2021 Ford Mustang Mach-E: Is this the future of Ford's pony-car icon?

Welcome to the 2019 LA Auto Show and welcome to what is undoubtedly the most controversial car here on the show floor and probably the most important as well. It's the Ford Mustang Machi. I'm Tim Stevens editor in chief of roadshow got Craig Cole reviews editor parotia [UNKNOWN] because you got an early look at this car before anybody got to see it. I did, I saw it about a month ago and experts being a little bit generous, I tu. But I have a few stats on this thing that are of note. So I think we're gonna start out you know, the naming controversy. Yeah, I [UNKNOWN] Some [UNKNOWN] a big divide. Here. The biggest thing that people are talking about is not the range, not the power, not the cost. It's this pony on the nose. Yes, yes. Do you think that this is a Mustang? Does it live up to that pony car branding? Well, it certainly looks like a Mustang, it's got the three chambered tail lights. They've. You know, echo that on the headlamps as well, long, good they push the A pillars back. It's got some nice stance to it. Definitely. Absolutely. And going into the 21st century, I think you've got to evolve the Mustang brand. They've got to push it forward and this shouldn't be a good way to do that. It is a crossover SUV. I gotta admit I'm not the biggest fan of SUVs in the world but this thing It looks really good and ultimately you know this is a car with a battery pack in the floor. Mm-hmm You know, the battery pack is probably two to three inches thick, so that's adding hight to the car and ultimatly that's part of the reason why this thing is taller than a normal mustang. [iii] wouldn't be that much different than let say the GT 500. Exactly. But because we get that skateboard battery pack, that gives us some advantages. We've got different motor layouts in this thing, depending on which drive-through you go with. What are some of the options? Correct, yes, so the standard has a big motor at the back. The car is rear-wheel drive- Which is awesome. Right out of the gate, yes, just like a Mustang should be, right? Absolutely. Then from there, you can get a small motor up-front, which gives you, of course, all-wheel drive The GT models, they get two large motors. Yeah! Way more performance. That's the way to go, and we're talking 459 horsepower, is that, right? Something in that range, 0 to 60, mid-three-second range for the GT Sounds pretty good. And the base model will be a little bit slower, but no slouch. Should do the 0 to 60 sprint About six seconds they're saying. Mid three seconds, 0 to 60, that's just about as quick as the new GT 500 with that supercharged V8. So this thing should be a lot of fun. And because it's got a separate drive train, different motor front to rear, it can be really Torque vectoring front to rear. Active differential, probably breaking side to side. So despite this being a presumably very heavy car it should be a lot of fun to drive. Now that they put the battery in the right place so it should handle well. And because the battery's in the floor, the motors are front to rear, that means We've got some extra space frontier. That's right, nearly five cubic feet of storage here in the front if you will, or fruits if you're British grasp. They've also made this out of hard plastic and there's a drain in the bottom. You probably can't see it from where you're at now, but this allows you to put your muddy boots in here and you can close it out when you're done. Keep it nice and clean, rumor has it they're also tooling up a foam insert so you can turn it into a cooler as well. So you can do a little bit of reverse tailgating in your Ford Mustang Mach-E? Right. Which is a very lengthy name for this car. Again, it looks good, really interesting drive train layout. All those numbers are good. Let's talk about range Because again, that's impacted by which order configuration [CROSSTALK]. There are a lot of variables here. They're actually two different battery sizes that they're offering. One is about 76 kilowatt hours. The other is about 99. So there's a standard and an extended range and again, depending on configuration, estimated driving ranges anywhere between 210 and about 300 miles. So we're still coming short of, right now, the Tesla Model S long range, in the range of about 370 miles EPA. So we're not getting quite there. But ultimately the cost on this should be much more affordable than a Model S which makes it pretty appealing. Yes, they're talking between, what, 40 and $50,000 I think on that? Right, I think they said the top end GT will be just over 60 as I recall, which still puts it at least 15 grand less than a Model S. Long range. And the Model S, of course, goes way up from there. So that's pretty impressive pricing. The performance then should be pretty comparable to the Model S as well. I would think so. And I think the interior might even be a little bit better than Model S. What do you think? Shall we check it out? Let's go check it out. [BLANK_AUDIO] It's pretty hard to miss the most significant part of the interior here which is this giant touch screen, with maybe a little bit of Tesla influence going on here. Let's say a lot of bit of Tesla. This thing is 15 and a half inches corner to corner and obviously dominates the dashboard here. It's home to a new generation of Ford Sync infotainment system. They haven't really given it an official name yet. It's probably gonna be Sync 4, I would guess, but maybe they'll call it something special for the [UNKNOWN]. But it looks pretty good. It's got the same basic clean interface that we see from Sync 3 right now. Basically easy to use, and reconfigurable interfacable. Right now we've got navigation up top here, which actually is pretty responsive considering this is, I would say, pre beta at this point. Yes. Frequently used to come down here. My favorite part though is definitely this big chunky knob down here, is floating on top of the touchscreen which is pretty neat to begin with, Mm-hm Because on the display can actually be reconfigured. So as you go to each faction like this Yes Might control the temperature right now is controlling volume. It's a really cool idea. Absolutely, and if you notice these cards here, these change based on the driver. So let's say you call your spouse every day after work at 5:15. His or her contact card may pop up there so you have instant access to that commonly used function. Nice was going to have some of the Masters we've seen from Tesla with the touchscreen interface but also we've got the tactility here have a real knob which we like. And we get a real gauge cluster ministry military which is something that the model three and because this is an EV, we've got a flat floor which gives us some storage advantages inside here as well. Absolutely. And it should mean some good rear leg room which we don't normally talk about when we're talking about a Mustang. No, shall we give it a try? Let's check it out. All right. [BLANK_AUDIO] So here we are Pretty good. I've got a ton of head room back here. The glass roof definitely helps in that regard. Yeah, the one affords a leader their battery electric vehicle programs about six foot six. And he says he can fit back here and still as a couple inches of headroom. Nice we got a flat floor which is good so. USB port on the Type C. Mygoodness. Not too bad. Yeah, I think definitely you know, there are a lot of advantages when it comes to packaging for an electric car. When you put the battery pack down low, it doesn't mean you gotta sit a little bit higher. I feel pretty comfortable right now. Yeah, they've given us plenty of leg room, the seat was pretty well adjusted for me as a driver and lots of sprawling room. This is the first time I've been comfortable in the backseat of a Mustang. Very good point. All right, we gotta check out the cargo space. So let's go to the rear hatch. Let's see can I find the magic button there? There it is. You can also notice the tail lights are quite sculptural way they've really tooled those. Plus, you've got square folding seats. We do, right here about 29 cubic feet of storage space that you fold the backrest down, that just about doubles. 16. That's quite spacious and overall this vehicle is about the size of an i pace or an Audi E Tron, but it should have more interior room. Definitely, so we've got veterans here than Tesla more range then the Tron would I pace, potentially more performance as well, and more portability than just about any of those cars. That's pretty exciting. But there's a cash we gotta wait a little. Exactly, we don't know exactly when it's going on sale. Sometime next year, they're estimating they can build about 50,000 on them in the first year. I think their constrained based on battery production capacity. That's obviously a major element of this vehicles to buils these batteries as tough. And if youw ant the GT, you're gonna have [UNKNOWN]. Yeah, maybe like 20, 21 for the GT which is too bad cuz that's what everybody's gonna want. It's a Mustang right? Absolutely, especially in Grabber Blue that would be my choice right here. 100%. So ultimately a lot of controversy, a lot of talk, a lot of claymores which we love reading, we encourage you to continue to do so, but I think that ultimately I think this looks like it might just earn that Mustang badge. It's right in the sweet spot of the EV market I think. A lot of style, it should drive very well, the performance with the GT and probably the base model too is going to be pretty good. Yes how it drives absolutely, that is going to be the key and that we're going to have to wait a little. A little bit longer to find out. But Craig, thanks very much for giving me a walk around democracy. This is definitely the most significant car here on the show floor. And I can't wait to see what this looks like on the road. All right, that's what Craig and I think of a new Ford Mustang Mache. But we want to know what do you think? Is this thing worth the pony on the nose or should they be called it a next gen Do something like that let us know on comments, like us, subscribe and checkout the roadshow that come from Craig's full walk through the Ford Mustang McKee.