The luck of our car rotation board has had me driving a variety of Ford vehicles for the past week, from one of their most modern designs to one roughly as old as dirt. It's been an interesting experience, kind of like driving a Ford timeline and tracking how far the industry has come in the last 20 years or so.
First up was the
Fusion Hybrid, a family sedan so good it now ranks as our top-rated domestic model in the category. Refined, quiet, and comfortable with or without the hybrid, the Fusion is fully competitive with market leaders. The hybrid powertrain is one of the smoothest and most transparent I've driven, and it returned 38 mpg at 70 mph with four aboard on a recent highway trip.
Next, I got the keys to the
Mustang GT. While the newly freshened ‘Stang is more polished than last year's model, it remains an unapologetic throwback to its 1960s roots – especially when compared with the Fusion. But the
Mustang gets away with it, striking a nice balance between retro style and modern livability and safety. It's also just unpretentious fun, and handily outscored the newer
Dodge Challenger and
Chevrolet Camaro in our testing.
My week rounded out with the
Ranger compact pickup, which has soldiered on with minimal changes since a decade before Chevrolet stopped building the Camaro in 2002. Inside and out, it looks and drives virtually the same as examples from the mid 1990s, including Fritz Kysar's. Who is Fritz Kysar, you might ask? We featured his truck in a story two years ago about driving vehicles past the
200,000 mark. At the time, Fritz had put some 488,000 miles on his, and many other motorists reported crossing the 200k milestone with their Rangers. Looking at his well-used truck, the body panels and even the pinstripes are the same on our 2010 Ranger. Unfortunately, so is the stiff ride, noisy interior, and skitterish handling.
True, Fritz managed to get a lot of miles out of his, and the simple, utilitarian design probably helped with that. But that doesn't make it competitive today. Just simple. Like dirt.
—
Jim Travers
