feature because I don't trust that it'll work.  I'm not using accident forgiveness on my insurance because the car decides to pin stripe another car because the sensors don't work that day. 

So when Ford hires cheap labour, they certainly get what they pay for.  And the car isn't worth what I paid for it, that's for sure.  It's the most expensive beater I'll ever buy.  And when I heard that Ford is going to stop making cars (for the most part) before perfecting their SUVs, I know it's time to switch brands.  It's a car and a malfunctioning car can kill you and/or others.

For you folks that stumbled across this blog entry and were wondering if you should get that 2018 Ford Escape, go buy something else.