It’s inevitable. The petrol and diesel engines are on their way out and that means bye bye manual transmission. Well, if you’re going to cheat on your gearbox, might as well do it with a hot new EV. Yes, Ford’s lifted the hood on the 2021 Mustang Mach-E, and gotta say, it does seem to have gotten a few things right.
Retaining the original look and feel
With the 2021 Mach-E, Ford still want you to feel like you’re driving a muscle car. It may have similar styling cues to the OG, but where mechanics are concerned, they’ve got nothing in common.
If only you could ignore the fact that it’s wholly powered by electricity, right? Not for the purists no, you’re probably yelling blasphemy at your screens and curling up in your GT350, but for the wider ‘greener’ public, this may be a reasonable alternative.
Something to call home about
One aspect that’s got us sitting up is a nifty little feature that Ford have called the Intelligent Range (minus fifty points for originality), which essentially monitors electricity consumption in real time.
The engineers took the concept of range estimates (how far you can drive on a full battery or tank of gasoline) and improved upon it. These improvements were necessary because while estimates work for fuel-driven cars (you can just pull up at any odd gas station when the fuel light’s on), it’s not quite the same for EVs. Charging stations don’t appear as frequently, and it does take longer to get to full charge, hence the need for a more accurate prediction.
Better accuracy
The Intelligent Range analyses electricity consumption and factors in driver behaviour (like stomping on the brakes), current and future weather conditions (this apparently has an effect on how far you can go on a single charge), plus data from other Mach-E drivers (shared with consent of course). Using this information, it predicts how much electricity the powertrain will use to complete a trip.
Say you’re one of those guys who likes to floor the accelerator (SMH) between traffic lights. Guess what? The Range will decrease. Conversely, if you go nice and steady with your acceleration, Range will increase or stay level. And you won’t miss out on any changes with notifications in the information cluster.
Worried that you’ll run out of electricity on the road? You can use our roadside assistance service to find a provider near you to bail you out.
Tech glory
The Intelligent Range joins other tech like the over-the-air updating system and hands-free Active Drive Assist in a series of impressive modifications for a different driving experience to what you may be used to.
As for the Range, future updates will review information stored in the cloud to analyse real-time traffic, road slope and elevation changes, and the temperature at the final destination before adjusting accordingly.
