gyveri

One week after our Ruby Red C-Max SEL arrived at the Benicia, CA railhead (and 31 days after the build date on the sticker), the dealer called to say that our car had been delivered to them. Hooray!!! We picked it up that afternoon and are greatly enjoying driving around in it. Here is a picture of it sitting in our driveway not far from the Monterey Bay in CA. --Ian

Hi, Cyberdman, Our Ruby Red C-Max SEL arrived at the Benicia, CA railhead on Saturday afternoon 4/27.The dealer called on Saturday afternoon 5/4 to say that it had arrived. We picked it up that afternoon and are greatly enjoying driving around in it. Many thanks for your status information: it helped me pry a railcar number out of the dealer so we were able to track our car's progress from Promontory Point, UT to Benicia. Here is a picture of it sitting in our driveway not far from the Monterey Bay in CA. --Ian

My C-Max arrived at the rail head at Benicia, CA Saturday afternoon. Still no word as to when someone is going to put it on a truck to ship it to the dealer. It's now over 4 weeks since my car was built. I guess they don't really need my money. --Ian

Many thanks for the info, Cyberdman. My car is on the move at last! May I trouble you for the number of the railcar that my C-Max is on so I can track my car's progress as it wends its way to California? Thank you in anticipation. --Ian

Hy, Cyberdman, Please would you let me know the status of my Ruby Red 2013 C-Max Hybrid SEL 303A package built on 2013-04-03. VIN is 1FADP5BU5DL534082 Thank you in anticipation. I really appreciate your doing this for those of us willing to wait for the car that is exactly the one we want --Ian

As long as Ford complied with the EPA's regulations when it tested its hybrid vehicles to generate the data on which its EPA fuel economy figures are based (and I've read that Ford is meticulous about this), it's unlikely, IMO, that this law suit will go very far. The most likely cause of the discrepancy between the EPA fuel economy figures and real-world figures is the EPA's mandated testing methodology. An interesting article on the subject of EPA fuel economy testing was published in the April issue of Car & Driver. It's entitled Why is the EPA so bad at estimating hybrid fuel economy? by Csaba Csere. The article points out that in the speed range in which the EPA highway test is performed (48 mph average, 60 mph max), and at the rates of acceleration and deceleration mandated by the test, a lot of the energy expended in accelerating the car is recovered by the hybrid car's regenerative braking system, so that the hybrid returns spectacular EPA highway fuel consumption figures (note that the regulations require no net change in battery charge between the beginning and end of the test). In more normal highway driving (e.g, freeway driving at 70+ mph), there's not much accelerating and there's not much regenerative braking: most of the energy for this kind of driving is provided by the gasoline engine, which consumes fuel. Hence the significant difference between EPA and real-world driving figures. What's needed is a EPA test methodology that more realistically models real-world driving and does not give results for hybrids that are hard to match in the real world. But this change would be highly political and so unlikely to happen any time soon. --Ian

Three drivers in this household. It's the car that's last in the driveway that usually gets driven, so the driver's seats of our cars get adjusted a lot. Two of our cars have memory seats with one memory setting for each of us. We hit the appropriate button and off we go in comfort. Unfortunately, Ford doesn't offer memory seats on the C-Max we have on order. The lack of memory seats was almost a deal-breaker but we decided we could live with a non-memory power seat. But a memory seat is certainly on my wish list. And why do you also have to get leather mandatory to get the power seat? --Ian

Does anyone know the railroad routing Ford uses to ship between the MAP in Wayne MI and Benicia CA? --Ian

The X1 is made in BMW's plant in Leipzig in former East Germany, The new plant cost approx. 1.3 billion Euros, However, a European Union regional development grant contributed 360 million Euros of this. A government contribution of over 25% of the capital cost of the manufacturing plant must certainly help the bottom line. Not to mention the amounts BMW charges for its "packages." --Ian

Thanks, Nick. Seems that there could be many reasons for the delay. I guess we'll never know which one. I'll let you know when the car actually shows up. --Ian

I concur with Mike B's comments. I had a 2009 Jetta diesel that got great fuel mileage (wll over 40 mpg) on long highway runs but less good mileage in start-stop driving and even less good mileage in start-stop driving in cold weather. I wished for a hybrid version to get some of the energy wasted in braking back in start-stop driving. I realize now that that might not be such a good idea because of the cold weather/cold engine problem unless additional measures (and expense) were taken to promote rapid ICE warm-up and keep the ICE warm when off. And these days, why do diesel engines cost significantly more than gas engines? --Ian

Is a long delay (e.g., 30 days) between build date and delivery date a reason to be extra vigilant in performing the pre-acceptance inspection? --Ian

I recently test drove an X1 that listed for about $39k. I loved the power train and vehicle dynamics -- they took me on the test route they used to demonstrate their sports sedans. But at that price, you get no toys, and the way they do their packages, some toys (e.g., back up camera) are very expensive to get. --Ian

Thanks, Nick, for your words of welcome. Maybe you or other forum members can shed light on whether I should be concerned that the car was built on 4/3 but is not scheduled to arrive in California until 30 days later (and 18 days after its originally-scheduled arrival date). What have they been doing with the car while it's been waiting for its train out west? --Ian

Hi, I ordered my Ruby Red C-Max hybrid SEL 303A package on 3/13. A couple of weeks ago the dealer called me to give me my VIN and say that my car had been built and would be delivered on 4/15 --- hooray! Last week, the dealer called to tell me that delivery was delayed till 5/3. So now I'm waiting patiently, reading the user's manual, watching the videos, cruising the forums. --gyveri