Pet Peeves

[HenryMac]

Horns have sucked ever since airbags came around. I can give my '91 F-150 the lightest chirp at someone I'm passing. It's nice.

My 02 Tacoma had the entire air bag / horn actuator as a separate unit from the steering wheel itself. You could have your hand on the rim of the steering wheel, and use your thumb to blow the horn.

So it can be done....

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[UncleBob]

This thread seems to address three main complaints: sheet metal thinness, ride height and cruise control.

1. Sheet metal: I don't know how thin the metal is, but I got my first ding last night. I can't blame anyone as it was self inflicted when I open my door and hit the door against the mirror of my bride's car. Ouch! Now I have a ding just below the handle in the drivers door.
Grrrr!!!

2. Ride height: My ride is a little higher than the Sport Trac it replaced. Enough so, that it is annoyingly more difficult to climb into. It is almost to the point where I need to have one of the side step bars. The only problem is that is totally dislike the look of vehicles with step bars so I didn't order them. Now, if they offered a motorized step bar like was was (is?) offered on the Navigator, I might be enticed.

The standing ride height, coupled with the unnecessarily still suspension which causes annoying bouncing around (inside the cab, not the lane) is giving me pause as to question my buying the truck. I wish there was a softer suspension option for those of who aren't looking for a 'work' truck.

3: Cruise control: I really like the adaptive Cruise control ever since I got used to it on my bride's Sonata. There are a couple of issues tho. While using it and you are taking off after a stop, when you press resume to tell it to take over, it doesn't seem to actually begin to accelerate to the set speed until you lift your foot from the accelerator. I don't like that because first you feel it begin to decelerate because you took you foot off the pedal and then starts accelerating. I would prefer to hold the pedal at whatever rate of acceleration the pedal position and let the cruise control take over and I feel the pedal release tension from my foot.

Also, I don't like the ergonomics of the control buttons on the steering wheel. There is not enough tactile feel to the buttons to tell which button is under your thumb/finger. I am always having to take my eyes off the road to find the button I want. The on/off button is too close to the Cancel/Resume button. I am frequenting trying to press Resume and hit the Off button by mistake. The +/- buttons to set the following distance could stand to see some attention as to where they are placed. I find the button arrangement on my bride's Sonata much for usable and friendly.

One last thing on the adaptive cruise control. As you are most likely aware the adaptive control not only keeps your speed up, it also keeps you from over speeding on down hills. So naturally, it applied the brakes when you start to creep up in speed on down hill stretches. I don't know how far over your set speed it where it starts to brake but it sure does brake. During a trip last week in my brides Sonata, where it does the same thing, we were going down a long hill in the dark and I was noticing the third brake light on in my mirror when the car was auto slowing down and wondered "Am I frustrating the following drivers by my constant braking going down this long hill?". I finally switched out of Adaptive Cruise (they call Smart Cruise) and just let to coast to a little faster speed until manually slowing less frequently. I kept wish for a way to temporarily disabling the brake light. I was wondering the if Ranger acts the same was since can't see my brake lights while driving and haven't had the chance to use it on long downhill stretches at night.

 

[HenryMac]

This thread seems to address three main complaints: sheet metal thinness, ride height and cruise control.

1. Sheet metal: I don't know how thin the metal is, but I got my first ding last night. I can't blame anyone as it was self inflicted when I open my door and hit the door against the mirror of my bride's car. Ouch! Now I have a ding just below the handle in the drivers door.
Grrrr!!!

2. Ride height: My ride is a little higher than the Sport Trac it replaced. Enough so, that it is annoyingly more difficult to climb into. It is almost to the point where I need to have one of the side step bars. The only problem is that is totally dislike the look of vehicles with step bars so I didn't order them. Now, if they offered a motorized step bar like was was (is?) offered on the Navigator, I might be enticed.

The standing ride height, coupled with the unnecessarily still suspension which causes annoying bouncing around (inside the cab, not the lane) is giving me pause as to question my buying the truck. I wish there was a softer suspension option for those of who aren't looking for a 'work' truck.

3: Cruise control: I really like the adaptive Cruise control ever since I got used to it on my bride's Sonata. There are a couple of issues tho. While using it and you are taking off after a stop, when you press resume to tell it to take over, it doesn't seem to actually begin to accelerate to the set speed until you lift your foot from the accelerator. I don't like that because first you feel it begin to decelerate because you took you foot off the pedal and then starts accelerating. I would prefer to hold the pedal at whatever rate of acceleration the pedal position and let the cruise control take over and I feel the pedal release tension from my foot.

Also, I don't like the ergonomics of the control buttons on the steering wheel. There is not enough tactile feel to the buttons to tell which button is under your thumb/finger. I am always having to take my eyes off the road to find the button I want. The on/off button is too close to the Cancel/Resume button. I am frequenting trying to press Resume and hit the Off button by mistake. The +/- buttons to set the following distance could stand to see some attention as to where they are placed. I find the button arrangement on my bride's Sonata much for usable and friendly.

One last thing on the adaptive cruise control. As you are most likely aware the adaptive control not only keeps your speed up, it also keeps you from over speeding on down hills. So naturally, it applied the brakes when you start to creep up in speed on down hill stretches. I don't know how far over your set speed it where it starts to brake but it sure does brake. During a trip last week in my brides Sonata, where it does the same thing, we were going down a long hill in the dark and I was noticing the third brake light on in my mirror when the car was auto slowing down and wondered "Am I frustrating the following drivers by my constant braking going down this long hill?". I finally switched out of Adaptive Cruise (they call Smart Cruise) and just let to coast to a little faster speed until manually slowing less frequently. I kept wish for a way to temporarily disabling the brake light. I was wondering the if Ranger acts the same was since can't see my brake lights while driving and haven't had the chance to use it on long downhill stretches at night.

Some great points here UncleBob. I find the cruise control controls to be tedious. On my old '02 Tacoma they were so easy, on my Ranger they are distracting... I have to look for them since, like you mentioned, there is no tactile differences.

My Ranger down shifts for engine braking... but it does not apply the brakes. But I have an XL with the 101A package. Do you have the Ford Co-Pilot 360?

 

[dmeyer302]

One last thing on the adaptive cruise control. As you are most likely aware the adaptive control not only keeps your speed up, it also keeps you from over speeding on down hills. So naturally, it applied the brakes when you start to creep up in speed on down hill stretches. I don't know how far over your set speed it where it starts to brake but it sure does brake. During a trip last week in my brides Sonata, where it does the same thing, we were going down a long hill in the dark and I was noticing the third brake light on in my mirror when the car was auto slowing down and wondered "Am I frustrating the following drivers by my constant braking going down this long hill?". I finally switched out of Adaptive Cruise (they call Smart Cruise) and just let to coast to a little faster speed until manually slowing less frequently. I kept wish for a way to temporarily disabling the brake light. I was wondering the if Ranger acts the same was since can't see my brake lights while driving and haven't had the chance to use it on long downhill stretches at night.

If you want to let it coast just hit Cancel until you get to the bottom of the hill. Then Resume.

 

[Renman333]

Ok, I am getting used to the Auto Start Stop to a point. But when I really would appreciate it is at a slow crawl/stop. IE: Traffic crawl or even in a drive thru. It seem that it will not engage(stop) if you are constantly crawling/stopping. It has to go above a certain speed or Rev, not sure????

 

[t4thfavor]

its during the start stop crawl that i really wish it would never shut off.
and in all honesty, a 2 second delay would be appreciative so it recognizes you have stopped to wait, not just a stop and go situation.
annoying to pull up to a stop sign to have it shut off (or into the driveway only to have it cycle a start to be shut it off by me)

EPA probably only gives you 3 polar bear bucks instead of 5 unless you make it super obnoxious and obtrusive.

 

[Hounddog409]

How are you getting so many miles on a tank? I only get about 380

468 last tank. 4x4 supercab.

 

[Hounddog409]

True, the weight is placed upon the glass now, though the new Tacoma's lowered bed height affects that ease of sliding items through. I was not a fan of the lowered bed height, I found tailgaters would roll up closer to my arse than they did in the Tundra, or with this Ranger. I know a lot of guys like the lower height, and dislike the Ranger's bed height, each his own. At least we have a rear defroster in the Ranger with the sliding glass, my Tacoma had the powered rear glass window and no defroster.

The slider is for ventilation, not carrying cargo.

My go...you have a truck bed. Why would you have to stick anything thought the vent window????

 

[Hounddog409]

Almost hitting my head every time I get into it I need to really duck down and I'm not that tall...
*Dealing with my Ford dealer who makes everything too F*** hard > I sure Hope I have no issues with my Ranger as I have little trust in the dealer I bought it from.

6.1 and zero issues

 

[t4thfavor]

468 last tank. 4x4 supercab.

With my crew cab, I get 400-420 maximum, but there’s a fair bit of city in that.

 

[DHMag]

The home button on the steering wheel is not in the same position as it is on the screen. Upper right on the wheel, upper left on the screen.

 

[t4thfavor]

The home button on the steering wheel is not in the same position as it is on the screen. Upper right on the wheel, upper left on the screen.

In addition there’s no home button on the screen in CarPlay (that I can find) and on the lariat, there’s no home button on the steering wheel.

 

[Toytec]

468 last tank. 4x4 supercab.

That's super impressive. Looking forward to mileage figures like that. Same truck (coming soon).

 

[FX4Offroad]

I easily get 400 per tank all highway.

 

[AzScorpion]

I easily get 400 per tank all highway.

I've yet to run a tank all highway but a mix of 35% highway and 65% city I'm getting 385. Not bad considering the bigger tires and level kit.

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