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Gates latest Electric Vehicle Driving Experience for staff is underway and the first New All-Electric Explorer review is in! Technicianr, Daniel, took to the wheel and here is what he had to say about the experience!
I was given the opportunity to test drive the new fully electric Ford Explorer for 4 days, over the working week. During this time, I drove the vehicle on my 50+ mile commute to and from work, I charged the vehicle and got to have a play around with some of the settings and features - however I’m sure there are plenty more I didn’t get to experience!
The vehicle doesn’t have the traditional ‘stop/start’ or ignition feature and neither does it have the usual automatic selection in the centre console, or even a handbrake - so I was shown the vehicle and instructed on how to operate the car before taking it away for my test drive.
To begin with these adjustments seem somewhat strange, but very quickly you adjust to the simplicity of using the vehicle. When I returned to my usual car, MY vehicle then seemed strange to operate!
The Explorer has key detection which means it will unlock automatically as you approach it simply by having the keys with you. To ‘ready’ the vehicle, you press the brake pedal and hold it until the dash displays illuminate. Selection for driving gears are conveniently placed on the end of a control stick (adjacent to the wiper controls), whereby twisting the end of the stick forwards for forward gears or backwards for reverse - couldn’t be easier! Once you have selected a direction of motion, the vehicle releases the handbrake automatically and you’re off! Being a fully electric vehicle the drive is smooth, comfortable and quiet. Driving for long distances feels effortless and the vehicle performance is extremely consistent. It was an unexpected fancy feeling benefit to see info like current speed being projected onto the windscreen as I drove along too. When you’re done, twist the stick to neutral and the vehicle does the rest for you. Simply exit and walk away!
Personally, as a man with a family to transport; I found my young children to be excited and captivated by the sizeable and well lit interior of the car. LED elements placed around door handles (inside and out) were extremely helpful for the dark evenings of winter and the fun dash led added to the quality feel of the car. Having plenty of storage areas and large cubby spaces for storing snacks for the kids was extremely beneficial, along with being able to change the colour of the LED’s to suit.
We ventured off to our local Esso garage to try out the 150kw charge station which was simple to use and completed within around 30mins - just enough time for a coffee to us adults and to refuel the mini humans with snacks! The charge station is easy to use as seen in my video and rapidly fuels the vehicle to 80%. This can be extended to 100% however, the final 20% is completed on a slower charge to give the vehicle battery longevity.
As the vehicle was charging I took the opportunity to have a look around noticing the Explorer logo projected on the floor either side of the car which seemed like a nice modern touch and the LED’s on the exterior handles again seeming like such a simple but very beneficial addition, especially in darker nights.
The only downside to my experience was that when selecting features on the touch screen, I found the options to be menu’s within menu’s and during my short experience I couldn’t find a way to save my preferences. Therefore options such as eco mode, or lane detection needed adjusting to my preference each time the vehicle was turned on. Done at the start of each journey it wasn’t a problem however if you were in motion I would imagine it to be quite distracting setting your preferences on the screen.
Overall it was a fantastic experience and I can imagine taking the family out of long day trips to be very smooth sailing in this stylish SUV.
A big thank you to Daniel for sending us his review - we will be sharing more details of our employee experiences on the website and social media media channels very soon so stay tuned!
You can also put the New All-Electric Explorer through it's paces by booking a 48 hour test drive at your local Gates dealership! Book yours now by clicking the below button.