I had one of the original Escapes. Seat bottom folded up against the front seat backs and the back seat back folded down. For more room, the seat bottom was easily removable. Twas a very nice arrangement, probably why they changed it.
That used to be very popular across manufacturers, but is much less common now. It could be that they changed for no reason, but it's more likely because they found out that it wasn't worth the engineering costs because not many people actually ever used the feature. (I know I rarely did because on a smaller car it impacted how far back you could put the front seat, it made it impossible to shove items onto the floor between the rear seat and the front seat, and I honestly just didn't care enough about whether the surface was flat to be interested in taking the extra steps necessary to achieve that. The only cases I can think of where a flat load floor is really essential tend to also be ones where the back of the rear seat isn't going to be a useful space anyway.)
All valid points in favor of discontinuing the feature. However, the removable back seat cushion pretty much negates them. It took all of a minute to remove and opened up a ton of storage. Even with the seat back down, you could stash stuff on the rear floor.
If course it can work, the question is whether enough people care to justify spending the money to make it work. Since nobody on this thread refused to buy the ranger because of the seat configuration it would seem Ford made the right call.
The new 6G Bronco, due out this fall/winter will share many components with the 6G Ranger, including interior foundations. They might have different looking seats, but I would guess the structures will be the same because of crash certification. And using the same basic seating for the two is better economy of scale. I just hope that they both have a fold flat design, Even though I don't flip my seats down more than once or twice a year, Its nice to have them folded flat when I do!
Yup. Ford made the right call on so many things. That's why you see so many of them out on the streets.
There are 263 million cars in the united states. Ford sold 90 thousand rangers last year. On average you should see one ranger in every 3000 or so cars. Happy hunting.Yup. Ford made the right call on so many things. That's why you see so many of them out on the streets.
While the back seat is a poor design and can be improved, it's still a 5% problem. I'm not going to dismiss the rest of the truck to spite the one thing that doesn't negatively affect the experience.Yup. Ford made the right call on so many things. That's why you see so many of them out on the streets.
I just keep gloves and bungee cords under the seat. I do wish the floor was more flat with the rear bench seat up. However, I bought a waterproof pet cover for the bench seat that fits quite nicely. Now I can just throw my ski boots on the seat or anything else that is dirty, like my brother-in-law. Good boy!
