"mazda616" (mazda616)
09/20/2018 at 13:44 • Filed to: Rental Cars
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"mazda616" (mazda616)
09/20/2018 at 13:44 • Filed to: Rental Cars | 0
| 7 |
This little car has lived a hard, hard life. 38,000 miles in just under two years as a rental. Yikes.
It has dents, dings, and scratches all around. It smells faintly of smoke. It has coffee stains in the seats. The driver’s air vent adjuster lever is broken. And, the rear luggage cover is broken and not attached to the hatch anymore.
But, it still drives decently. It has plenty of pep, averages 29 miles-per-gallon in city traffic, and feels smooth and well put together. It’s also way, way quieter on t he highway than I expected.
If it weren’t for the silly dual clutch transmission that doesn’t know how to behave, I’d say a Focus would be a good cheap car to get. Especially since Ford has discontinued the model here in the U.S. I bet some new 2018s will be deeply discounted soon.
Junkrat aka Rick Sanchez: Fury Road Edition
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 13:52 |
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I had a 2012 SE, and didn’t mind the DCT at all. It was a bit rough in parking lots, but it was expected so I never made a big deal about it. I put 140k miles on it in two years and never had a single problem. Would buy again if given the right opportunity, but I won’t need another car for a while.
Aremmes
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 14:07 |
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Besides reliability issues
, I don’t get the hate hard-on against the PowerShift gearbox. In my exper
ience i
t behaves only slightly differently from a transmission equipped with a torque converter. Early versions showed some shuddering when rolling from a stop with light pedal input,
particularly in reverse, something that anyone who drives stick shift would recognize instantly as clutch slip
, but
Ford changed that in a firmware revision. Outside of that, it seems to behave and feel like a modern slushbox.
Eric @ opposite-lock.com
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 14:21 |
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What’s weird about the DCT is that it seems to like being driven like a manual. When we rented one in Canada a while back, it hated my wife but only missed a beat a couple times for me.
Otherwise, they really are great cars, but I am a bit biased.
Chariotoflove
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 14:31 |
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I still don’t understand this policy of abandoning the car market in the US. It seems like leaving money on the table. A lot of money. And it’s putting all the eggs in one basket. Seems awfully short sighted to me.
Textured Soy Protein
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 14:46 |
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I’ve rented a few of these over the years. T he transmissions have ranged from feeling mildly uncooperative to straight up broken. I always have trouble with Fords trying to figure out where the hell in the menus I’m supposed to find bluetooth pairing.
The thing is, basically every modern compact car is surprisingly comfy and quiet with high mpg. If I were shopping for one, I’d rather have a Civic, 3, Elantra or Forte.
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mazda616
> Aremmes
09/20/2018 at 16:31 |
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This one bucks and shudders when I accelerate unless I just absolutely floor it. I thought the issues were corrected by 2017 but apparently not.
ranwhenparked
> mazda616
09/20/2018 at 17:29 |
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I drive the closely related Escape SE, and have put 62,000 miles on in just under 2 years, and compared to the Focus, it rides like an oxcart, handles like a wet noodle, requires the pedal permanently mashed to the floor to get out of its own way, and averages 25mpg.
Oh, and doesn’t seat any more people or carry any more cargo than a Focus hatchback.
Oh, but today’s crossovers are so much more car-like and so much more efficient than the SUVs of yesteryear that there’s no need for Ford to sell cars anymore, since the only reasons anybody ever bought a car over an SUV was because of the lower MSRP and better MPG.