Mondeo: Big. Steers nice. Lots of space. Looks nice. Cheap interior.
Diesel: Unrefined, especially at low revs.
Auto: Just don't.

Drove a manual one a few weeks ago (when merc was off road due to pothole
damage) and it was fine as long as you kept it above 2000 rpm, or there was
no go and risk of stalling. Now, with merc yet again off road due to pothole
damage, I have another, but this has an autobox.

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's higher
than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing, then
nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and vibration
can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it does. Or if you
drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd and drops back into
the low RPM range again.

Of course if it's wet when you do this the traction control kills the newly
found power and drops you back into the low revs, crawling across a
junction.

I can see the most useful feature on this car will be the side impact bars.
Right turns need forward planning and preferably booking weeks in advance,
overtakes need manual mode.




--
And remember kids, RAID is safe and the UPS never fails, and Cisco routers
never develop intermittent faults, and external hard drives never fail with
only a month's use, and the DNS is reliable and resilient, and the
mailserver is protected from all forms of attack, and the replacement UPS
will be reliable as the first one was an unusual failure. No one will ever
guess /that/ password, the aircon can't fail 285V is close enough to 230,
and the QoS on the PWan won't obstruct the tagged traffic.

"Tim S Kemp" wrote in message
. uk...
Mondeo: Big. Steers nice. Lots of space. Looks nice. Cheap interior.
Diesel: Unrefined, especially at low revs.
Auto: Just don't.

Drove a manual one a few weeks ago (when merc was off road due to pothole
damage) and it was fine as long as you kept it above 2000 rpm, or there
was no go and risk of stalling. Now, with merc yet again off road due to
pothole damage, I have another, but this has an autobox.

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's
higher than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing,
then nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and
vibration can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it
does. Or if you drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd
and drops back into the low RPM range again.

Of course if it's wet when you do this the traction control kills the
newly found power and drops you back into the low revs, crawling across a
junction.

I can see the most useful feature on this car will be the side impact
bars. Right turns need forward planning and preferably booking weeks in
advance, overtakes need manual mode.




--
And remember kids, RAID is safe and the UPS never fails, and Cisco routers
never develop intermittent faults, and external hard drives never fail
with only a month's use, and the DNS is reliable and resilient, and the
mailserver is protected from all forms of attack, and the replacement UPS
will be reliable as the first one was an unusual failure. No one will ever
guess /that/ password, the aircon can't fail 285V is close enough to 230,
and the QoS on the PWan won't obstruct the tagged traffic.

A very interesting review of a diesel auto and one with traction control.
You have put me right off. I have a diesel and the only vibration is at
idle,
anything else is fine. Mine has a 5speed manual box and I find it sits at
just over 2000rpm in 5th at 70mph. Unfortunately at 30mph 3rd feels
like it is the wrong gear at 2000rpm and 4th knocks it back to 1300rpm
so there is no acceleration and the car seems to vibrate more.
So a bad combination seems to be a diesel auto with traction!

Tim S Kemp wrote:
Mondeo: Big. Steers nice. Lots of space. Looks nice. Cheap interior.
Diesel: Unrefined, especially at low revs.
Auto: Just don't.

Auto Mondeos have always been hopeless.

I've not tried the new Mondeo diesel so I'm not gonna comment on it, but
it's a diesel so I wouldn't be buying one anyway.

As for cheap interior, the ones I've been in have been no worse than the
later ****hats. Comfier certainly. I don't like the ALBA-esque silver
plastics in anything, but the last Mondeo Mk4 I was in had the printed
wood option, which isn't much better...

--
Pete M - OMF#9

'78 Escort 1300 Sport
'99 BMW 318is Coupé


"It's an Alfa, it will go wrong, it will **** you off, why should your
Alfa experience be different from everyone else's.
Now get back out there and swear at it before something else breaks."

"TJ" wrote in message
...

A very interesting review of a diesel auto and one with traction control.
You have put me right off. I have a diesel and the only vibration is at
idle,
anything else is fine. Mine has a 5speed manual box and I find it sits at
just over 2000rpm in 5th at 70mph. Unfortunately at 30mph 3rd feels
like it is the wrong gear at 2000rpm and 4th knocks it back to 1300rpm
so there is no acceleration and the car seems to vibrate more.
So a bad combination seems to be a diesel auto with traction!

Not true, my own car (the mondy is a rental) is a diesel auto with traction
and ESP, I've had that for over 100k miles now and it's completely
different. For the price of this Mondeo you could have a 1-2 yr old low
mileage E class Merc like mine, which is as economical, smoother, quicker,
rear drive and doesn't suffer any of the problems the Mondeo does, and if
you consider that my car will (driven gently) change up at 1500 rpm it's a
testament to the engine design.

Ford have cocked up big time.


--
And remember kids, RAID is safe and the UPS never fails, and Cisco routers
never develop intermittent faults, and external hard drives never fail with
only a month's use, and the DNS is reliable and resilient, and the
mailserver is protected from all forms of attack, and the replacement UPS
will be reliable as the first one was an unusual failure. No one will ever
guess /that/ password, the aircon can't fail 285V is close enough to 230,
and the QoS on the PWan won't obstruct the tagged traffic.

"Tim S Kemp" wrote in message
. uk...
Mondeo: Big. Steers nice. Lots of space. Looks nice. Cheap interior.
Diesel: Unrefined, especially at low revs.
Auto: Just don't.

Drove a manual one a few weeks ago (when merc was off road due to pothole
damage) and it was fine as long as you kept it above 2000 rpm, or there
was no go and risk of stalling. Now, with merc yet again off road due to
pothole damage, I have another, but this has an autobox.

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's
higher than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

Is it possible that yours was faulty..? It did die today!

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing,
then nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and
vibration can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it
does. Or if you drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd
and drops back into the low RPM range again.

Whilst not great, it isn't as bad as all that.

Of course if it's wet when you do this the traction control kills the
newly found power and drops you back into the low revs, crawling across a
junction.

I can see the most useful feature on this car will be the side impact
bars. Right turns need forward planning and preferably booking weeks in
advance, overtakes need manual mode.

No, it isn't _that_ bad. And I expect it'll hypermile well, with the
aggressive lock up.

Or it could be updated out of it...

--
The DervMan
www.dervman.com

"TJ" wrote:
A very interesting review of a diesel auto and one with traction control.
You have put me right off. I have a diesel and the only vibration is at
idle,
anything else is fine. Mine has a 5speed manual box and I find it sits at
just over 2000rpm in 5th at 70mph. Unfortunately at 30mph 3rd feels
like it is the wrong gear at 2000rpm and 4th knocks it back to 1300rpm
so there is no acceleration and the car seems to vibrate more.

Not all diesels are bad at as low revs at that. I'll assume the JackH
position in defending the original 4-pot VAG TDI, which are quite frankly
****ing brilliant. I briefly had an Ibiza with that engine in (which Tim
picked up for me and drove it down to me at the junction point of the whole
space-time continuum, Leicester Forest East services), and it was stupidly
economical, definitely quicker than you'd expect, and pulled strongly from
about 1200rpm.

So a bad combination seems to be a diesel auto with traction!

Well, the wrong diesel auto. Never heard Tim complaining about his Merc,
and that's one of them.

--
"For want of the price of tea and a slice, the old man died."

In article , Tim S Kemp
says...

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's higher
than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing, then
nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and vibration
can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it does. Or if you
drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd and drops back into
the low RPM range again.


Is it broken? Is it the lame version? Sounds nothing like my TDCi 130
and that has 135,000 on the clock.


--
Conor

I'm not prejudiced. I hate everybody equally.

In article , TJ says...

"Tim S Kemp" wrote in message
. uk...
Mondeo: Big. Steers nice. Lots of space. Looks nice. Cheap interior.
Diesel: Unrefined, especially at low revs.
Auto: Just don't.

Drove a manual one a few weeks ago (when merc was off road due to pothole
damage) and it was fine as long as you kept it above 2000 rpm, or there
was no go and risk of stalling. Now, with merc yet again off road due to
pothole damage, I have another, but this has an autobox.

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's
higher than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing,
then nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and
vibration can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it
does. Or if you drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd
and drops back into the low RPM range again.

Of course if it's wet when you do this the traction control kills the
newly found power and drops you back into the low revs, crawling across a
junction.

I can see the most useful feature on this car will be the side impact
bars. Right turns need forward planning and preferably booking weeks in
advance, overtakes need manual mode.




--
And remember kids, RAID is safe and the UPS never fails, and Cisco routers
never develop intermittent faults, and external hard drives never fail
with only a month's use, and the DNS is reliable and resilient, and the
mailserver is protected from all forms of attack, and the replacement UPS
will be reliable as the first one was an unusual failure. No one will ever
guess /that/ password, the aircon can't fail 285V is close enough to 230,
and the QoS on the PWan won't obstruct the tagged traffic.

A very interesting review of a diesel auto and one with traction control.
You have put me right off. I have a diesel and the only vibration is at
idle,
anything else is fine.

Ignore him. Its either broken or, going on the number of accidents Tim
has, he can't drive it.

--
Conor

I'm not prejudiced. I hate everybody equally.

In article ,
says...
Not all diesels are bad at as low revs at that. I'll assume the JackH
position in defending the original 4-pot VAG TDI, which are quite frankly
****ing brilliant. I briefly had an Ibiza with that engine in (which Tim
picked up for me and drove it down to me at the junction point of the whole
space-time continuum, Leicester Forest East services), and it was stupidly
economical, definitely quicker than you'd expect, and pulled strongly from
about 1200rpm.

One of the director has a Fabia VRS, he left it at work for a couple of
days while off snow boarding, so I had to move it from the CEOs spot
when he got back from Holiday. That PD engine is very easy to drive.
Light clutch, no need to even think about bite, it just pulls.
--
Carl Robson
Get cashback on your purchases
Topcashback http://www.TopCashBack.co.uk/skraggy_uk/ref/index.htm
Greasypalm http://www.greasypalm.co.uk/r/?l=1006553

Conor wrote:
In article , Tim S Kemp
says...

Vibration at 1500-2000 rpm is awful on these engines, unfortunately that
translates to 50-70mph in top. By 3000 the noise starts to get to you.
There's not a "right gear" at 70, you want to be at 2500rpm but it's higher
than that in 5th and lower than that in 6th.

And sluggish??? The lockup is about 1500rpm, the boost doesn't kick until
about 2000 rpm. So you pull from a junction with nothing, then nothing, then
nothing, then whoosh. All the time wondering whether the noise and vibration
can get worse, which if you nail the throttle to the max it does. Or if you
drive like a granny it does as well as it changes to 2nd and drops back into
the low RPM range again.


Is it broken? Is it the lame version? Sounds nothing like my TDCi 130
and that has 135,000 on the clock.

Probably just what Tim's used to. Just tell him its not a Mercedes and
that a 1-2 year old Mondeo costs less than a new E Class and that
there's a reason for that.

--
Douglas