I've been pondering going with the 2017 because I want a certain look. what features stood out to you? just curious
Sure, let's start with the bad and end with the good.
Bad:
The transmission isn't as refined as I'd like. Sometimes clunky, lurchy, and sometimes doesn't do what my foot is telling it to do. After driving it for 3 months, I can work around those issues, and tend to just leave it in Sport mode while city driving, because the throttle response is tighter and simpler to predict. ZF-8 would have been ideal with the correct programming. Also the AWD, stability, traction control is noticeably inferior to the Audi. But that said, it's totally fine unless you are driving aggressively involving curves.
If I could go back, I would have opted for the 2nd row bench upgrade. I would lose the 7th seat, but more flexibility with being able to move the 2nd row seats forwards or backwards. The bench doesn't move and neither do the 3rd row seats. So it's a good decision to think through before you buy.
Also Ford was little too canny with their fancy 3rd row folding, deploying seats. You get a lot of cargo space with 3 rows because of the bucket well, but if you need more cargo space and need to stow the 3rd row, you have to move EVERYTHING out of the bucket well before you can do it. And vice versa... so it's a pain to switch unless you keep your car completely empty all the time.
The roofrack with sunroof only has 45lb weight limit (100lbs without), which is ridiculous. Also the car is so big, even putting the tiniest of ski boxes on top will make the car too high to enter many underground parking lots. For example, my car is 5'11" and my work garage has a 6'8" clearance, leaving me with just 9" of roof clearance. No carbo box is that short, leaving me with just considering a open ski rack. I'm sure the car can handle a larger capacity on top, it's surely just a center of gravity issue.
Gas guzzler, but it's a 7 seater. I also do a lot of stop and go city commuting. Also depending on trim, it's not going to matter much -- your fuel economy is going to be lackluster. It easily eats twice as much gas as my Honda Civic did for the same driving conditions.
Good:
I really like the Land Rover-esque exterior look. Definitely looks and feels like a proper SUV, with angles instead of curves. At first I looked at the Platinum trim because the exterior with the chrome accents looked amazing, but the interior was inferior to me. I didn't like the wood grain, nor the pleated leather seats. So going to the Sport trim gave me the nice red accent stitching and brushed aluminum. So on a purely aesthetics basis, I preferred the Sport in the end but there were certainly some tradeoffs, such as losing the chrome.
The 3.5L EcoBoost engine note is really nice, even nicer than the V6's of Audi, and I am a real Audi fan boy. This engine truly kicks ass. Quick powerful and fast when you want it to be. It almost feels wrong in a car this big, which makes it feel very right.
The Sync-3 System is quite nice and mature. Apparently way faster and more usable than the prior system. Boot times, nav calculations super fast, pinch zoom, UI responsiveness is as good as can be expected. Easy controls on the steering wheel and voice command recognition is quite good.
Explorer has a lot of interior connectivity -- USB and even physical power plugs for keeping the whole family charged on road trips, very nice. Even a plug in the back for say an icebox or a boombox. Lots of space to store things.
I consider the adaptive cruise control with collision assist braking an essential option. It'll save your sanity or save your ass -- or both. Cruise control is finally useful again. I can set follow distance and target speed and all I have to do is stay in my lane. It does a very good job of handling the rest for me. Just have to watch for edge cases like motorcycles straddling lanes as the sensors might not see him, and not recommended for windy mountain pass highways. Not practical for city driving, as it automatically disengages at low speeds.
I love the overall design of collision detection system. Unlike other cars, it won't automatically slam on the brakes when a freak mylar balloon flies in front of you causing the guy behind you to rear-end you. Instead, it just brightly flashes red dots onto your windshield so it's visually in your face, while it mutes any other audio while beeping at you loudly. It definitely gets your attention in all the right ways. If you are slow to react, it will calculate how much time you have before you collide and may pre-charge your brakes so if you do touch the brakes lightly, it'll apply the appropriate minimum force which could be maximum force. I get false positives from people in front of me turning left, and occasionally when taking an exit, but it's all good.
The stereo is fine. Mine only has the 380W version, not the 500W version, which is standard now -- something in Canada about a production date after July 21st or something, and has been an option in the US ones for a long time now. It's plenty loud enough for me. Loud for me is 50% volume. I don't have problems with audio rattles or cracking. But music source matters. Sirius XM has laughably bad streaming quality. Terrible bandwidth, worse than normal radio. Having my iPhone connected via cable or wifi is excellent, and streaming through Spotify is very good quality for me.
Interior room is excellent. I'm 6'2" and have no problems.
Also very glad to get the sun roof -- really opens up the otherwise dark interior. Closing the sunroof blinds makes it feel like nighttime inside.
It's a very comfortable car to drive in cities or on highways -- quiet, smooth, powerful, comfortable. High ride height is nice and tons of flexibility for people and/or cargo moving.
The cameras for backing up (and going forwards) are nice enough, but really would have preferred the surround camera systems that are in the Audis. This can be a difficult car to park. Also the camera washers are brilliant. I just have to use it basically everytime I back up. But it does a good job of cleaning the lense so I can see. The guided curved lines work very well.
Also came with remote starter built into the fobs, which I didn't even know about until I read the instruction manual. It has amazing range and works well. It's just nice that it's part of the native fob and not a dedicated key fob. Wish it would automatically engage the heated mirrors, but apparently I can't control that or figure it out. When getting in the car to start it for real, I thought it was turning off, but it was just started and quiet because of the fans going back to normal. While I compare a lot to Audi, this feature isn't even available as an option. You can get it 3rd party though... nice bonus point for Ford!
Folding, heated mirrors are nice, and touchless locks, auto headlights, etc... take it all for granted already.
Last but not least, because the police interceptor is so popular, my "smoked quartz" aka "almost black" car looks like a cop car so people frequently get out of my lane, which is a nice perk. Smoked Quartz looks amazing in person but looks terrible on the configurator and it's a new color for 2017.
Bang for the Buck Deal:
What made me pull the trigger overall was in Canada there were luxury tax issues to consider and I was able to get just below that $55k pre-tax threshold with the Sport, plus there were some great deals with Employee Pricing & Costco deal -- saved over $6000 off MSRP. Out the door after taxes/fees was a little under $60k CAD, while an equivalent spec Audi Q7 was going to cost me $90k CAD. I was also able to secure 1.9% financing over 4 years at the same time as the discount. Financing cars is generally more expensive with less options in Canada compared to the US. If I got the Audi, my finance rate would have been 3.9%.
I also purchased an extended 10 year, 120,000 km bumper-to-bumper warranty for an extra $2900 for total piece of mind.
No regrets, no problems. Loving driving this car every day!