Bye Bye Lemon Focus!

[MNiceGuy]

My black '05 ZX5 has been traded off after a long and terrible list of experiences. Lately it had been one trip to the mechanic after another; causing me to miss work due to tows and the like. In fact, in the last 8 months, it spent 37 days in the service garage. The last series of repairs carried out would have become somewhat serious safety issues had they been given a chance to get any worse. Too much time, money, and effort was being spent keeping the car on the road.

I decided not to give up on the Focus since mine is the only problem child out of a long list of friends, family members, and coworkers that own and love theirs.

And I got this (this has tan interior...mine has black):



I know what you're thinking...it's the new body style and it's not an SES. Personally I much prefer the newer style to the 05-07' and that's even considering the beloved hatchback is no longer an option. The inside is more refined and seems to be more pleasant to drive.

I bought an SEL because I found the extra features to worth the extra money over an SE. My particular SEL has SYNC and everything down to heated leather seats. The suspension is slightly upgraded with a rear sway bar but does not have the sportier setup of the SES. In hindsight the SES would have been cooler with the SVT EAPs, smoothed bumpers, and better suspenstion but none were to be found with the combination of other features I wanted (I have an unbridled and irrational hatred of tan interior). Combine that with the fact **zips up flame suit** that I would rather have a comfortable ride (I commute across back country roads) than be able to zing around corners like I did with the old car.

[Monkey-Gein]

[zurno]

glad to see you stayed with another focus



your old car must have been made on a Friday

[MNiceGuy]

Well actually the old car was built on 4/24/04 which I believe was a Tuesday

Monkey you know how the roads are around here (I moved to your neck of the woods and work in Cannon Falls). With the new car it's like riding on a bed of pillows covered in angels feathers.

[Steve@Tasca]

Nice choice, just needs a tint and a drop (someone had to say it).

[Redlineracer12]

riding on a bed of pillows covered in angels feathers.

That sounds pretty nice

[Monkey-Gein]

i know. i had one for a month, i didn't really like it. you gonna do anything to it? there's a simple add cheap way to upgrade the fly by wire.

you live round here too? where you work?

[Stilz]

Nice choice, just needs a tint and a drop (someone had to say it).

lol
<--- Thats gonna be the universal mod fot the new ones... I swear. the car NEEDS it. lol

[hafftrak]

A lot of people complain about them, but I like the look of the 2008+ cars.

[Monkey-Gein]

i don't like the drastic style change, deletion of the hatch, the the dash look, the seat adjustment (liked the crank, not the lever), fly by wire, and it having the dura with the drastic change. it just don't seem like a focus. don't get me wrong, they are decent and i wouldn't pass one up, but i prefer the other styles. they should have waited for the change for when they had a new engine, and maybe kept some of the styleing from the others (like the arch around the wheels. arn't we getting the euro style foci soon?

[MNiceGuy]

@ Monkey-Gein: living in Northfield now

@ Stilz: The Focus has been sporting the 4x4 look since '05 and I agree it would be the most obvious first mod. I think they look much better with even a moderate drop.

@ Monkey-Gein: I was originally the number one hater of the '08+ cars. For starters they deleted the hatchback which pissed me off because I took advantage of that feature on the old car numerous, many times. It wasn't until I was given one (or several) loaners to drive that I really started to like them.

While the exterior and lack of a hatch are still up to debate the interior is 97,000 times better than the old cars IMO. There's more room, the audio/HVAC controls are laid out better, the info display on top of the dash is nice, and etc. As gimicky as SYNC sounds (or at least sounded to me) it's absolutely positively wonderful if you're someone who makes and takes a lot of calls on the road. Nobody yet has complained that I'm hard to hear with my crappy, dog-chewed T-Mobile phone. A lot more can be voice-controlled but I haven't tinkered with it yet.

Another thing the Focus had going for it was price and value. I looked at the Civic, Golf, Mazda 3 (butt fugliest car like it on the road), and Corolla but none seemed to have the features-per-dollar of the Focus. One could argue that it's slower, less refined, and depreciates faster than the other compacts but none of those are issues for what I wanted to get out of it.

And finally, Motor Trend's 2011 Focus spy shot: