Gadgetory

this may look like a standard Ford Focus hatchback it even kind of tastes like a standard Ford Focus hatchback but if I were to hop behind the wheel and fire it up right now it realized that it doesn't sound anything like a regular Ford Focus hatchback and that's because this is the 2015 Ford Focus Electric and it doesn't use a single lick of gas let's hop behind the wheel and check the text now here in the cabin you've got pretty much standard fare Ford Focus interior you've got the MyFord Touch infotainment system here and you can check out our previous reviews of the standard Focus to see our sort of so-so feelings about that but over here you've got a very interesting my Ford touch instrument cluster on one side you've got a mirror of your infotainment data and on the other side you've got a variety of tools that are going to help you to mind the cars battery life and range you have a bunch of different views that you kind of scroll through using this d-pad on the steering wheel and that's going to let you see things like your historical data and how much battery life you have left all of these systems are going to be built around what Ford calls a range budget and that's at the beginning of every trip the computer going to evaluate your range and give you an idea of how much range you can expect to get and as you drive and turn on the climate control system or step on the throttle a little too much it's going to add or subtract from that range to let you know how good you're doing now when you plug the Ford Focus Electric into the wall using its charging port right there on the front fender that electricity is going to come in to the onboard charger where it's going to be converted and then fit back into the trunk to a 20-3 kilowatt-hour lithium-ion battery pack where it's going to be stored that process is going to take anywhere between three point six hours and 20 hours depending on whether you use a 240 volt fast charger or just plug it into the wall in your garage now when you're ready to hit the road the focus is 107 kilowatt electric motor which is underneath the onboard charger is going to pull that power from the battery pack and put about 143 horsepower to the road and about 184 pound-feet of torque you're good for about 81 miles according to the EPA if you drive it with a nice light foot now as is the case with most electric vehicles not the pedal on this thing you'll find that it takes off with a lot more augusto than you think a wimpy green eco car probably should and that's because electric vehicles litter all of their torque instantaneously there's no winding up the maximum torque at 4500 rpm like you having a gasoline engine it's all there all immediately of course you won't want to do a lot of petal matting in this vehicle if you want to get anywhere near the 81 miles prescribed range by the EPA now there are a lot of advantages to driving an EB I mean it's a green car there's a lot of pork but there are a couple of compromises that come along with it in the back of your head or always kind of keeping my eye on the range and looking for places that you can potentially charge the vehicle and then of course paying attention to a lot of auxilary systems that are going to have an impact on the range that may not affect the gasoline vehicle I mean I've never paid attention to what I fit my climate controls to before I got into an e V and I saw that turning the air conditioner on takes about a five-mile hit off of your estimated range now I think part of the appeal of the 2015 Ford Focus Electric is well that it doesn't draw a lot of attention to itself it looks like a regular hatchback aside from the smaller grille in this charging port right here no one's going to be able to tell that you're saving the world one gallon of gas at a time I kind of like flying under the radar in that way the other thing I like is the price and it's easy to price this 2015 Ford Focus Electric because there are no options twenty-nine 170 gets you out the door but there are thousands of dollars in tax incentives they can get your net price just for those twenty thousand dollars