Focus. Diesel. Now.

[niky]

The Ford Focus has always been an exceptional car, but a heavy body and a gasoline engine mated to an ancient four-speed automatic transmission have handicapped it immensely on the local market. The new Honda Civic has it beaten black and blue in terms of outright speed and economy, and has the lion's share of the market.

Well, place your bets for Car Of The Year 2007, people... Ford's finally got a contender...


pic courtesy of rangerXLT / rav_5 /ravien of Ford Club Philippines


pic courtesy of stone911 of Ford Club Philippines



Quick low-down:
136 hp at 4000 rpm
340 Nm of torque at 2000 rpm (that's more than the 1.7 million peso Subaru WRX puts out)
13.5 km/l - city fuel economy
20.5 km/l - highway fuel economy (media teams got 20 km/l crawling around Subic's restricted speed zone, with its zillions of stop signs).

Six speed gearbox with a sweeeeet shifter (Euro-style) with a very positive and smooth action, heavy duty clutch (amazingly strong... no burnt clutch smell despite the numerous drag launches, and absolutely no slippage on drop-clutch launches) with a light feel, and still the best sound insulation, ride, handling and brakes in the compact class.

Oh, and there's a 1.8 liter gasoline hatchback coming out, too. ;)

Price: confirmed at 1.089 million pesos. Whew!

Head on over to http://forum.fordclubph.com for more of the buzz. Man, the guys are excited.

[alwayz_yummy]

yehey!!!! kailan testdrive pasabit naman please...

una ko nakita ata yan sa manila auto show.. then 1st ko nadinig ang makina sa "hotwire" sa silvercity..

gusto ko maramdaman ang takbo!

may dvd parin ba?

[Auto_Xer]

[QUOTE=niky;866090]The Ford Focus has always been an exceptional car, but a heavy body and a gasoline engine mated to an ancient four-speed automatic transmission have handicapped it immensely on the local market. The new Honda Civic has it beaten black and blue in terms of outright speed and economy, and has the lion's share of the market.

Well, place your bets for Car Of The Year 2007, people... Ford's finally got a contender...


pic courtesy of rangerXLT / rav_5 /ravien of Ford Club Philippines

Cooking it into the corner....

[mazdamazda]

Wow... they are launching the Ford Focus Diesel! Man - I would've loved to drag launch one. :innocent:

[niky]

Hahaha... actually, that's a TRS instructor, doing it on purpose. They destroyed a whole bunch of tires last weekend...

Man, it was a blast. There will definitely be a few more test-drives, and JP Tuason is talking about setting up some of these babies for track work.

The additional down-low torque makes a joke out of autocross work. They had another car (2.0, 5 speed MT, gasoline, 155 hp... wanna guess what it was? ) do the autocross, and despite the considerably better acceleration out-of-the-hole of the "enemy" car, it couldn't match the cornering speed and corner-exit speed of the diesel... worth a difference of 1.2 or 1.5 seconds on a 43-45 second autocross course.

[artpogi]

wow hayuf sa torque!

[drey]

Nice! Now replace the old TRS cars with this diesel Focus...

At sana, lower the price tag of the TRS racing lessons... hehehe...

[FedEx]

ganda sana makakuha nko nito pero mahal heheh hirap ipon..

[niky]

Hehehe... I'm seriously thinking about trading in the RS for this baby... To say the Ford Club was impressed is an understatement.

[drey]

Go ahead sir niky... Its not a bad car, but I guess its hard for you to let go since it doesnt have the essence of your RS being your first car...

[niky]

Haha... not first... just... best... ...

But the Focus TDCi is just so much more.

[alwayz_yummy]

sir niky, anu ang package nyan kaya?

DVD, sunroof, fogs(front+rear), everything the 2.0gas(except matic) focus hatch has-->nandyan parin kaya?

[niky]

Not sure about DVD.

Minus:
No sunroof, no rear-airconditioning (though still automatic dual-zone climate control)

Plus:
Six speed manual, diesel

[alwayz_yummy]

yup, wala na yung rear aircon(ok lang...)

yung display unit nila sa "hotwire" sa silvercity noong july, may sunroof at DVD, walang fogs lang.....sana ilabas na para malaman na kung anu accesories na kulang..


love the 6-speed manual na pull-reverse..pero sa baguhan/sanay sa jap-style, mahihirapan....

[niky]

It's not as hard to use as the Hyundai/Kia Euro-style shifter. The Hyundai/Kia shifter is kind of rubbery and notchy, whereas the Focus shifter is very good. I'd say it's about as good or better than the new Civic's shifter.

It's better than the CRV's shifter, too. The CRV crams six-speeds and reverse into a limited space, and it comes off notchy, with gates too close to each other. With the Focus shifter, there's no danger of accidentally shifting into reverse, or mistaking second gear for fourth or fourth for sixth, as in the CRV's.

[alwayz_yummy]

yun ang maganda dun...kahit sa hyundai/kia-->hiwalaya ang R-->at malapit sa 1st gear din...

mga novice/ baguhan lang matatagal mag-adjust, lalo na kung actual driving, baka malito..pero kung tulad natin na sanay na, no probs sa shifting kahit nakapikit, diba?

uyy, dami guest!

PM nyo naman ako kung tetestdrive kayo,e....

[manager]

will there be a diesel automatic option?

[AG4]

Same facelift as the new Chinese Focus...

[alwayz_yummy]

no matic, gas lang matic at manual lang sa diesel---> yehey!

[niky]

Looks similar... the Philippine version gets a non-chrome grille (which I like better).

Regarding automatics... no word yet. Mahirap sabihin, because they say there isn't an AT unit that will take the engine yet.

But that's all the better for fuel economy... and the diesel has so much torque you can leave a stoplight in third or fourth gear (as demonstrated!!!). I bet you can drive it all day in third gear without having to change at all... ...the amount of overtaking torque is very good.