Purchased a demo 2002 5spd ZWT with 19k. The initial test drive was fine except for a slight drift to the left. They did the alignment, gave me the readouts and I was on my way. A year has passed and now have 45k on the car and have the following observations: No one can tell me why the car drifts to the left. the car turns right like a go cart, left like the Queen Mary. The alignment readout is equal on both sides the car performs better and gets better fuel economy with 89 octane fuel than it does with 92 or 94? I average between 9 and 11 liters per 100 kilometers (23mpg The 5 spd will occasionaly misengage. The sun roof requires a reset if the engine is turned off before the roof fully closes. Replacement tires are $276.00 Canadian each! I like the advanced features Radio will run for an hour on battery power. When the door is unlocked with the remote it will relock in 30 seconds if not opened. Windshield wiper will sweep 3 times when washer is depressed, wait 5 seconds then sweep 1 last time.
Well thats it....can anyone help with the alignment?
I can't help you with the alignment, but be sure to shop around for tires. Even in Switzerland I can get premium tires (Conti Sport Contact2, Michelin Pilot, Bridgestone S-03, Goodyear Eagle F1 etc), for my Focus in 205/50-16 for much less than 200.- CAD with taxes. The fuel economy seems a bit suspect as well, as I averaged about 8 when I rented an auto 2.0 Focus sedan in Canada, with mixed highway, secondary road and city driving.
If your tires are Firestone Firehawks, then that's your problem. There is probably nothing wrong with the alignment. If found the pull to the left, especially when breaking ended when I put on my winter Blizzaks.
my 2003 ZTW came with Pirelli P6 tires and from the first day I noticed a slight left pull when driving on a slanted roads dealer fixed the problem after 2 alignments
as for fuel economy......I'm getting a poor 13 litres/ 100km and I do alot of mixed driving. The poor fuel economy could be related to oxygenated gas but my dealer can't confrim this and insists fuel economy will improve. Car only has 2000 km.........hope he's right.
I developed a drift to the left as well, it was annoying so at my last oil change I had the tires balanced and rotated front to back. The drift mostly disappeared - very slight now. I'm only at 10k with my
2003 ZX5. The wide 50 series tires from Firestone are definitely NOT the best for straight ahead tracking. Another manufacturer or narrower tires would straight ahead track better BUT would have less lateral traction.
The Focus was designed for 87 octane. I have used 89 and 92 octane ethanol blend gas and the mileage did drop a little, but the car runs smoother with the 89 instead of 87. The higher 92 gas only dented the wallet more with no benefits. So for me I'll stick to the lower grades of gas.
I have driven more urban than highway and I've been running (9.5 l/100km) 29.6 mpg combined and maxed out the highway mileage at 43.1 (running @ 115 kph). The lowest urban driving (summer) mileage was
24.0 mpg and (winter) at 11.6 !!! Those cold February winters were murder on a brand new car....
You can turn off the auto lock function if the sound of the solenoids going off at 5kph gets to be too annoying. For me, that lasted only for as long as it took to find the instructions in the manual. My passengers jumped! when they heard them ka-lunk in...
They did that as a quick and CHEAP fix to a bad wiper design. The wipers collect water and dirt TDC of the windshield and then drips down to annoy you... What damn Brit figured out that was a good idea I've never found out. (My Focus was designed in Germany, engineered in Britain, re-engineered in the US, and built in Mexico and sold in Canada with the Canadian winter package).
Other features on my car that came as Standard but are extras on much more expensive vehicles from other companies: heated seats and mirrors, electric mirrors, tilt AND depth adjustable steering wheel, height adjustable seats, pollen filter, radio with automatic volume control, ABS, traction control and excellent handling (far better than any Civic I've ever looked at). Add to the fact the ZX5 has only a few real competitors in body style/utility (Mazda 5, Toyota Matrix/Vibe, Suzuki Aerio, others?). I LOVE this car... :-)
My minor quibbles with the car -- make the car 2" longer so I can fit
5' panels in easier and fit my clubs better without scratching the plastic, the wiper thing, engine a bit loud and coarse, the hatch won't stay up in -30*C weather -- this car needs to have some CANADIAN engineers take another look at these things not some stupid Brits. My 2000 Focus had a very quiet tic tic signal but the '03 has a louder AND funnier toc doc signal.
Oh and did I mention this car has a HUGE wiper fluid reservoir! I run half the year on one fill up!
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