2011 Lincoln MKZ Hybrid

[ Music ] ^M00:00:07 [ Background music ] >> Here it is, Lincoln's first Hybrid. This is the MKZ hybrid rolling out here at the 2010 New York Auto Show. You know largely sibling related to the Fusion and Milan which are well received already in the marketplace. Therefore it's the same under the hood contents as we've seen in Fusion and Milan which is to say a 2.5 liter inline 4 Atkinson cycle which is kind of a lean burn thing and of course coupled to an electric motor. Now they're not competing against Ford, that's all in the family. These guys are competing against those guys, Lexus, specifically their HS250H which they've been crowing about as the first luxury hybrid sedan. Well, now we've got this guy. Stack em up number to number. They are saying 41 MPG is the number on the Lincoln, that's 6 better than the HS250H. Also this guy can roll up to 47 miles a hour in electric only mode versus about 25 for that HS250H. For what it's worth those are kind of meaningless bragging rights on that EV run mode thing but you see what's going on here, a head to head competition for a luxury hybrid sedan. Now of course the Lincoln brand prints differently than the Lexus brand, kind of in the same universe but on different planets if you know what I mean. This car is a little larger and I would say prints a little more stodgy is too harsh but a little more conservative than the Lexus which is Prius based as you know just by looking at it. As far as cabin tech, it's the same stuff we've seen in other Lincoln vehicles nothing too surprising there. The Ford My Key technology so you can control the volume and speed for example when your teen is driving the car. This isn't really a car your teen is gonna want to drive, I mean it's a nice car, but it's not their kind of car so I'm not sure how much that translates. We're also looking inside here to see a new version of SmartGauge. More than just green leaves that grow on the dash when you drive efficiently there are also now also white flowers that will drive and they're more about the lifetime of the ownership of the car. Telling you how greenly you've driven over the long term, where the leaves are more short term, weird stuff. Keeping the green theme also, that wood you see in the interior is responsibly harvested from managed forests and that's chromium free tanned leather from the bridge of weir folks in the UK. Same leather they use on the seats in the House of Parliament. Now the comparison of the Lexus HS250H that matters the most, maybe price. This car in the non-hybrid form is about $34,000 on the market right now. That HS25H also about 34 right now but it's already a hybrid so Ford's gotta do a good job of bringing the hybrid technology in while not blowing the price over the top. [ Background music ] That we'll find out in the fall when it hits showroom floors. [ Music ]