4DThinker

LOL. As one of six kids, and one who always had the pleasure of riding in the back facing 3rd row of whatever Dodge wagon my Dad had for a family hauler, I won't deny any of your claims. There was always one sister who HAD to sit in front with the parents or would get sick in any other seat. And rather than anger following cars with gestures, the usual goal was to get a wave or honk from them. Most would comply with a smile, as we must have been cute kids for my parents to keep us. Kids will throw up and it is usually because they are sick. They do it often enough in front facing seats now to prove that point. What WILL prevent rear facing seats are the safety regs. Every kid has to be strapped in with a 5-point harness now, It's amazing we survived at all, since I don't remember seat belts in those 60s era rear seats. We never had a booster seat for sure, but often the small ones were allowed to sit on the thick family dictionary for a higher point of view. I say let kids be kids. If your inclination is to shoot at kids in other cars that make gestures at you, I suggest you seek counciling fast.

If the designers could come up with a rear-facing rear seat like 60's era stations wagons had, and make it retro-fit into existing XLTs, they might have something. Access would be best through the rear doors. Best place for grade-schoolers to sit/play IMO.

That "saves money over its life span" argument is fine, but hard to swallow when there is $35,000 to make up over a gas model. Right now gas is $2.70ish where I live, but I'll offer $3.50 for this calculation. The electric TC will have a 70 mile practical range. Lets use 40 as the daily miles for 10,000 a year or so. My gas TC is getting 20.1mpg in town so far. We'll use 20. 40 miles at $3.50 each 20 consumes $7.00 each day. That 35,000 will run my TC 5000 days, or 13.7 years. If I keep either just 10 years (long for me) I'll have burned up $25,500 or so in gas, with $9,500 left for oil changes and gas engine related maintenance. Someone will need to provide maintenance cost for electric drive systems over 10 years. It can't be $0. Every penny spent to keep the electric TC running also increases its total cost. Electricity isn't free. Tires still wear out. Electric motors wear out. This is the same math hybrid vehicle makers have to deal with, and you don't see hyrbids being prices 3x the price of gas versions. $60k may see a few vehicles sold, but nobody will be "saving" money over the long haul at that price.

Great post. Welcome! I'm loving my TC too. My Wife had it all day yesterday for a video shoot, and the video crew was enamored of it. They started throwing their gear in it rather than their own sedans as they moved from site to site.

I wouldn't muck with the rear pressure, as it is 49 for a reason. The TC is tall and will hold 1600 lbs in the back. I'm sure the high pressure is to keep the TC from leaning over much in cornering. You'll also see your mileage go down.

Looks like it took a beefier pin to solve the original problem. I'll agree they are an aesthetic downgrade though. 4D

I had a bad case of alternator noise after they installed my small amp and rear speaker, but only through the rear speaker and not the front. Noise filters wouldn't solve the problem. I eventually traced it to interference on all the low level line outs provided by my Pioneer. The high power speaker outs didn't show have any noise. I solved it by having the installer use the high power outs and an adapter to convert them to line-out levels to feed my amp. After some reflation, I think it could have been solved with a DC power line filter, as the noise was clearly alternator hum that changed pitch as the engine changed RPMs, coming into my head unit through the 12v power feed.

60k is what I've heard before, and although the technology behind the electric TC is more expensive than that of a gas version, a 60k price sure sounds like they really don't want to sell the electric version. I don't mind paying an early adopter penalty, but at 3x the price of a gas TC I can hear Ford claiming "The public just doesn't want electric vehicles" when they cancel the program. How about trading me? I'll throw in my nearly new XLT wagon with a $1500 A/V upgrade and under 1000 miles, and offer another $25k cash for an electric XLT.

Have you got one to sell? If I hadn't already given up and bought a gas version I'd be writing you a check right now. The biggest problem I seem to have is location. I keep reading that the electric vehicles are being only sent to target markets (big cities) and my small midwest town is out of luck. I had to travel just to find the blue connects I bought, as my local Ford dealer was only getting van versions to sell, claiming they had no demand for a wagon version. I took my demand elsewhere.

I wonder if they make a rug for just just the cargo area behind the rear passenger seats in the wagon version.

It certainly looks like that PDF was put together by an engineer with no communication skills. I've seen the wire harness and back of the CD unit and don't think I could deduce what is intended within that document. Anyway, Good luck!

There are unused pins which may be for an Auxiliary in/out that connects to the external Nokia bluetooth module. Other than for the power/speaker pinouts I have no info on which of the other pins are what. Sorry.

I feel your pain, sort of. I had my OEM CD unit replaced with a Pioneer 7" nav unit and also lost the Aux-in capability. My unit had an Aux-in, but it wasn't available through the Pioneer wire harness adapter needed to connect to the TC's harness. What I got instead was an iPod/iPhone dedicated dock cable that does let me play music and videos off the iPhone when connected. I don't know the computer's wiring, but the AUX wires ARE available in the harness. It just may take a clever installer to trace them, pull them from the adapter, and connect them to the specific aux-in of your computer.

I've had my head unit replaced, and nothing has happened to the AC. Nothing related that I can tell, unless the installer tapped the AC circuit for your new unit. Shouldn't have needed to with the right wiring harness though. Yes, new door speakers and rears will help tremendously. I put Pioneer's flagship unit in mine, along with alpines 5.25" speakers in the doors and alpine 6x9s in the reat door panels.

something I discovered about my Pioneer head unit that may be a problem for other pioneer products: Mine has both amplified and line-level outputs for speakers. When I added an amp and rear speakers, we used the line-outs to the amp. The front speakers used the powered outputs through the TC's harness. With the unit on, the rear speakers produced a distracting buzz that increases in frequency relative to increases in the engine RPM. Alternator noise. - to try and eliminate this noise, we replaced my cheap old amp with a new modern one. Didn't help. - We ran a new RCA cable. The original followed the power cable to the amp. Didn't help. - We added a noise filter, once at the amp end and once at the head unit end. Didn't help. - Finally we abandoned the line-outs and used the rear speaker out from the Pioneer. We also added a speaker/line-level adapter between the head unit and amp. Problem solved. Noise eliminated. Apparently the amped side of the Pioneer is well shielded against noise, but the un-amped side is NOT. The noise was being picked up off the DC line feed to the Pioneer, and affects all line-outs. 4D

Welcome, Moviegourmet. Did you get a wagon or utility version? I've had my Blue XLT wagon for a month or so, and am still getting the long looks and questions about it. I've had a rear-view camera and 7" screened head unit put in, and backing up feels much safer now.

I'll add a vote for quick release rear seats. Folding them forward is nice, but when you need that extra 10 inches quick the two bolts holding them in are a pain. I've almost solved that problem with some engineering stolen from quick release c-clamps. I got some 3' and 4' nice bungie straps at my local target, and have found the seat child restraint attach points and latch bar are good places to hook to. Picture:

My camera is in. Photo: Image on the 7" screen is excellent. Wide angle view sees the road about 2' behind the rear bumper edge from the position I have the camera located. That area is angled down a few degrees, which is perfect for the camera.

My TC is nothing like a 4 door Saturn. It's an XLT Wagon with the rear seats and windows, and for personal use. No sports car, but more fun to drive than the Pontiac Vibe I trade in for it. If you like adapting your vehicles to your needs, I can't imagine an easier one to have fun with. I've mainly just upgraded the sound system with a nice nav/media uniit, new speakers including 6x9s in the rear doors, a monitor for the rear passengers mounted on the overhead shelf, and a rear-view camera. It would be easy to make it into a camper. There are two 12v sockets in the center console, and one by the rear door.

No AC problems in mine. Almost too cold on some days at the coldest setting. My TC gets parked in my garage overnight and while I'm home. As for the TC getting hot when parked in the sun such as on a big asphalt parking lot griddle, I've gotten into the habit of cracking the front windows down 1/2 inch or so. Hot air rises and leaves through the top of the windows. My old car had a sun roof, and leaving it slightly open would help tremendously. As for the acceleration delay, I've noticed that too. Blaming it on the drive-by-wire connection between the pedal and the engine. Was a little un-nerving at first, but either it's a rare happening or I'm used to it and not noticing it much lately.

Yea, I'm lucky to have a wife who's theory is buy the best available at the time you buy. The AVIC-Z120BT was also the only device I could find that had every feature I wanted already built-in. You'll be happy with any upgrade to the stock radio though.

I just had Pioneer's AVIC-Z120BT installed in my 2010 XLT and with the right dash kit and wire harness it fit and worked fine. You'll need all three parts show on THIS page.

Welcome, Groundstabber! Yes, its a good forum. All it needs is a few hundred thousand more members.

You can get a harness at Scosche Industries The one I got had the wire codes on the bag. Although it is for a volkswagon, it works perfectly in the Connect. LINK: http://scosche.com/products/productID/691. You may also want the dash kit and antenna adapter HERE: http://scosche.com/products/productID/1911

A small possibility is that RF interference might trigger the lock. Around my house there are so many RF devices it is scary. From Bluetooth to WiFi to Cell Phones to the garage door remotes, I'm surprised it all doesn't crash and burn in invisible RF flames.