Ford Mondeo 1.6 Ti-VCT Range Car Review

Facts At A Glance
Car: Ford Mondeo 1.6-litre Ti-VCT range
Prices: £15,695-£17,945 - on the road INSURANCE GROUPS: 9-11 [est]
Emissions: 175-182g/km [est]
Performance: [1.6 Ti VCT 124bhp] 0-60mph 9.9s / Max Speed 125mph [est]
Fuel Consumption: [1.6 Ti VCT 124bhp] (combined) 37.5mpg [est]
Safety: Twin front, side and driver’s knee airbags, ESP stability control, ABS with electronic brake assist
Dimensions: length/width/height 4778/2078/1500mm

TOO GOOD FOR MONDEO MAN?

Our Rating: 7.7 / 10

The Mondeo used to be the car for the common man. Looks like common man is getting ideas above his station. Andy Enright reports on the 1.6-litre petrol-engined models

It’s rare that a new car gets a virtually unblemished scorecard but the latest Mondeo 1.6-litre gets within a squeak of exactly that. Roomier, more handsome, better built and packed with features, the Mondeo has left its rather proletarian roots behind and absorbed some genuinely premium look and feel. The best bit? The prices haven’t marched upmarket with it.

You must remember Mondeo Man. He was the everyman, the no-nonsense bloke who brought Labour a landslide in ’97 and who represented the honest grafter just trying to get ahead. These days you don’t see too much of him. Perhaps it’s because graduates are now working behind the counters in Nandos whereas plumbers and plasterers now hanker after BMWs and Audis that the false promise of ‘education, education, education’ rather dropped the bottom out of the Mondeo man’s core market.

Ford’s response wasn’t predictable. Rather than stick to what it’s been doing well for years, the Mondeo has attempted to shin up the greasy pole a bit, offering the sort of tactility and soft touch, silicon-damped, deep pile quality we’ve come to expect from the premium brands. Even James Bond took a turn behind the wheel. Ford showed with the GT sports car that the Blue Oval badge was no impediment when a brilliant product was on offer. Now it’s the Mondeo’s turn to follow suit.

It helps to do a soft reboot and try to forget what you knew about the old Mondeo when it comes to driving the latest car. Not because it’s worse; merely because it’s very different. Throw it at a corner and expect that same pointy front end, the detailed feedback through the wheel and the sporty lack of body roll and you’ll wonder where the progress has gone. Instead everything feels polished, buffed to a sheen with glassy steering responses and a ride that’s wrapped in cotton wool. It’s not wholly sporty but, if anything, the absolute levels of grip and go are better than before. It’s when you’re not trying to corner the Mondeo on its door mirrors that it all feels so sublime.

Refinement is massively superior to the old car and even the base 1.6-litre car has ride quality that shames an Audi A4. Two engines are available, both four-cylinder 16-valve Ti-VCT units fronting up either 109bhp or 124bhp, depending on how deep your pockets are. Once you learn to trust the front end, handling is excellent with a very clever ESP stability control system. Given the car’s roadholding levels, the wide front seats lack a little in terms of lateral support.

Take a seat inside the car and you’ll notice high quality surfaces, materials and finishes. As with the outside, dynamic lines and styling curves are again evident, plus the low profile instrument panel provides very generous cabin space for front seat occupants. The dashboard is clear and the major controls for the electronics systems largely intuitive although the wood veneer finishes fitted to the Ghia models will have anybody under the age of 50 recoiling in horror.

The design team has also paid great attention to interior detailing, and examples of this include new generation infotainment systems, plus the next generation of Ford's Human Machine Interface (HMI). This easy to use system features the same steering-wheel toggle switches seen on new Galaxy and S-MAX, but introduces the availability of a large central LCD screen with full colour graphics situated between the main analogue instruments in front of the driver.

Rear seat headroom and legroom have also come in for scrutiny by the Mondeo development team and these have been maximized for occupant comfort and safety. I’m 6’4" and I was easily able to fit comfortably in the back seat behind a front seat virtually all the way back on its runner.

Ford’s old ‘pile ‘em high and sell ‘em cheap’ tactic has been replaced with a more responsible approach that safeguards residual values. Whereas the old car was initially offered at a relatively high price but with plenty of scope for negotiation, this time round Ford has slashed list prices by