Ford Escape Hybrid Review

In any form, the Ford Escape makes good sense as an alternative to its much bigger brethren -- especially if, say, you\'re not going to be escorting home a couple of soccer teams and their gear. Seating up to five, it felt right at home zipping in and out of parking lots and easily carried a good amount of groceries and other stuff. It seemed just perfect performing the zillion and one other errands that moms and dads have to carry out to keep home and hearth running. Our test Escape also had four-wheel drive and did rather well in some moderate off-road work. People who are just getting into the sport utility market would do well to try out an Escape. Besides, at an overall length of 174.9 inches, you can boast that your SUV is the same overall length as a Porsche 911 Turbo convertible. Okay, so the Porsche will have a big advantage in acceleration, handling and other considerations, but it\'s the Escape that has more than 65 cubic feet of cargo volume and insurance rates that will be, shall we say, significantly lower. For 2005, along comes the full hybrid Escape. (See slide show.) It runs primarily on a gas-powered engine, in this case a 2.3-liter, 133-horsepower I-4. While it\'s assisted by an electric motor, the hybrid did seem a bit underpowered at times, such as when merging on to interstates or getting around slow-moving traffic (farm tractors, etc.) on back roads. It did feel like the continuously variable transmission and the little four were always giving you everything they had. The hybrid also sports an electric traction motor that assists the drive wheels, as well as a generator motor that recharges the batteries. A 330-volt nickel-metal-hydride battery pack is located beneath the rear floor. (Ford offers towing capacity up to 1,000 pounds.) The EPA rates the hybrid at 29 miles per gallon on the highway and 33 around town, again reflecting the fact that the electric motor does its best work in traffic. In all kinds of driving, we averaged 27.5 miles. That 29/33 compares to 19/22 miles per gallon in the base four-cylinder non-hybrid Escape. Ford also claims the hybrid can go more than 400-miles between fill-ups. And emissions are greatly reduced, with the hybrid producing about half the carbon dioxide, according to Ford. Our test Escape had the $595 (optional, but much desired) canopy and side air bags, but we wouldn\'t have shelled out $625 for outside cladding and related stuff or $1,850 for the navigation system. When you add in leather seats and some other options, the bottom line on our test hybrid was $32,450. Is it worth it? We\'ll leave that for the marketplace to decide. But with gas edging ever higher and, it seems, more people looking for a \"correct\" alternative these days, we think Ford should have no problem selling every Escape hybrid they crank out.