riderdan
Member
- Joined
- June 26, 2011
- Messages
- 15
- Reaction score
- 0
- City, State
- Santa Clara, CA
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 2011 XLT
Last week I loaded up the family in our 2011 Explorer and set out from the San Francisco Bay Area to SLC Utah. The trip went great, and we were glad to have the Explorer as opposed to our old car.
Overall the Explorer performed well, including some limited off-road and dirt road driving in Wasatch Mountain State Park. The (non-AWD) Explorer handled the washboard-surface dirt roads quite nicely and was nimble enough (for a 4000lb vehicle) on the single-lane asphalt roads we were on. I did notice several times that the ground clearance is limited--at least once I checked as I slowly rolled over a medium-sized bump and the bottom of the vehicle was within an inch or two of the dirt.
Trip average MPG was 24.8. That included some very mountainous terrain on winding roads in the Park, as well as a good bit of city driving. The best tank-full an impressive 28.7 MPG on the flatter stretch of U.S. 80 between SLC and Reno. The best fuel economy seemed to come right around 72-74 MPH, significantly worse at higher speeds.
MFT/Sync worked well in general. We have an iPad set up between the front seats for the kids to watch videos on as we drive and used the Bluetooth audio to play the sound through the Explorer's speakers. We also have a USB drive loaded up with a few hours worth of kids music, which the little ones enjoyed. The turn-by-turn directions worked out well, and we were even able to find directions to an obscure restaurant using the "Find a business" feature.
I did experience two MFT glitches along the way. Once the system stopped responding and rebooted itself in the hotel parking lot, and once the turn-by-turn directions were dropped from the system while driving. Neither glitch was a serious problem, though both were annoying.
Overall, a great time and a great car.
Overall the Explorer performed well, including some limited off-road and dirt road driving in Wasatch Mountain State Park. The (non-AWD) Explorer handled the washboard-surface dirt roads quite nicely and was nimble enough (for a 4000lb vehicle) on the single-lane asphalt roads we were on. I did notice several times that the ground clearance is limited--at least once I checked as I slowly rolled over a medium-sized bump and the bottom of the vehicle was within an inch or two of the dirt.
Trip average MPG was 24.8. That included some very mountainous terrain on winding roads in the Park, as well as a good bit of city driving. The best tank-full an impressive 28.7 MPG on the flatter stretch of U.S. 80 between SLC and Reno. The best fuel economy seemed to come right around 72-74 MPH, significantly worse at higher speeds.
MFT/Sync worked well in general. We have an iPad set up between the front seats for the kids to watch videos on as we drive and used the Bluetooth audio to play the sound through the Explorer's speakers. We also have a USB drive loaded up with a few hours worth of kids music, which the little ones enjoyed. The turn-by-turn directions worked out well, and we were even able to find directions to an obscure restaurant using the "Find a business" feature.
I did experience two MFT glitches along the way. Once the system stopped responding and rebooted itself in the hotel parking lot, and once the turn-by-turn directions were dropped from the system while driving. Neither glitch was a serious problem, though both were annoying.
Overall, a great time and a great car.