To celebrate International Women’s Day, an excellent tongue-in-cheek advertisement was aired to “Introduce the Ford Explorer Men’s Only Edition.”
Follow along as Chris Amos takes the new, powerful, Ford Explorer ST for a spin. Does it live up to the ST badge?
Wear headphones! The audio in this video was recorded with in-ear binaural microphones. With headphones or earbuds on, you’ll feel like you’re actually sitting in the driver’s seat.
Our reviews of the Ford Explorer have been pretty positive since our initial test in late 2010. The big seven-passenger made a successful shift to a unibody platform, and has found a level of refinement the nameplate has never known. We’re also quite bullish on Ford’s EcoBoost range of engines, with particular love being heaped on the 3.5-liter V-6 from the Taurus SHO, Flex, and F-150. These two items have joined forces for 2013, resulting in the Ford Explorer Sport. So naturally, when the Dearborn-based manufacturer invited us to test this automotive witches brew, we were loath to decline.
So yes, the paper argument for the 1.6 EcoBoost is extremely compelling. But what’s it like on the road? Well, quite good, actually. The charm of Ford’s EcoBoost engines is how they perform at the low end of the spectrum, where most drivers spend most of their time. With a torque peak of just 2500 rpm, the Escape gives the illusion of a much more substantial powerplant under its hood.
Ford unveiled its 2013 Explorer Sport ahead of this week’s New York Auto Show. Rather than a two-door Explorer (which is what all Explorer Sports have been until now), this new trim gets the 3.5-liter, EcoBoost, biturbocharged V-6.
It’s this combination of old and new that really makes us like the Durango. The fact that it’s a decently entertaining way of hauling seven people doesn’t hurt either. That V-8 engine is Chrysler’s 5.7-liter Hemi V-8, and produces 360 horsepower and 390 pound-feet of torque, meaning the three-row Dodge can really scamper. We didn’t run any performance tests, but we’d feel comfortable estimating a sprint to 60 miles per hour in the seven-second range. Not blistering, but plenty quick for a 5400-pound vehicle.
“X-cylinder power, Y-cylinder efficiency.” It’s a mantra we’ve been hearing for decades now, as manufacturers struggle to squeeze as many miles out of a gallon of gas, without impacting outright performance. More often than not though, power is sacrificed for economy, or vice versa. Like a set of scales, it’s difficult to get the balance quite right.
Domestic automakers protected their home turf this morning at the Detroit auto show, with Chevrolet and Ford claiming top honors in the North American Car and Truck Of The Year voting
The Ford Explorer helped to start the SUV trend way back in 1990, and along the way it has gone from sales leader, to public disgrace, to also-ran SUV. It has sold in the millions and has been exported to over 90 different countries in its lifetime. With 96 percent nameplate recognition, the only Ford products that are more well known are the Mustang and the F-150, both of which have been on sale continuously for 26 and 42 more years, respectively. To say the Explorer is important to Ford’s business plan is an understatement of mammoth proportions.
Ford’s sprawling Dearborn campus is home to many walled-off buildings with blackened windows that work to keep prying eyes out. Every time we drive by, we can’t help but try to catch a glimpse of what’s inside. This time however, we got to see the other side. We were invited in to see an extremely important new Ford, the 2011 Explorer. We spent half-a-day at Ford’s Product Development Center being briefed on all that is new with the Explorer.
The embargo has officially ended, and Ford has released a flood of images of the new Explorer. Check out our updated gallery, and the original story here.
The 2011 Explorer is a big deal for Ford, as it looks to change what was once a gas-guzzling truck-based SUV into a more efficient, unibody crossover. One of the stars of that effort is the all-new 2.0-liter Ecoboost I-4, which is set to take over for the previous generation’s 4.0-liter V-6.