RSS Feed
April 17th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
2013 Ford Escape front-616
Click here to view this gallery.
[More from Mashable: Musk: Tesla Is a Success, on Some Levels [VIDEO]]
I used to think hands-free driving meant you keep your hands off your smartphone when hitting the open road. A brief spin in Ford’s new 2013 Ford Escape, however, taught me that sometimes it can also mean you don’t need to put your hands on the wheel, the door handle or a latch.
[More from Mashable: Tablet Sales Expected to Reach 120 Million This Year [STUDY]]
The new Escape, which is arriving at auto dealers in a couple of months ($31K for the fully-loaded model), is one advanced vehicle. It has the latest MyFord Touch 2.0, which is essentially a touch-friendly overlay for the Microsoft Sync technology. It offers a big 8-inch, in-dash screen that starts out divided into four panels for your connected smartphone, music, navigation and climate. You can switch among any of them either via touch or a physical control knob.
The updated MyFord Touch is, according to Ford representatives, slimmed down and simplified, but you can control most of it by voice (it understands 20,000 different commands), including adjusting the temperature, choosing which Billy Joel song to play and who to call on your Bluetooth-connected smartphone. “We know customers love their mobile devices and they’re not going to stop using them. We want to give them the systems in which it’s easiest to use,” Jason Sprawka, Ford Escape Brand Manager told Mashable.
The car is festooned with sensors, which help drivers pull into garages without hitting the wall, pull out of parking spots when they can’t see what’s coming in either direction, know if there is a car driving in their blind spot (a little amber warning light shows up in the passenger side view mirror) and, most impressively conduct a hands-free parallel parking maneuver (Ford just calls it Active Park Assist).
During a test drive around New York City, I got to see this feature in action. We pressed a small in-dash button, which tells the Ford Escape to start searching for a suitable spot. As we drove slowly along, the screen would light up telling us that the space we just rolled by would fit the SUV. We accepted the space, our driver lifted her hands off the steering wheel and then the Ford Escape took over. The driver did keep her foot on the brake just to slow the car down as it alerted us to passing cars on the right. The wheel spun back and forth as we rolled backwards into the spot. It was a perfectly-executed, automated parallel park.
The sensors have another purpose. They work in tandem with the Ford Escape’s key fob, which has radio sensors inside of it. When you’re near the car and you touch the door handle, the car recognizes that you have the keys and automatically unlocks. If your hands are full and you want to load the rear gate, you simply walk up to the car and pass your foot under the rear bumper. The rear gate (or hatch) opens up. Pass your foot under it again and it closes. Yes I tried and it and it worked smoothly.
Tooling around in the new 2013 Ford Escape that day, I felt like the future of driving had finally arrived — and I was anxious to move from the passenger to the driver seat.
Check out the gallery for an up-close look at My Ford Touch 2.0 and watch the video for a demo of active park assist and opening the rear gate with my foot.
This story originally published on Mashable here.
Related posts:
Views: 0
Posted in 
Tags: 
