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My Brief Experience with a 2020 Escape SE


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1 hour ago, dlghtjr90 said:

It would be good to further clarify exactly what aspect of rotary shifter that folks don't like.

 


I like to rest my hand on the shifter. I have nerve damage in my shoulder/upper pec on my right side so that helps keep my arm from going numb while I'm driving. Having a water bottle or coffee mug in the cup holder helps a little bit, but the position isn't quite as perfect as the shift lever normally is. 
 

then there's the lie about it saving space on the console. That IMO was total BS to try to sell the public on it somehow being a better way. 

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18 minutes ago, CKNSLS said:

It is a "rental grade interior" at least in this trim model.

 

Exterior is uninspiring.

 

Final verdict-a vehcile made to appeal to three product segments-that doesn't do an adequate job of appealing to one.

 

It appealed to me. The SE trim level could be a bit better, but not near as bad as Ford haters make it out to be. And you can always buy  Rav4 with faulty fuel tank and rear suspension, or CRV with oil dilution problems. With Escape, you just have to option it right to your tastes. If you want an opulent interior and different exterior, buy/lease the Corsair. 

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8 hours ago, T-dubz said:

2020-Lincoln-Corsair-gear-shifter_13998_

 

if they really wanted to save room, they’d just use the piano key shifter from Lincoln. It takes up zero console space, and is easier to use.

 

It isn't easier to use.  With the piano keys, you have to look at the buttons to push them.  The rotary is all there in a dial.  You know exactly where you are when turning it as opposed to which button do I have to push.

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16 minutes ago, blwnsmoke said:

 

It isn't easier to use.  With the piano keys, you have to look at the buttons to push them.  The rotary is all there in a dial.  You know exactly where you are when turning it as opposed to which button do I have to push.

You don’t have to look at them any more then you do the knob, and that doesn’t really matter anyways. I don’t think a lot of people are doing no look shifting. With the knob, you have to go through the other gears whereas with the piano key, you go straight to the one you want. 
 

obviously neither of these are difficult, piano keys just free up a lot more room.

Edited by T-dubz
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24 minutes ago, T-dubz said:

I don’t think a lot of people are doing no look shifting.


Really? I’ve never looked on any of my cars. Backing out of your driveway, a parking spot, three point turn, you have to look at what “gear” you are in?

 

For me only when I had a car with a rotary. 

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37 minutes ago, sullynd said:


Really? I’ve never looked on any of my cars. Backing out of your driveway, a parking spot, three point turn, you have to look at what “gear” you are in?

 

For me only when I had a car with a rotary. 


you don’t look at the shifter or the IP? This has happened in my town multiple times from people not knowing what gear they are in.FamousInfantileHapuku-size_restricted.gi

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Thank you for your open and honest real world review. The 2020 Escape is selling well at our dealership in Oklahoma. Personally, I am a huge fan of the Escape Hybrid. I'm hoping for a Sport Appearance Package on the SE and SEL like Ford offered on the 18-19 models. Those too were good sellers. Super excited for the upcoming Bronco Sport to bring back the customers that prefer their CUV to look more like a traditional SUV in the way the Gen1 Escape did.

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12 hours ago, rperez817 said:

 

FordBuyer sir, you bought a 2020 Escape SE Sport Hybrid with Premium Package correct? That's the sweet spot in the 2020 Escape lineup for the U.S.

 

Correct. And if I still lived in MI on the lake off a dirt road, I probably would have considered the SEL in velocity blue with AWD and optional 2.0 turbo, towing package, and 19 inch wheels. Another very competitive Escape. My wife loves Toyota and loved our quartz blue limited Crosstrek, and hates Ford. But she loves this Escape. That says something. Also, the plugin isn't even out yet and 2021 MY will probably come with new trim packages. 

 

Lost in all this is the fact that the new Escape is much more competitive in every way than the previous generation. The reason I got the Crosstrek back in 2017 was because it was the best buy for the money hands down. The 2017 Escape wasn't even a close second. The 2020 Escape put itself back on my shopping list and I would argue better than the Toyota/Honda offerings or at least as good. Ditto for the SEL with 2.0 turbo IMO. Ford is back in the game with this new Escape, and some tweaking in 2021 and beyond will only make it better. Btw, the 10 way Active X leather seats are super soft, comfortable, and supportive. 

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17 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


I like to rest my hand on the shifter. I have nerve damage in my shoulder/upper pec on my right side so that helps keep my arm from going numb while I'm driving. Having a water bottle or coffee mug in the cup holder helps a little bit, but the position isn't quite as perfect as the shift lever normally is. 

 

Thanks for your experience. Is it possible that a design like below from Audi A4 is also acceptable?

It is a shift-by-wire, but Audi chose to make it look like a traditional shifter.

It would be good to understand if people miss the latent feature to rest your hand on the shifter, or hate the general shift-by-wire technology.

 

maxresdefault.jpg

 

 

17 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:

then there's the lie about it saving space on the console. That IMO was total BS to try to sell the public on it somehow being a better way. 

 

Also very true. It's basically an iceberg phenomenon that the top of the shifter may look nice and sleek with the rotary design, but there is 50lb more content compared to a mechanical shifter underneath.

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13 minutes ago, dlghtjr90 said:

Thanks for your experience. Is it possible that a design like below from Audi A4 is also acceptable?

It is a shift-by-wire, but Audi chose to make it look like a traditional shifter.

It would be good to understand if people miss the latent feature to rest your hand on the shifter, or hate the general shift-by-wire technology.


I would be willing to try it as long as it's not confusing to use. I've read that some of those can be not very user friendly. FCA's is particularly awful. 
 

13 minutes ago, dlghtjr90 said:

Also very true. It's basically an iceberg phenomenon that the top of the shifter may look nice and sleek with the rotary design, but there is 50lb more content compared to a mechanical shifter underneath.


I doubt it's 50lbs worth of stuff. If nothing else mechanical linkages are completely gone and those weigh more than any wiring. I'm talking about physical visible space on top of the console. 

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31 minutes ago, fuzzymoomoo said:

I would be willing to try it as long as it's not confusing to use. I've read that some of those can be not very user friendly. FCA's is particularly awful. 

 

The biggest difference is the shifter always comes back to the 'central' position unlike the mechanical one where P is all the up, D/S is all the way at the bottom, etc.

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I got the sport package on my f150 because I wanted the console shifter and I do rest my hand on it and I like it. I do miss the push button start but it wasn’t worth $8k to upgrade to a Lariat.

 

But I also don’t have an issue with the push buttons on the MKX.  I go back and forth with no issue.

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7 hours ago, dlghtjr90 said:

 

The biggest difference is the shifter always comes back to the 'central' position unlike the mechanical one where P is all the up, D/S is all the way at the bottom, etc.

 

I have an Audi with this shifter so I can explain this better. The main reason some company are shifting to RND setup is the maintain internal logic in shift pattern. In this operation, pulling down the shifter always means moving forward, and pushing up always means moving backwards, and pushing the button always means park - three different motions for three different modes. It's more intuitive for younger generation of people who grew up on video games and using binary control user interface. And once geezers like me get use to it, it becomes second nature as well (took about 3 days of getting used to it).

 

The traditional PRND shifter has no internal logic... It is actually a pretty terrible piece of industrial design that people have learned to cope with over time. The issue is that sometimes you pull down to go reverse or neutral, sometimes you push up to go reverse or neutral. If you are distracted or in an emergency situation, you can accidentally shift into reverse or neutral by mistake - especially for inexperienced drivers that have not untrained their brain logic to adopt the illogical PRND movements with contradictory directional input.

 

PRND shifter logic:

Start in P - to go reverse = pull down; to go forward = pull down; contradictory directional input - both action require moving shifter down but going in opposite directions.

Start in D - to reverse = push up; to park = push up; contradictory directional input - both action require moving shifter up.

Start in R - to go forward = pull down; to park = push up; logical directional input however, logic is inconsistent with other position.

 

RND shifter with binary control that returns to center logic:

Start in P - to go reverse = push up; to go forward = pull down; logical directional input

Start in D - to go reverse = push up; to park = push button; logical directional input

Start in R - to go forward = pull down; to park = push button; logical directional input

 

The trouble FCA got itself into was that they were using a PRND shift pattern in a binary input shifter that always return to center... well, you can see why that is a problem. You can't change the input device and still keep PRND... it doesn't work.

Edited by bzcat
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30 minutes ago, bzcat said:

 

I have an Audi with this shifter so I can explain this better. The main reason some company are shifting to RND setup is the maintain internal logic in shift pattern. In this operation, pulling down the shifter always means moving forward, and pushing up always means moving backwards, and pushing the button always means park - three different motions for three different modes. It's more intuitive for younger generation of people who grew up on video games and using binary control user interface. And once geezers like me get use to it, it becomes second nature as well (took about 3 days of getting used to it).

 

The traditional PRND shifter has no internal logic... It is actually a pretty terrible piece of industrial design that people have learned to cope with over time. The issue is that sometimes you pull down to go reverse or neutral, sometimes you push up to go reverse or neutral. If you are distracted or in an emergency situation, you can accidentally shift into reverse or neutral by mistake - especially for inexperienced drivers that have not untrained their brain logic to adopt the illogical PRND movements with contradictory directional input.

 

PRND shifter logic:

Start in P - to go reverse = pull down; to go forward = pull down; contradictory directional input - both action require moving shifter down but going in opposite directions.

Start in D - to reverse = push up; to park = push up; contradictory directional input - both action require moving shifter up.

Start in R - to go forward = pull down; to park = push up; logical directional input however, logic is inconsistent with other position.

 

RND shifter with binary control that returns to center logic:

Start in P - to go reverse = push up; to go forward = pull down; logical directional input

Start in D - to go reverse = push up; to park = push button; logical directional input

Start in R - to go forward = pull down; to park = push button; logical directional input

 

The trouble FCA got itself into was that they were using a PRND shift pattern in a binary input shifter that always return to center... well, you can see why that is a problem. You can't change the input device and still keep PRND... it doesn't work.


I agree this is much more intuitive once you use it a few times.  Then again I always like things that are logical.

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On 6/7/2020 at 9:09 PM, sullynd said:

Three point turn with a dial or push button is a pain. Does self parking shift for you when you have electronic shifting?  My Edge self parks, but you have to shift it (2015 - Prerotodial.)

 

I can maybe see it with push button, but how in the world is it difficult with the dial?  If you're in drive, you rotate it left two clicks and you're in reverse, 2 clicks right you're back in drive.

 

On 6/7/2020 at 10:54 PM, sullynd said:


Never. 

 

Aren't you special lol.

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I do a 3 pt turn backing out of the garage and it’s just as easy in my f150 console shifter as the MKX push buttons.

 

pull down once/hit R

pull down twice/hit D

 

And when parking with the truck it’s push shifter to park.  Turn ignition off.  Remove key.

with the MKX I just hit the Start button.  It puts itself in Park and I think the rotary dial does the same.

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17 hours ago, bzcat said:

The traditional PRND shifter has no internal logic... It is actually a pretty terrible piece of industrial design that people have learned to cope with over time. The issue is that sometimes you pull down to go reverse or neutral, sometimes you push up to go reverse or neutral. If you are distracted or in an emergency situation, you can accidentally shift into reverse or neutral by mistake - especially for inexperienced drivers that have not untrained their brain logic to adopt the illogical PRND movements with contradictory directional input.

 

Isn't this just a technical limitation from the 1940-50 when automatic transmissions first came out and they where column shifted, just like manually shifted cars (never used a 3 on a tree before, so no fucking clue)

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50 minutes ago, silvrsvt said:

 

Isn't this just a technical limitation from the 1940-50 when automatic transmissions first came out and they where column shifted, just like manually shifted cars (never used a 3 on a tree before, so no fucking clue)

 

I don't think it was technical.  I think it was just a design choice.  I think the logical progression of gears in most cases is from P to R (to back out of a parking spot) then to D.  Neutral had to go somewhere so they stuck it between R and D.  Pretty sure GM was the first with their hydramatic transmission and everyone else just copied it.

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2 hours ago, akirby said:

 

I don't think it was technical.  I think it was just a design choice.  I think the logical progression of gears in most cases is from P to R (to back out of a parking spot) then to D.  Neutral had to go somewhere so they stuck it between R and D.  Pretty sure GM was the first with their hydramatic transmission and everyone else just copied it.

 

So did some digging...and Olds was the first car with the Hydramatic transmission-1940 to be exact...and the shift pattern is  NDLR or DNLR

199666_Misc_e546ec89-98a2-47b8-94bd-592acd22f2d9_Web.thumb.jpg.81b59997b2bfaef0ac62054ab2d14646.jpg

1940-olds-f-series-60-conv-inst.jpg.1fb6e73cefcc86107d5a3184b6ec9d09.jpg

 

The used Hydramatics in Tanks too, so here is one out of a M18 Tank Destroyer...Can't quite make out the first letter but it looks like  RN123

m18-ropkey-107w-4.jpg.2e9b7fcc62922055830e7933ea7498a4.jpg

 

Edited by silvrsvt
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