Originally Posted by
ElbowJoe
I absolutely love my '03 Escape Ltd in the snow. Ford can call it whatever they want. It works!!
I have a general Escape traction question. A friend went on a UP fishing trip this past spring with this father in law who has an '09 Escape. He claims they parked on a small grassy hill and got stuck on the wet grass when they went to leave. He said they could not get the Escape moving due to the traction control system preventing any wheel spin. The system applied braking to wheels about to slip and limited the RPMs. End result is that the Escape would not move forward.
He said they could not find a way to turn the traction control off. I also have a fleet Chrysler Pacifica front wheel drive (really sucks - but it is free) and this happened to me during a recent snow fall. I ended up turning off the TCS and flooring it - permitting wheel spin to get moving. I would be surprised to find out that Ford did not include a way of turning off TCS for instances just like this. Perhaps someone could comment on this......
The '09 has a switch which disables the TC. Not sure what the '03 had in the way of TC, maybe marginal or none at all.
We just had about 8" of snow. They plowed the street but left the end of the street where it meets a main road untouched. It isn't bad turning right but turning right into the street is pretty deep. Returning home today, turning left into the street, a van was approaching the corner, so I was forced into the deep stuff. The front end dug in, the rear end started to come around and I had to turn into the slide to correct it. Not sure if TC was activated but this is how spinouts happen a higher speeds. Not sure what you guys are all raving about as I haven't been overly impressed yet.
My last two vehicles Ford 4x4 Rangers.