[R.G]

Good news for people waiting for Ford Ecosport in Kerala.

I saw two Ford Ecosports leaving Technopark trivandrum , today morning around 9.30 AM.

A grey one and a blue TITANIUM badged one. I could not stop to talk to the people in the car or take snaps as I was in the queue to enter the campus.

Cars were TN registered with red number plate. They looked awesome .

Ford dealership is in walkable distance from my home. I will pay them a visit tomorrow.

Hope to see more of them on road.

Note: Just realized that akhil_rpmlover spotted them already in TVM.

[zenren]

Originally Posted by sunsetorange

Why do all the test mules still have the hatch opening on the Right side of the car? is this not inconvenient for us Indians?

Is there any real disadvantage with rear door hinge being on the left side and the handle on the right? I couldn't think of any situation, probably because of my limited hands-on experience with such vehicles. Would be great to know the practicality aspects.

[swiftnfurious]

Originally Posted by zenren

Is there any real disadvantage with rear door hinge being on the left side and the handle on the right? I couldn't think of any situation, probably because of my limited hands-on experience with such vehicles. Would be great to know the practicality aspects.

When luggage has to be loaded, you need to carry it to the right side of the car, probably keep in the road, then open the hatch & load it. Since we drive on the left side of the road (and usually park on the left side too), it would be ideal to have the hatch opening from left side too.

Originally Posted by R.G

....Ford dealership is in walkable distance from my home. I will pay them a visit tomorrow...

Chances are slim dealers will have any info. The Kottayam dealer didn't even get to see the cars. I am wondering where did the other 3 from the convoy move to?!

Originally Posted by diffsoft

Read in one of the posts above and in the Indianautos blog that the DCT automatic will be only mated to the 1.5 liter petrol engine and not to the 1 liter Ecoboost engine.

Can someone confirm? If it is true then that's terribly disappointing to me.

Cheers,

It could be the case. It may not make financial sense to mate Ecoboost to an Auto. Or it could be that they want to gauge response to it & then take a call. Since powershift is already mated to 1.5L in Fiesta, development cost too should be lesser. Above all, it could be Auto's lesser FE that Ford took a call not to introduce it. They may want to market the better FE of Ecoboost & then bring in Auto later.

[r_devakumar]

Took the pictures today in my way to office (GST Road, Chennai South). Couldn't get side and front view because of the usual heavy traffic in GST Road. Car looks good, but from the side and rear view, it may not score high on road presence.

[suhaas307]

Originally Posted by zenren

Is there any real disadvantage with rear door hinge being on the left side and the handle on the right? I couldn't think of any situation, probably because of my limited hands-on experience with such vehicles. Would be great to know the practicality aspects.

Picture this..

You're driving your brand new EcoSport on Indian roads. Naturally, you have to stay on the left side on a two-way road and you're approaching your house. You park your EcoSport on the left side of the road, next to your house. Your wife tells you that you need to ferry the MIL to the Airport so you'll need help her with her suitcases.

You walk into the house, you grab her suitcase and walk out the front door and towards your car. You stand behind the car and you attempt to open the boot-lid. With the boot-release lever on the right, the door swings open effectively blocking your view of the house. This prevents you from loading luggage in one fluid motion with the door kept open.

You load one suitcase. but what about the other luggage?

You have two options:

- Slide the suitcase underneath the opened boot-lid.

- Hurl the suitcase over the door and catch it on its way down after running around the door.

OR

- You could keep opening / closing the boot-lid every time you load one suitcase.

[pgsagar]

Originally Posted by sunsetorange

Why do all the test mules still have the hatch opening on the Right side of the car? is this not inconvenient for us Indians?

It is inconvenient. But then how often do we open that tail-gate? I wouldn't write off a good product for such small oddities. Incidentally, it is cost-cutting exercise by Ford and while evaluating inconvenience caused vis-a-vis cost of altering involved, they also take frequency of boot use into account.

[sbala]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

Picture this..

You're driving your brand new EcoSport on Indian roads. Naturally, you have to stay on the left side on a two-way road and you're approaching your house. You park your EcoSport on the left side of the road, next to your house. Your wife tells you that you need to ferry the MIL to the Airport so you'll need help her with her suitcases.

You walk into the house, you grab her suitcase and walk out the front door and towards your car. You stand behind the car and you attempt to open the boot-lid. With the boot-release lever on the right, the door swings open effectively blocking your view of the house. This prevents you from loading luggage in one fluid motion with the door kept open.

You load one suitcase. but what about the other luggage?

You have two options:

- Slide the suitcase underneath the opened boot-lid.

- Hurl the suitcase over the door and catch it on its way down after running around the door.

OR

- You could keep opening / closing the boot-lid every time you load one suitcase.

I agree that this will be annoying. So was the indicator stalk in Ford cars. People always complained. But we owners got used to it . The same will happen here.

[naut]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

Picture this..

You're driving your brand new EcoSport on Indian roads. Naturally, you have to stay on the left side on a two-way road and you're approaching your house. You park your EcoSport on the left side of the road, next to your house. Your wife tells you that you need to ferry the MIL to the Airport so you'll need help her with her suitcases.

You walk into the house, you grab her suitcase and walk out the front door and towards your car. You stand behind the car and you attempt to open the boot-lid. With the boot-release lever on the right, the door swings open effectively blocking your view of the house. This prevents you from loading luggage in one fluid motion with the door kept open.

You load one suitcase. but what about the other luggage?

You have two options:

- Slide the suitcase underneath the opened boot-lid.

- Hurl the suitcase over the door and catch it on its way down after running around the door.

OR

- You could keep opening / closing the boot-lid every time you load one suitcase.

Although I would much prefer to have the door open to the right rather than the left (unlike what ecosport has), there's another solution to the problem you've described above.

Park the car in the opposite direction but right next to your door on the left side of the road. I agree that it's probably a big inconvenience to make a u turn to get the car into this position on most Indian roads. Also it might not be possible on busy roads and might be possible only in small roads which are not one ways typically the ones in residential areas.

If your lucky to have your residence which meets all the above criteria then you can probably work around this limitation by sacrificing a little bit of your convenience. Do you really want to do all this after having paid well over a half-a-million (probably a million) bucks is debatable.

Going by what I've seen of ford (pardon my limited knowledge here), i think that they don't seem to prefer customising their cars for RHD markets.

[zenren]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

You stand behind the car and you attempt to open the boot-lid. With the boot-release lever on the right, the door swings open effectively blocking your view of the house. This prevents you from loading luggage in one fluid motion with the door kept open.

You load one suitcase. but what about the other luggage?

You have two options:

- Slide the suitcase underneath the opened boot-lid.

- Hurl the suitcase over the door and catch it on its way down after running around the door.

OR

- You could keep opening / closing the boot-lid every time you load one suitcase.

Tried picturing and it didn't force me with any of the above listed option!

The assumption in your scenario is that the boot-lid, when opened would block the entire gate. If the gate is so narrow, how will the ecosport enter through that gate? Assuming the gate to be atleast 1.25 times the width of the car, you would still have space left behind the open boot-lid to get the suit cases in. Otherwise you could park the car a little further to get enough space. Remember that ecosport is a sub-4m car and you have allowance to park a little ahead

I would prefer the current design, considering the way my house is. Front door of the house leads to the driver side of the car, when the car faces the gate. If I move the car forward a few inches, I can get the suitcases loaded into the boot with the way it currently opens. If it opened the other way, I would have to move the car a little further ahead so that even the open boot-lid is not in my path.

I guess it is just a matter of convenience/inconvenience on a case to case basis, at least for the scenario you mentioned.

Personally, I would be more frustrated with the indicator stalk on the left side than the boot lid handle on the right.

Disclaimer: I don't have any relation with Ford, and have not owned a Ford car. This is just an opinion based on my logic.

[sbala]

Originally Posted by zenren

Tried picturing and it didn't force me with any of the above listed option!

The assumption in your scenario is that the boot-lid, when opened would block the entire gate. If the gate is so narrow, how will the ecosport enter through that gate? Assuming the gate to be atleast 1.25 times the width of the car, you would still have space left behind the open boot-lid to get the suit cases in. Otherwise you could park the car a little further to get enough space. Remember that ecosport is a sub-4m car and you have allowance to park a little ahead

I would prefer the current design, considering the way my house is. Front door of the house leads to the driver side of the car, when the car faces the gate. If I move the car forward a few inches, I can get the suitcases loaded into the boot with the way it currently opens. If it opened the other way, I would have to move the car a little further ahead so that even the open boot-lid is not in my path.

I guess it is just a matter of convenience/inconvenience on a case to case basis, at least for the scenario you mentioned.

Personally, I would be more frustrated with the indicator stalk on the left side than the boot lid handle on the right.

Disclaimer: I don't have any relation with Ford, and have not owned a Ford car. This is just an opinion based on my logic.

Guys,
Please don't go that further. Looks like people will write screen plays and come up with a Short Film ..

Its just the matter of getting used to it. Ask any of the Ford owners how they got adjusted to the indicator stalk. Its completely on the other side of the car when compared with other brand cars. I got used to it. So does everyone who owns a Ford.

[karan561]

Found a pic online of the 2010 Ford Ecosport doing some more than mild off-roading;



^ will our 2012/13 version (4wd variant) handle this, i think hell yeah

[Auto freak]

Spotted an Ecosport this morning on NH45. It had no camouflage and even had the 'Ecosport' badge!
I must say the car has immense presence on our roads!

[benbsb29]

Karan, that is not an Ecosport. The Ecosport is an entirely new model for developing markets, IIRC.

[howler]

Originally Posted by benbsb29

Karan, that is not an Ecosport. The Ecosport is an entirely new model for developing markets, IIRC.

I think i can see "ecosport" across the front of the bonnet,

[naut]

Originally Posted by benbsb29

Karan, that is not an Ecosport. The Ecosport is an entirely new model for developing markets, IIRC.

Benbsb,

The pic that Karan posted is of the previous generation ecosport which was on sale in brazil. The one that's coming to india is the new version which is already on sale in brazil and has replaced the old model.