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The last time the Chinese-market Ford Escort was seen, it had made its world debut during the 2014 Beijing Auto Show. Over the weekend, however, new official photos had surfaced.
CarNewsChina reports the Escort, originally due in showrooms Q4 2014, will instead arrive in January 2015. The new compact will retail between ¥90,000 and ¥120,000 ($14,510 – $19,347 USD), and will come with a 1.5-liter I4 driving 110 horsepower and 81 ft-lb of torque to the front through either a five-speed manual or six-speed automatic.
The Escort is underpinned by the current China-made Focus Classic, which in turn is based upon the second-gen Focus riding on the C1 platform. It will replace the Focus Classic, and slot under the current third-gen Focus.
17 Comments on “2015 Ford Escort Goes Sunbathing Months Before Showroom Debut...”
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It’s not bad looking (good DLO), especially for such a small car. I noted the door handles are too big though.
Agree. And I quite like the brown! (I know, I know…). I just returned from a trip to the UK, and saw several Focus cars in this gorgeous brown that we don’t get here – not Jetta/JSW brown, but perhaps a tad more metallic one. I really loved it.
In other news, I rented a 1.2l gas Corsa, which apparently makes 75 or 80 hp. I had forgotten about these. It did ok if you kept it 80 mph and never let go of full throttle, because if you did, it felt like you had to walk for five miles before getting up to speed again. I have never seen a more inconsequential case of “pedal to the metal.”
Maybe the door handles are just right and the rest of the car is just too small?
I know it’s not exactly the same, but the first thing that came to mind was the 2015 Sonata or Genesis. Then my brain woke up and I thought about the 2015 Subary Legacy. Is everyone moving towards the same front grille?
You’re not alone. I thought this was a Sonata at first. And the taillights seem very Optima or Mazda 6 to me.
Maybe because the Sonata and Genesis resemble the most recent version of the Ford Fusion? It’s that blunt nose, and the greenhouses are similar too.
That looks excellent, in my opinion. The color is lovely, and the proportions are great. They even got the union right between the fender, mirror-triangle and door cut-line, which is sure to make Sajeev happy. Why can’t we have this instead of that frumpy-looking Fiesta sedan (although I like the Fiesta hatch)?
I would like Ford to offer the Fiesta and Focus as hatchbacks only (since that is what they were designed to be), and the Escort as a sedan. Build it in Cuautitlan since the Fiesta is apparently moving to Thailand.
Works for me. The Focus sedan is also hideous, while the hatch is just the opposite.
The Focus and Fiesta sedans also have less than useable trunks.
This is a very good looking small sedan. The front fascia looks like a toned-down version of the 2015 Focus ST and it has a much nicer looking rear end than the sedan version of the Focus… Too bad it probably will never make it to the US since it’d cannibalize the low range Focus (or perhaps Fiesta sedan, since they’re the ugliest) sales.
I think the word is “stately”. It doesn’t try to accommodate for its small size with youthful, flashy styling gimmicks like most other compact and subcompact vehicles on the market. It just has simple, handsome and mature lines…which is something I really appreciate in a car. It’s the same thing that draws me to cars like the Audi A3 and Chevy Cruze.
Flashy sells! That’s how they sold the Focus:
http://i.imgur.com/EjtLm.jpg
Ford needs Jack to help sell this car.
I wonder if they’ll offer the 1.0 Ecoboost 3-cylinder as an optional engine.
Anyone else have trouble believing that picture? What is at the rear? Is the car placement on the ground realistic? In other words, is it photoshopped?
Those are “bumps” in the railing behind the car. Those same “bumps” also have murals painted on them; it is the murals that throw off the appearance of the scene directly behind the car. The car itself is the real thing, and the photos are real, though the background is not the best.
The front sail panel (what the mirror bolts onto) is smaller on the Escort than on the Focus (at least the part that is outside the window glass.) The rear doors are several inches longer, which moves the C pillar further back, and results in a smaller window in the C pillar. It also makes the entire car longer, which improves it’s appearance; I will stick to my guns for now and say the overall length and profile of the Escort will be closer to the Fusion than the current Focus.
The door handles are a little longer than the ones on the Focus; but the depression behind the handle is smaller than the one on the Focus; which probably means it also sticks out more.
Adding those few extra inches to the wheelbase and length does indeed help the appearance of the Escort; I like it as well. I mentioned on the Forum that I am working on a paper model of the Escort based on the patent drawings that were released on the web along with the photographs; here is a comparison of the side panel of the Escort model with the side panel from Kim S’s Focus (not Fusion, my mistake) model. (Kim S is a Japanese paper modeler whose models of Ford and other cars are great, and the scale is spot on.) If the link below doesn’t work, let me know, and I will trying something else:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/75105572@N08/14629500653/