kmarnes
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- July 28, 2016
- Messages
- 538
- Reaction score
- 53
- City, State
- Vancouver, BC
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 2017 Explorer Sport
Just got mine yesterday in Vancouver BC.
It seems I got lucky. I test drove in July, waffled about whether I wanted or not because I was still cross shopping and didn't pull the trigger because the interest rates in Ford Canada were 3.99%, even though the price was right. It came down between the Explorer and the Audi Q7. I ruled out each and every other 7 seater. Few notes:
I negotiated a 10 year bumper to bumper warranty for under $3000, which is transferable if I sell. If I total the car or trade it in, it'll be transferable to the new car. I opted out of the overpriced scheduled maintenance. It's literally double the price of AudiCare, which I find confusing. Although Ford does cover brakes... but brakes aren't that expensive to justify that difference.
Picked it up last night and finally got to spend some time with it. It is truly a nice car! For those that are thinking colors, I completely discarded the thought of Smoked Quartz. On the website configurator, it has this weird blue tinge to it, but in real life, it looks amazing. Super dark, almost black metallic paint. In certain light, you can see a little blue. But side by side against Magnetic Gray which was the color I originally wanted, it didn't look nearly as nice. So maybe someone else will see what I mean. I kind of wonder if that's how I ended up with it, because the color is possibly underated?
Also I deeply compared platinum vs sport, but ultimately chose sport:
Onto the pics:
It seems I got lucky. I test drove in July, waffled about whether I wanted or not because I was still cross shopping and didn't pull the trigger because the interest rates in Ford Canada were 3.99%, even though the price was right. It came down between the Explorer and the Audi Q7. I ruled out each and every other 7 seater. Few notes:
- Q7: Would have bought this if I could have afforded it. But out the door price after taxes was $90k CAD. The loaded Explorer Sport was just under $60k CAD after fees and taxes (before extended warranty).
- XC90: Beautiful car, amazing seats, horrible UX (touch screen for everything, lack of key driver controls), underpowered 4-banger engine with whining engine note, poor seat management, major reliability issues.
- Durango: Priced more expensive than Explorer with superior transmission, but don't think it was as nice. Worst possible reliability and depreciation, and ugly, dated exterior.
- CX9: Underpowered but cheap for mid level trims. Lower trims of CX9 compare favorably to lower trims of Explorer, but once you get to Sport/Platinum levels, the CX9 twitches with sadness on the side of the road. Different directions, CX9 favors fuel economy, while the Explorer favors performance.
- Traverse: Took one look at exterior and moved on.
- Pilot: Weirdly underwhelming and not a fun driving experience, terrible touch screen. Honda pooched the redesign and hopefully can fix it soon.
- Jeep: Oh wait, they don't make 7 seaters any more. I used to own a 5.7 Hemi Jeep Commander. That thing was awesome, but 9MPG in the real world.
- Yukon: Too expensive and dated.
I negotiated a 10 year bumper to bumper warranty for under $3000, which is transferable if I sell. If I total the car or trade it in, it'll be transferable to the new car. I opted out of the overpriced scheduled maintenance. It's literally double the price of AudiCare, which I find confusing. Although Ford does cover brakes... but brakes aren't that expensive to justify that difference.
Picked it up last night and finally got to spend some time with it. It is truly a nice car! For those that are thinking colors, I completely discarded the thought of Smoked Quartz. On the website configurator, it has this weird blue tinge to it, but in real life, it looks amazing. Super dark, almost black metallic paint. In certain light, you can see a little blue. But side by side against Magnetic Gray which was the color I originally wanted, it didn't look nearly as nice. So maybe someone else will see what I mean. I kind of wonder if that's how I ended up with it, because the color is possibly underated?
Also I deeply compared platinum vs sport, but ultimately chose sport:
- +No wood grain! This was very important to me. Red accent stitching and aluminum/carbon inlays is to my tastes.
- -Blacked out exterior. I preferred the chrome on platinum, but blackened look is growing on me.
- +It's weird, people are moving out of my way now when I drive.... not sure why.
- -Don't get the 500W stereo, but the 380W is good enough for me. In Canada the upgraded stereo isn't an option in the Sport.
- -Don't get lane assist. Don't get park assist. But I don't care about those features, and seeing I've never had them before, I will never miss them. Besides, now I have an awesome backup camera!
- -Don't get massaging seats
- -Digital dash is different. Sport has big center physical dial with left and right digital screens. It works fine, and is well organized, it's just different. That's kind of why I wanted Platinum at first.
- +Got under the luxury tax limit in BC with Sport. Platinum would have taken me over the threshhold and it would have added another $2k in taxes to the price. That won't apply to most other folks.
Onto the pics:
