wh500special

This is an interesting thread and glad to see the bump bringing it to the top. Last spring we bought a used '08 Edge and noticed - even thru a record cool summer here in Indiana - that the AC system was far and away the worst performing system I have ever had in a car at bringing the interior temperature down to something reasonable in a reasonable amount of time. In my experience, I've never had a Ford that didn't have a good AC system - even our old clunker '83 truck cooled well up until the day it hit the scrap pile. It really shouldn't take any special fooling around to make an AC system cool the car down when placed in recirc or auto modes. There were days last summer when in St. Louis for work that I would get in the car at lunchtime to run and get something and would return from my trip 20-30 minutes later and still have a pretty warm car. St. Louis has New Orleans quality summers with oppressive heat and humidity and this car really suffers. This with the AC pumping wide open the whole time. I noticed the other morning that while the heat comes quickly enough that the defroster doesn't seem to sweep as much moisture out of the air as I expected on a cool morning. I think a trip to the dealer is warranted and I'll bring up the possible leaking hose (although I don't notice any rapid cycling of the compressor). My local dealer is wonderful by the way. This is a GREAT car and I'd buy another one again. But the AC system is definately not optimized for the task. Steve West Lebanon, IN

Thanks guys. I'm not completely unhappy with 14 mpg, but just wanted to do a little sanity check to make sure I was in the right ballpark. I backtracked the same route on the way home last night sans the boat and the trip computer revealed a little better than 24 mpg. Actual (fill up and do the math routine) was about 23. So the hit taken via trailering the boat is pretty hefty. That's OK though since I really don't plan to use this as anything other than an occasional tow vehicle. Tomorrow night I'm hitching up a little flatbed and headed to Indy to pick up a garden tractor, so we'll see how it does on that jaunt. i agree, this being more of a fwd/awd passenger car it just isn't going to be up to the task of frequent towing near its limit. I still need to mount the brake controller but will likely just stick it under the dash as PSU did. I'm already preparing to catch grief from the wife when/if she bumps a knee on it. But I think Tekonsha offers removable brackets so my investigate that as well. This car replaced my wife's '02 Escape and we are very pleased. It has better passenger space, a little larger cargo area, is much fancier, AND gets better mileage from a larger, more powerful engine. I'll admit MY first choice was a VW Jetta Wagen diesel, but I have really taken to this thing...never could have pulled the boat with the Jetta anyway. And there is sufficient room behind the front seats for my carseat sitting kiddos to not constantly kick the front seatbacks. The other two cars in my fleet are a '97 F250 LD 4wd (4.6L, E4OD) and an '06 Mercury Monterey (Freestar clone) van. I bought the truck new, it's never spent a night in a garage, and the age is really starting to show. But it's worth more to me to keep as an occasional use + tow platform that I will probably have it forever and at only 150k miles it still runs well. The Edge marks my wife and my 7th Ford since we've been married...unless you also count tractors and then it's nine. They've all been good ones and this Edge seems to be a good one too. Mom and Dad are currently looking to replace their Explorer with something a little smaller and seem to have taken a shine to our Edge and an Uncle's MKX. Only thing holding them back is Dad's 17' Deep V boat. But they have a pickup too. Thanks for the feedback! Much appreciated. Steve

I've been poking around on this forum for a while and finally decided to stop lurking and make a post...didn't see these topics covered yet so bear with me if they have. This spring my wife and I replaced our 160k mile 2002 Escape with a 2008 Edge awd. Our vehicle did not come with the tow package but I installed a 2" receiver and 4 pin harness promptly after bringing it home. Finally got around to towing my small fishing boat this weekend and have some questions. This is not my first tow vehicle. For heavy stuff I have my F250. But I intend to use this vehicle once in a while for my 16' aluminum boat (pkg weight ~1500 lb) and a couple small utility trailers with the largest having a GVW of 3500 pounds with electric brakes. Probably will never even knock on the door to the Edge's max capacity since I have the luxury of multiple vehicles and have this phobia of being caught overloaded... So, the questions: 1. WHERE have you folks who have installed brake controllers have them mounted? There really seems to be a lack of suitable spaces to hang one with the exception of in the little storage cubby at the front end of the floor console under the HVAC system. I like the Tekonsha Prodigy and will likely equip this truck with one of them. 2. I am reading reports of up to 18 mpg (or better ) when towing light loads. The other night thru IL on flat terrain with the cruise set on 65 mph (max, seriously) and a 5-10 mph headwind (I think the weatherman reported 7mph) I barely broke 14 mpg with my boat in tow. And this is a small boat the almost completely tucks behind the frontal area of the car. I ran with OD off since I'd rather preserve the transaxle than maximize fuel economy, but even when tinkering around I found that even when OD was enabled it would rarely go into the top gears. Should I expect better or does this seem reasonable? (The Escape needed the OD off to pull 75% of the time). I have been towing stuff for many, many years. This car doesn't even "feel" like anything is back there with the boat in tow and it has all kinds of reserve power, but it certainly made a difference in consumption. Our escape didn't take nearly the hit in MPG that this thing does (on the same roads every week I average 23 mpg during my weekly commute w/ no boat) and I have to admit I am quite disappointed that my larger 4wd V8 truck gets better mileage with the boat behind it than this thing does. In most cases it is the aerodynamic drag that a trailer exerts that impacts tow performance as much as trailer weight. My boat is pretty small (16' Lund Rebel, 72" beam, 500# hull weight, 245 ound motor, 300 pound trailer (guess), 300 pounds junk, + 200 pounds stuff to be conservative). But perhaps it catches more wide than I realize. Essentially, I'd like to hear a sound off on whether I am in the ballpark of what is reasonable to expect. If so, I can live with it with no worries. Being an engineer/geek I am a bit fanatical about maintenance/duty cycles/appropriate expectations. But these results are catching me by surprise. Steve West Lebanon, IN