Good day everyone,

 

I have a few questions regarding MK4. I plan to purchase a new car and MK4 Vignale is one of few options on my shortlist. I did own MK2 a while ago and was satisfied with it. I mainly plan to do longer road trips, driving within the city is a waste of time im using bicycle or public transportation so my only engine option is a diesel. Im mainly looking at 2019-2020 if it matters

a) Would you suggest 120 or 150hp one?

b) Manual vs auto gearbox? I have seen some complaints about auto one on this forum

c) are Adaptive LEDs worth it over non adaptive ones?

d) Any general issues car is likely to face? Software, rust, etc

 

Any advice is greatly appreciated :)

Very happy with my 1.5 ecoboost manual. Done 60k in it so far and touch wood no real issues. I’d steer clear of the 1.0L ecoboost engines to be honest. Lots of horror stories about the wetbelts failing early. The 3 cylinder 1.5 150bhp does have an oil pump wet belt but not the main one the 1.0L engines have, it has a chain. Expert Advice I’m getting is to replace my oil pump wet belt before the 126k that Ford advise so I’ll probably do that quite soon but other than being a bit cautious regarding ford’s overly optimistic estimates for belt longevity I would say the 1.5L 150bhp manual is a strong choice. Plenty pokey enough even when loaded. I have the adaptive LEDs and they are super bright. I also have used forescan to enable the fogs as cornering lights and to enable the rear sidelight leds as daytime running lights.  

forget to mention, unless you replace the stock battery with a decent one then don’t expect start stop to work! But to be honest that’s the same with a lot of modern cars.

i get a lot of different hire cars provided by work to drive and with the exception of a 2.0L diesel auto Passat GT, which was a rocket ship, I still prefer my focus every time. Although the Passat was quick and a fantastic cruiser my focus was more fun to drive. 
 

other bits I love:

theres a spare wheel

the parcel shelf cover fits under the boot floor

heated seats can go hotter than Hades

pan roof

adaptive cruise control. Use this every day!!

rear camera

bose sound system 

heads up display

effortless overtaking  

Supportive comfy seats 

another thing is that I think the estates look super cool and you hardly ever see them out there. They’re also really aerodynamic so unless you’re in tripple figures or at night in the midge capital of Europe, you hardly ever are guilty of mass insect genocide. Had a Tiguan once and after 60miles on the M40 I had to visit the services to scrape the bodies of the windscreen.

be interested to know other 1.5 150bhp ecoboost manual estate owners views but I love mine and will keep it for at least another 60k if I can.

 

 

Just seen you said you were considering diesel, so probably lots of the above isn’t relevant for you, but might be worth trying the 1.5 petrol, I think you’d be surprised how much you like it. I have a heavy right foot and got rock solid consistent 36mpg which is fine for me.

You’ll have battery issues with any Mk4 Focus, doesn’t stop the car working but stop start will rarely work if that bothers you. Keyless entry on some doors would stop too if it got very bad but if you can top the battery up every few weeks with a charger then it’ll be fine. 

30 minutes ago, SB active X estate said:

Just seen you said you were considering diesel, so probably lots of the above isn’t relevant for you, but might be worth trying the 1.5 petrol, I think you’d be surprised how much you like it. I have a heavy right foot and got rock solid consistent 36mpg which is fine for me.

I do not completely rule out EcoBoost, but i prefer diesel. 36 MPG in mixed conditions? Looks pretty nice then i would ve expected 150 PS petrol to use more than 7l/100, especially with city driving. 

 

Seats and good LED lights are certainly very important to me.  The Sound system on few Focuses i have marked is Bang & Olufson I would suspect its also very good - a solo ride with loud music at times relieves the tension 🙂  Ill note the car battery part - start/stop is not a deal breaker to me but if you stand near traffic light for 2minutes there is no reason for engine to stay on. Ty alot!

I have the 1.5 ecoblue diesel - "only" 120bhp but with 300nm of torque on tap it is very spritely - even towing a caravan! Put it in sport mode and keep the revs above, say, 1500 rpm, using the torque instead of revving the engine and it wizzes along quite nicely thankyou. A road overtaking (no caravan!) is a breeze. Exhaust noise around 2000-2250 rpm can be a nuisance at lower road speeds. I've seen an average of 72mpg from South Birmingham up to Gretna, dropping to 62mpg by the time we reached Letterkenny (with some pootling around around Stranraer waiting for the ferry). 50-55 mpg on a normal "around town" week. NB the trip computer is aboui 0.5 - 1.05 pessimistic, rather than the 5-8% optimistic that I'm used to on a Skoda!

Mine is manual - slow speed manouvering is a breeze, just using the clutch and footbrake and letting the engine do its own thing.

My stop-start has worked reliably so far since I kept pestering the dealership to do something about it about 18 months ago.

I keep a full sized spare in the boot - lose about 3" of floor height but its worth it.

2 hours ago, StarGuitar said:

I do not completely rule out EcoBoost

Please see a Doctor immediately  !!!! 🤣

I have a 2019 Focus Mk4 2.0L Ecoblue Automatic and it gets around 46MPG mixed driving.

I have my stop/start that has stopped working, it got quite intermittent when I turned it off when I didn't want the car shutting off, and then I turned it back on. could it be a battery problem or should I be doing a battery monitor reset, by pressing the rear fog light 5 times and then the hazard light 3 times or should I only do this when replacing the battery?

Thanks 

4 minutes ago, Tommi97 said:

should I be doing a battery monitor reset,

Absolutely not.

There are over 251 threads on the forum as to why Stop/Start doesn't work.

https://www.fordownersclub.com/search/?q=Stop start&updated_after=any&sortby=relevancy&search_and_or=and&search_in=titles

 

Thank you again, pal, I will also check the voltage and battery percentage and replace it if need be, but only when I get a new battery, will I then make sure it reset once fitted

I wouldn't touch a Ford auto with a barge pole.

If you want a decent auto get a BMW

1.0 isn't really powerful enough for Focus body so if you want Petrol go for 1.5, either 150 or 180 it doesn't really matter or Diesel go for the 1.5 Ecoblue 120, the 2.0 Diesel suffers with injector faults.

An early 1.5 Petrol will have the better rear suspension

Go for adaptive lights, yes, you'll know if they're adaptive, they'll have headlamp wash

3 minutes ago, DaveT70 said:

I wouldn't touch a Ford auto with a barge pole.

If you want a decent auto get a BMW

1.0 isn't really powerful enough for Focus body so if you want Petrol go for 1.5, either 150 or 180 it doesn't really matter or Diesel go for the 1.5 Ecoblue 120, the 2.0 Diesel suffers with injector faults.

An early 1.5 Petrol will have the better rear suspension

Go for adaptive lights, yes, you'll know if they're adaptive, they'll have headlamp wash

Ford removed the headlight washers in 2020 even if you have full adaptive lights. 

8 minutes ago, DaveT70 said:

I wouldn't touch a Ford auto with a barge pole.

If you want a decent auto get a BMW

1.0 isn't really powerful enough for Focus body so if you want Petrol go for 1.5, either 150 or 180 it doesn't really matter or Diesel go for the 1.5 Ecoblue 120, the 2.0 Diesel suffers with injector faults.

An early 1.5 Petrol will have the better rear suspension

Go for adaptive lights, yes, you'll know if they're adaptive, they'll have headlamp wash

Oh, and software. there can be glitches. If I had another MK4, which I wouldn't, I would update the software in every module to the latest level

12 hours ago, SB active X estate said:

Just seen you said you were considering diesel, so probably lots of the above isn’t relevant for you, but might be worth trying the 1.5 petrol, I think you’d be surprised how much you like it. I have a heavy right foot and got rock solid consistent 36mpg which is fine for me.

I do not have a heavy right foot and it's showing 45.3 mpg, happy with my car so far after 3 years, I wanted a car with a bigger engine than my motorbike had so went with the 1.5 150ps, I thought the 1.0 might be straining a bit in a Focus.

2 hours ago, alexp999 said:

Ford removed the headlight washers in 2020 even if you have full adaptive lights. 

Owned mine nearly 2 years and never noticed until you said that!  

15 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

Owned mine nearly 2 years and never noticed until you said that!  

Had mine 3 years and only just realised the parking sensors are forwards and backwards directional sound. So if reversing the sound is behind you, if pulling in the sound is in front. 

17 minutes ago, shawty1984 said:

Had mine 3 years and only just realised the parking sensors are forwards and backwards directional sound. So if reversing the sound is behind you, if pulling in the sound is in front. 

Unless it has an issue communicating with the ACM then it uses the cheap sounding buzzer from behind the dash for both. 

1 hour ago, alexp999 said:

Unless it has an issue communicating with the ACM then it uses the cheap sounding buzzer from behind the dash for both. 

Factory Park Assist uses the ACM to put the sound through the relevant speaker for the sensor

3 minutes ago, DaveT70 said:

Factory Park Assist uses the ACM to put the sound through the relevant speaker for the sensor

Yeah it's supposed to, but occasionally there is communication failure, or your battery is too low and it will use the behind dash buzzer as a fall back.

Just now, alexp999 said:

Yeah it's supposed to, but occasionally there is communication failure, or your battery is too low and it will use the behind dash buzzer as a fall back.

That'll be an ACM or PAM or IPC software issue, typical MK4

Just now, DaveT70 said:

That'll be an ACM or PAM or IPC software issue, typical MK4

I've had the same thing happen on the Mk8 Fiesta.

It mostly happened when the battery was low after washing the car and it had shut down modules to save power. First start up, it used the cheap buzzer, next time start back to using ACM.

I had more software issues with my Mk3 Focus than Mk4.

Have the 2019 1.5 (120bhp) diesel ST LineX and would i get another, NO.

Love the looks.

Car has plenty of umph to overtake easily, unless you're a speed freak. Getting about 53mpg average with a good mix of town/country and motorway.

The Start Stop will probably be OK if you drove the car every day, i've already had a second battery, worked for about 2 weeks, and it's only done 27'000 miles, still don't work!!

The engine is a tad noisy.

Various electrical gremlins that have been present since i got it from new, hill assist reports not functioning, weird USB port's get disabled, SYNC 3 hangs and needs to be reset (had this 2 times), collision assist pipes up every now and again with a false reading, SYNC 3 struggles with USB audio if you have over 20'000 tracks, books says it can handle 50'000, i would beg to differ! All have been sorted with an overnight ignition off cycle.

The interior plastics are cheap and easily break. The MK 4 also comes with its fair share of rattles when the sound system is turned up above 9!!!

The paint is wafer thin, bonnet easily chips just looking at it!

Metal is thin, lots of panel movement when washing.

Sportier models have lowered suspension, 20mm ish, causes the car to bottom out every now and again.

The sportier models can be a bit crashey on UK roads, this is down to the poor state of most UK roads. The alloys seem to be strong on the ST LineX due to a number of times i felt that a pothole had caused damage and the alloy seems to be fine.

I had most of those issues on my 2019 too.

Plus, Door seals hanging off

Bonnet release stopped working, I had to rip the handle and the trim off in the end

Woeful Halogen Headlamps

5 hours ago, alexp999 said:

Yeah it's supposed to, but occasionally there is communication failure, or your battery is too low and it will use the behind dash buzzer as a fall back.

Damn, I used to wonder why my parking sensors become irritatingly loud for no clear reason!

 

a) 150hp at least, or 184ps ecoboost if you can find!

b) My 8 speed torque converter auto has been flawless, the Focus is better suited for auto, way more than in the Fiesta.

c) They are fun and give the car extra personality, flashing the beams is slightly slower because the lens physically have to tilt up. Otherwise, a premium option that cars worth £10k+ more don't even have fitted, so very much worth it on your Ford - where you've hopefully already saved loads of money on the list price.

d) Just the OEM battery really. If you are blessed with good eyesight, the lines within the heated windscreen may bother you daily.

When you have adaptive dampening, adaptive cruise control with lane centering, the HUD, heated wheel; the Focus is an exceptionally good value car if you need the tech, to say the least, very difficult to beat on features for the price.

I have the 2 ltr diesel 150hp estate and am very happy with it.  Just did a 1000 mile run through France, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland fully loaded with luggage and 4 people and it ran like clockwork averaging just over 60mpg on the motorways without holding back too much. Not as economical as my old Mk 2 1.6 tdci but you can really feel the extra power when you need or want to use it.

I read about the various problems on here and think I will get a glitch one day but fingers crossed it hasn't happened yet, well except for the odd warning signal or low battery issue.  I was half thinking about selling it and buying a newer one so it would be under guarantee if anything happened but then I end up swapping a problem free car for a lemon and regret it.