POWERSTROKE

Your four BLIZZAK tires make a HUGE difference over the factory installed Michelin's. I HATE Michelin tires! I picked up my Michelin shod S40 Volvo the week after I watched the 2005 US F-1 GP where six Bridgestone shod cars ran hot laps until Schummy won, Michael, not Ralf. The 14 Michelin shod cars hid in their garages because the F-1 Gods wouldn't change the track to slow the cars down.

Our first Edge had real touchy brakes, slightest tap of the pedal almost required a HANS Device. It was a late January or early February build car. In the almost 12,000 miles we put on it the brakes got less touchy and Wife & I both got used to it. Our water leak replacement Edge, an August build SEL has much easier to modulate brakes.

STUDY THE CHART SHOWING THE THREE POSSIBLE SHUTTER LOCATIONS! Location #1 has the greatest reduction of drag. That's where NASCAR crew chiefs put duct tape on grills for qualifying. Location #2 is where FMC put them, and drag reduction is about half of position #1 IIRC. I don't think position #3 had a percentage of reduction shown. All Ford's chosen location does is create a high pressure area right in front of the grill which in effect makes the grill appear to be bigger than it actually is to oncoming air. They should have mounted the shutters in FRONT of the grill so the airflow flowed smoothly, LAMINAR AIRFLOW, up over the grill, hood, windshield, roof, rear top spoiler, etc. If you would look under your Edge you would see a bottom cover under the engine to help reduce the amount of air getting up around the engine and causing drag, and establishing a flow pattern to evacuate hot air from under the hood. Only about 1/3 of the heat energy of the gasoline burned by a car engine is used to propel the car. About a third is expelled as hot exhaust. The other third is radiated out of the engine via the cooling system, engine oil, etc. You do NOT want that heat to accumulate. Ohhhh, spoilers, on most cars actually INCREASE drag, they are intended to reduce aerodynamic lift, which keeps the car's tires remaining firmly planted on the ground for maximum traction for acceleration, stopping & turning. As a FORMULA 1 race fan, a car with the lowest down force package can hit 235-240+ mph. Same car with maximum down force spoiler package can't even break 200 mph.

WOW, Now I'm happy for the stepper motor! One summer when I was in college I drove a 1966 White ready-mix cement truck that had shutters. All open or all closed, mounted right out in the front of the grill. The temp gauge never moved from normal operating temp. The quicker engine warm-up with an electrically operated shutter system is neat. I know for a fact that improves MPG, I've seen that every winter all winter with my pickups. But there's NO WAY a few square feet of naugahyde over the grill improved the coefficient of drag on a full size 4WD pickup! If Ford would have done a better job of making the Edge's front end aerodynamic and incorporating the shutters into that design, I could see coefficient of drag reduction induced MPG improvements. As a Formula 1 fan I HATE to use NASCAR as an example, but look what NASCAR crew chiefs do to the grills of their race cars for qualifying.....with duct tape.

That "technical paper" read more like a promotional advertisement. It seemed to promote the reduction of CO2, and it's structural attributes. And the shutter's ability to protect the heat exchangers from damage, and hasten cold engine warmup. From looking at the last couple illustrations, Ford put the shutters on the Edge at the LEAST helpful position for reducing coefficient of drag. And for those of us in areas that get snow, the shutter vanes being located right behind the grill will surely cause the shutters to ice up solid. Personally, I can't wait for my shutters to freeze up solid with snow/ice and kill the shutter servo, and then I confirm this $45 cost for the shutters mentioned above.... Think I'll use that opportunity to lighten the front end of my car by a couple pounds! Shutters & curtains were used on farm tractors clear back in the 1900's, 19-Teens & '20's to heat the engine & induction system up hotter to vaporize the heavier fuels like Kerosene & distillate, even oil, to allow it to burn more efficiently. It's 100 year old technology that's been computerized and made electrically operated. Sorry, But I'm not impressed. Dad used a burlap bag over the grill of his tractors in winter in the 1940's, '50's & '60's. I've had a winter front for EVERY Ford pickup I've owned since 1980, had to make the first one, they weren't available factory-made until about 1985.

My '96 F-250 I ordered out and waited 13 weeks for had the extremely reliable International 7.3L direct injected turbocharged engine. It has over 300,000 miles on it and still runs like new. My daily driver is a 2006 Volvo S-40 with the 2.5L inline 5 turbo engine, actually similar to the 2.0L EcoBoost except it has a 5th cylinder and a lower pressure turbo system, only about 10 psi so 218 HP. It has had a couple minor problems fixed under warrantee but has been trouble-free the last 90,000 miles. Both my turbocharged vehicles get oil & filter changes slightly sooner than the manuals recommend, the F-250 at 3000 miles, Volvo at 5000 miles. I'm not sure how many THOUSANDS of hours I've run turbocharged diesel engines but it's lots and lots! Turbo's on diesels at least are very reliable.

Never had a single hesitation or stall with our 3.5L '15 Edge. 11,500 miles so far.

I've run winter fronts on EVERY Ford pickup I've owned for the last 35 years. Effectively the same thing as your shutters, only nonadjustable while moving. You can see the effects of following a truck, the temp gauge goes up even with the reduced load of less aerodynamic drag. You also reduce cooling airflow. Ford has to assume that 245 HP engines in vehicles WILL BE REQUIRED TO PRODUCE 245 HP and size the cooling system accordingly. And under all sorts of conditions from fridgid arctic cold to hot tropical or desert heat. Vehicle moving at maximum speed or stationary. Still not buying the idea that shutters on a grill of an SUV will improve mpg enough to warrant the expense or increase in vehicle weight. Making the body out of aluminum like the new '15 F-150's would improve mpg of the EDGE ten or more times what the shutters ever possibly could! Also increase the MSRP too. But UPS has found out aluminum bodies do pay off in the long run. That's why all their package cars have had aluminum bodies for 50 years. A MILLION drops of gasoline is about 6.6 gallons. If every Edge saves ten drops of gasoline over it's life time due to grill shutters, 100,000 Edges would save 6.6 gallons of gas. Hardly seems worth the effort & expense.

Shutters were used on heavy-duty trucks back in the 1920's, 30's, 40's, 50's, & early 1960's to regulate coolant tempurature, also on construction and agricultural equipment for the same purpose. If shutters worked on the crude old diesel engines produced all those years ago they surely would work on the 3.5L V-6. The extrordinarily small increase in mpg that shutters would make from aerodynamic drag reductions would barely make up for the increased heat stress from drastically higher under hood temps. A 245 HP engine needs lots of cooling air whether it's a twin turbo 2.0L direct injection gasoline engine or a 900 cubic inch diesel engine designed & built in the 1930's or 40's.

Well, supposed to pick up our new '15 Edge SEL replacement Thursday night. Our '15 SEL was a January or very early February build and was picked up late May, never leaked a drop of water, had the recall performed mid-September, got 2 inches of rain one night two weeks later, had inch of water on driver's floor, had car repaired a second time, carpeting was damp after a light shower the next day. Dealer worked hard to get my buy-back approved. The new Edge has a couple options we couldn't find last spring, like navigation, power lift gate, towing pkg, and remote garage door opener. And it's a September build so shouldn't leak!

SON put homemade systems into his last three vehicles... He's on vehicle #4 now with no plans for a sound system other that stock. The best system was the Solo Baric 12" subwoofer in a homemade enclosure in the spare tire well in the '88 Mustang GT hatchback. Anything over half volume would rattle the aluminum siding on the house when the Mustang was in the shop 90 feet away. The enclosure was built to Kicker spec's and did NOT disappoint! I forget what his next subwoofer was, was 12" also, in a homemade enclosure replacing the center console of his '93 F-150 Lightning. The enclosure was just a bit smaller than it was supposed to be, like 1.1 or 1.2 cubic feet vs 1.25. It never performed like the Solo Baric. My advice, decide on 8", 10", 12", or 15" subwoofers, one or two or more, give them the necessary room Kicker recommends, throw all the power Kicker recommends at them and smile!

Mpg on our Edge since new, 10,000 miles, 3.5L V-6, SEL, 23.5 mpg, and I drive it rather hard. 75-80 mph on Interstates, keep the revs up around 4000 in city traffic accelerating. I'm actually surprised, I expected to be closer to 21-22 mpg.

Well, there's TWO FIXES we should all be concerned with. First, the one Ford supposedly implemented in assembly on April 28th and the second is the repairs all the dealerships do to cars manufactured April 28th and before. And I'd REALLY like to know if anyone with a car made April 29th or later has had leaks. I know for a fact the dealer repairs don't always work, and I am suspect of the plant's supposed fix as well. As an aside, I REALLY have to laugh at people calling the Edge a "truck". My '96 F-250 4wd diesel is a " truck", my Son's old 2006 F-150 Supercab 4wd FX4 was a "truck", the 1958 F-750 spreader truck I drove the summer of 1973 was a " truck". The 1978 L9000 or 1980 CL9000 tiltcab semi-tractors I drove sometimes were "trucks". The EDGE is a car, or a Crossover, but not a truck. I could agree that the FLEX or the EXPLORER are trucks, but not the Edge.

Our SEL AWD has no shimmy or shake up to 80 mph. Your issue sounds like a tire balance problem. Our Edge has 18" tires/wheels, Continental tires IIRC, Titanium's and Sports have 19 & 20" wheels/tires.

Further info, paid the dealer a visit right after lunch Monday 10-5, talked to sales mgr, never got a phone call in am, guy I talked to Saturday didn't leave the body shop mgr a note or message like he said he would, plus body shop mgr gone on Monday anyhow. But dropped Edge off Monday night, jumped in loaner car (base model Focus) and went home. Get call about 1PM Tuesday, Edge is fixed/done. Pick car up Tuesday late afternoon, 5:30 pm. Carpet still slightly damp, not replaced. Small rain shower Thursday afternoon. Wife buys a few groceries on way home from work. Leaving wet foot prints again. Carpet is very wet, not quite sopped, but light shower today vs Two Inches of ran last time. FMC & Dealer get one more shot at fixing it and it gets Lemon-Law'd! I'm getting tired of my car passing their water leak tests but any precipitation finds it's way into the car and soaks the carpet. Ford's built MILLIONS of cars, it's absolutely unbelievable to me that they built new Edges for 2-3 MONTHS with water leaks this bad!

The 2.7L is a lot different than the 3.5L. Different filter, FL-500 IIRC on the 3.5L, typical spin-on filter accessable from underneath. Cast aluminum oil pan with machine screw threads & o-ring seal on 3.5L too. Wish FMC would have made the oil fill and dipstick tube 2-3 inches longer, would have made under-hood service much easier. I did my first oil change myself at 4200 miles. Wife had a trip she had to make and I wanted fresh oil in the car, 5W-20 Mobil 1. Appears to be lots of similarities between the 2.7L and the 2.5L in-line 5 in my S40 Volvo, except the Volvo has cast aluminum oil pan and steel machine screw threaded drain plug. Cartridge style oil filter with o-ring seal on the cap. The '15 Edge is much easier to service than our '03 Mountaineer w/4.6L V-8 it replaced. Seems that FMC struggled with that serviceability issue for years. Like 5.0L Mustangs in the late '80's with two drain plugs, '90's vintage 2wd V-8 pickups with oil filters installed thru holes punched on frame cross members. Most serviceable engine I've seen is a "half-breed", my '96 F-250 4wd with International Harvester V-8 7.3L diesel engine. 3-1/2 gallons of oil from oil pan & filter drains into a 5-gallon bucket and I may splash a drop or two of oil on the shop floor from the filter or drain plug. I've done over 110 oil/filter changes in the over 300,000 miles on it. It was my daily driver for ten years, did an oil/filter change every 5-6 weeks. Oil and diesel fuel was MUCH cheaper back then!

I've driven 4wd & AWD vehicles for 35 years and NEVER had an incident. 2wd vehicles for 45+ years. Driven UPS package cars on snow & ice covered roads 4wd pickups couldn't negotiate. Driven semi-trucks on roads so slick you couldn't stand up on them. Please keep your unsolicited driving advice to your self. I've backed up more miles than you've driven!

AWD, for driving on roads so slick with snow/ice it isn't safe to walk!

Get the 3.5L with the life of the car timing chain.

Just because you had the recall performed don't for a second think your water leak problems are over. New February build '15 Edge purchased May 30th, no water ever leaked inside the car, recall performed September 17th, half hour in the body shop at most, two inches of rain early Tuesday morning 9-29, Wife drives the car a couple times and notices leaving wet foot prints when exiting the car. Feels carpet and it's sopping wet. Call dealer, body shop locked up, nobody in on a Saturday morning, talk to Service Manager. I'm not sure I successfully conveyed my frustration to him. I didn't find this forum until after We bought the car, if I had known then what I know now by reading these two topics about Pre-April build cars, No WAY would I have bought the car sitting in our driveway. Not even sure I'd have bought an Edge!

Ha-Ha.... Thermo-syphon cooling systems used to be common on farm tractors back in the 1930's and early '40's. Yes, it works, sorta, but is slow as heck! Still a good idea to let your turbocharged engine idle 2 to 5 minutes depending on how hard and how long you ran it. The small amount of coolant thermo-syphon would give a water cooled turbo bearing would extend it's service life. I always heard once you got things cooled off to 300-350 degrees F that coking wasn't a concern, even with dino oil.

I typically buy my gas at a Kwik Trip station. We have a lot of them around here. Their gas has one of the strongest detergent packages available in it. If I have a problem with drivability I run a can of Techron thru it.

I did my first oil & filter change at 4200 miles to Mobil 1 5W-20 and the Motorcraft filter. Wife was taking a long trip so I changed it! Car had burnt maybe a cup of oil, no where's near needing any oil added. 3.5L V-6.

It's actually pretty DISGUSTING how much plumbing and wire harnesses are required on today's engines. I thought things couldn't get much worse than the mid-1970's vintage pollution controlled engines. I was wrong! I'd put the covers back on and keep them on.