SA Road Tests

Welcome

This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. We drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under South African conditions. It also just happens that most of the vehicles we drive are world cars as well, so what you read here probably applies to the models you can get at home.
*To read one of our road tests, just select from the menu on the left.
*Please remember too, that prices quoted were those ruling on the days I wrote the reports.


We give the 2013 Ford Focus ST3 our undivided attention

No delicate plaything

Published in Weekend Witness Motoring on Saturday March 9, 2013

Tangerine Scream; it sounds like the title of a Travis McGee whodunit, but it isn’t. It’s the new signature colour for Ford Focus STs and is exclusive to the better-appointed ST3 version. In plain English, it’s a metallic rendition of Roads Department Yellow, but sort of sexier. On a hunkered-down Ford hatchback with attitude, it’s also a lot more in-your-face than any government appliance. It gets you noticed.

We drove a five-cylinder ST in August 2008. It was brilliant back then, but no manufacturer can afford to sit on laurels too long. The old Volvo 2.5 made way for a 2.0-litre Ford Ecoboost that makes 18 kW more power at fewer revs and 40 Nm more torque slightly higher up the range. The car also shed 30 kilograms. The payoff is that it’s three-tenths of a second quicker to 100 km/h, has seven clicks more top speed and, for fuel watchers, Eurotest combined cycle consumption goes down from 9,3 litres per 100 to 7,2. The CO2 number drops from 224 grams to 169. 

The metamorphosis lies in a different turbocharger, direct fuel injection rather than sequential, lower reciprocating mass in the engine, a new Bosch engine management system and an updated gearbox. It’s still a Getrag-Ford six-speed; an MMT6 (modular manual transmission) designed originally for a Mondeo diesel. The body has grown about 19 mm wider and 37 mm taller, while tracks have expanded by a few millimetres and the fuel tank holds seven litres more.

Whereas the old car gave you a choice between three doors with or without leather and sunroof; or Bluetooth and voice control in the five-porter, both new STs have five doors. The choice is in equipment levels labelled ST1 and ST3. Basic ST1 gives you sports suspension, torque vectoring control, six airbags, ABS with EBD, ESP and hill launch assist, manually adjustable cloth-covered Recaro seats, keyless start, cruise control with limiter and an onboard computer. Air conditioning is manual and the ICE system offers six speakers with Bluetooth, the usual plugs and voice control.

ST3 ups the ante to leather seats with eight-way electrical adjustment, keyless entry as well as start, automatic climate control and a Sony music system with nine speakers and a bigger control screen. There is also an automatically dimming interior mirror, automatic wipers and headlamps, folding exterior mirrors, bi-xenon headlamps with washers and the screaming tangerine paint job if none of the other schemes does it for you.

But enough of the sales manual: You sit in the deeply bolstered leather bound Recaros with their under-thigh extensions, rather than on them. The leather is properly draped and immaculately stitched. Recaro lettering on the seatbacks is a nice touch. Did we mention that they are heated? 

The hand brake, set for right hand drive, is a dogleg design that lifts rather than pivots. The shift lever for the six-speed Getrag is just the right length and placed exactly where it should be. Try a couple of dry shifts – it’s smooth and positive. Look up. Two deeply hooded binnacles house white-on-black tacho and speedo, while between them in a smaller pod, sit fuel and temperature gauges. On top of the dash, in a similar pod, are dials for oil temperature, boost pressure and oil pressure. Do you get the idea that this is a driver’s car?

Thumb the black button with its Ford logo and get on with applying your seat belt while the engine gurgles into life. Its sound has been engineered for enjoyment, while a resonating chamber pipes in the varying sound effects to keep you entertained on the move. Clutch in – it’s heavy, but you expected that. Take care letting it out, because this isn’t some delicate little plaything for urban housewives of either gender. The best approach is to take charge and show it who’s boss. It appreciates that and will reward you.

This thing is a rocket. Torque reels off seamlessly between 2000 and 4500 rpm, with power peaking at 5500. The energy feels endless and it pulls like a Sherman Tank (the real meaning of ST?) from almost nothing in any gear. Its steering self-centres strongly at low speeds but smooths out as velocity builds. The literature brags about taming torque steer, but unlike its competitors, the ST’s designers didn’t dial all of it out. If you use the box enthusiastically and treat the loud pedal the same way, happy little torque twitches are there to be enjoyed. It’s these little imperfections that make a good car brilliant.

It sits solidly on the road and it engages your senses. Bends are there to be straightened and the ST does that well. The grin factor on its own is almost worth the asking price, while its handling limits are beyond most sane people’s boundaries. Just live it.

Tangerine Scream - a brilliant colour for a brilliant car. Had old Travis known about these, he would have traded Miss Agnes, his scruffy blue Rolls-Royce hearse, in a heartbeat.

Test car from Ford Motor Co. SA press fleet

We drove the 2016 update here

The numbers
Price: R362 500
Engine: 1998 cc, DOHC, 16-valve, four-cylinder, turbocharged
Power: 184 kW at 5500 rpm
Torque: 360 Nm between 2000 and 4500 rpm
Zero to 100 km/h: 6,5 seconds
Maximum speed: 248 km/h
Real life fuel consumption: About 9,3 l/100 km
Tank: 62 litres                                                                                                           Trunk: 316 litres
Warranty: 4 years/120 000 km; with 3 years’ roadside assistance
Service plan: 5 years/90 000 km; at 20 000 km intervals

What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that every car reviewed is given my personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every test car goes through real world driving; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

I do my best to include relevant information like real life fuel economy or a close mathematical calculation, boot size or luggage space, whether the space is both usable and accessible, whether life-sized people can use the back seat (where that applies), basic specs of the vehicle and performance figures if they are published. In the case of clearly identified launch reports, fuel figures are of necessity the laboratory numbers provided with the release material. If I ever place an article that doesn't cover most things, it's probably because I have dealt with that vehicle at least once already, so you will be able to find what you want in another report under the same manufacturer's heading in the menu on the left.

My reviews and launch reports appear on Thursdays in the Wheels supplement to The Witness, South Africa's oldest continuously running newspaper, and occasionally on Saturdays in Weekend Witness as well. I drive eight to ten vehicles each month, most months of the year (except over the festive season) so not everything gets published in the paper. Those that are, get a tagline but the rest is virgin, unpublished and unedited by the political-correctness police.

Hope you like what you see, because there are no commercial interests at work here. As quite a few readers have found, I answer every serious enquiry from my home email address, with my phone numbers attached, so they can see I do actually exist.

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