I think Ford has done a good thing by using a NA DI 2.0 instead of a smaller cube turbo engine.

Give it a couple of years and I bet alot of other car makers will follow this move.

Couldnt agree more with the comments about the ford dealers. I phoned up a dealership in SA to test drive an xr6 turbo ute and they said no worries. When i got there they had no idea i phoned and i ended up test driving a g6 sedan. Apart from the fact i found them quite rude, they were generally utterly hopeless and they lost a potential sale.
But getting back to the point in hand, The focus looks like a great car, pity i wont be test driving one!

I was very keen to upgrade our Golf Mk 6 and buy a Titanium but was concerned with the Wheels magazine review. They said the Titanium ride and noise level was spoiled by the 18 inch wheels and 40 series profile tyres. After having the same result with an XR6 a few years ago Im a bit reluctant to dive in again. I wonder if Ford reads wheels magazine and are thinking about offering the 17 inch wheels with the 50 profile tyres as an option.

I hope they are put together properly.

Would be great if anything actually played after the ‘sponsor message’. Or even if the ad played.

Ford dealers are the most arrogant, and incompetent dealers in the country, and Ford Australia must expedite some sort of a customer service program to address this.

I have attempted to purchase several Fords over the years, and the buying experience prompted me to go elsewhere.

I went into City Ford at Rockdale to purchase the XR5 in 2006. I walked around the car for 20 mins before someone spoke to me. When I finally got attended to, I asked the guy to unlock the car so I could check the boot space etc. He turned around, gave me a brochure, told me it was X liters, and said this car costs $44,000. I was shocked because the RRP was 34,990 + onroads. When I told him this, he turned away and sat at his desk.

I went next doors to Mazda and Plonked $40k on an MPS3.

Oh, and by the way, the new Focus Titanium is a one hell of a car!

Test driven both the diesel and petrol titaniums, both great cars to drive! Optioned with the Sports Executive pack, i don’t think there is anything that can top it for features under $40k. Steering and ride is great, not as quiet as i thought it’d be but definitely no worse than my SP25.

Dual clutch auto is much less terse at rolling speeds than the Golf 103TDI i tried out a few months back, although the Golf was more refined and had better punch. Anyway, the Focus diesel is definitely the pick, however we put an order down on a petrol with Exec pack/sat nav since it’l do under 10,000k’s a year and never make up the cost/don’t want to deal with inevitable DPF issues from 5 minute commutes through the week.

beautiful fuel filler cap? come on…

My wife and I have just bought the Focus Titanium sedan with turbo diesel for her car and have to say we were most impressed by the quality of the sales experience at McGraths Ford dealership in Belconnen in the ACT.   The sales guy, Stuart, was fully knowledgeable on everything related to the car and all its features and was able to answer all our questions.   We got a fantastic deal on our demo model (7k off list price) and my daughter has also bought an identical car with a family discount of 3k.   I had not driven a diesel before and was very surprised with how it drove on our test drive.   Whilst the quality of the Golf is better the Focus is not far behind and is certainly ahead on features, technology and value for money (particularly the amount of tech and capped price servicing way cheaper than VW).   The Focus has way more tech stuff than my Scirocco R, although it will never compete in the speed and looks department.   Probably my only real gripe is how shallow the boot is in the sedan, no esky is going to fit in there.