Cargo capacity - get over it

It is interesting to me how much people obsess about the battery pack being obtrussive on our FFEs.

1. I am a drummer - I carry a full set of drums in may car with no problem. I roll in a hard golf club case that has all of my hardware into the cargo deck from the back seat. It is very heavy and its length is the entire width of the car - perfect fit! This is not possible with the Leaf - I noticed on my friend's leaf that the seat backs are soft so when they are folded down they ae not as durable.

2. I pile a large grocery trips worth of groceries in the back with the seat up. (no cargo management system in place) I just pop off the cargo cover and put it in the back seat - plenty of room.

3. Most of the time there is plenty of room in the back cargo area with the cargo management system insert removed. I took it out and never use it.

I would much rather have my upragded leather interior with the durable flat cargo deck - with the seats folded down, than the slightly more room found in the Leaf that doesnt work as well for my purposes.

Good for you. Just because it works for you doesn't mean it couldn't be improved upon.

jonessoda said:

Good for you. Just because it works for you doesn't mean it couldn't be improved upon.

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I don't think he said it couldn't be improved.

I think what he said was the FFE cargo space isn't as "compromised" as some would make it out to be. You can carry a lot and, in many ways, the configuration of the FFE cargo space may be more useful that the space in the Leaf.

And I think the "get over it" was aimed at the collective audience of people who poo-poo the minor limitations of the FFE cargo space (without having actually lived with it), not anybody in particular.

Sure. I guess people whining about other people whining always strikes a nerve with me.

It's a small car combined with new and bulky technology, so I just signed it off as part of the sacrifice of having an electric car. However, it would have been really nice if the battery was at the same level as the back seats folded down to allow for a larger flat surface. My Fusion Hybrid was that way (Bigger car, smaller battery though), and the largest thing I ever fit in there was a 65" TV in its box without having to do anything. Like I said in my Fiat 500e vs FFE thread, I was able to fit a portable AC unit in its container in my Fiat, which is significantly smaller than the FFE, that would never fit in the FFE. I guess if people are complaining, it's probably because other cars have done it, even smaller ones, so why not the FFE?

so - your Fiat only has two doors - in my FFE the back doors allow you to access the main cargo space in front of the battery pack. For most of My applications the four door configuration seems more usefull. You have to tilt the seats forward on the Fiat. When you do have passengers on the Ford they have their own functoning windows and doors. I am extremely clautrophobic in the back seat of 2 door hatches. Do you carry around a lot of big screen TVs? omg What bugs me the most is when people cop an attitude on blogs sites - chill

There have been much worse attitudes copped here.

I think we can take it pretty easy in this thread. The discussion has been fairly reasonable.

epaminondas said:

so - your Fiat only has two doors - in my FFE the back doors allow you to access the main cargo space in front of the battery pack. For most of My applications the four door configuration seems more usefull. You have to tilt the seats forward on the Fiat. When you do have passengers on the Ford they have their own functoning windows and doors. I am extremely clautrophobic in the back seat of 2 door hatches. Do you carry around a lot of big screen TVs? omg What bugs me the most is when people cop an attitude on blogs sites - chill

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What does the entry and exit of passengers have to do with what we are talking about? Nice red herring...

The point of me bringing up the Fiat (even though I have already said it), was that it is a smaller car and it still has a flat surface from trunk to seats, so why couldn't that layout been used in the larger Focus? That is completely independent of the number of doors and available functioning windows a car has. I'm still not sure why you brought that up.

It looks like from the reviews I have just been reading that the Fiat has some of the most usable cargo space in its class - interesting. It might be a good drum car. I had a friend that had a Volvo p1800 that actually worked well.

The doors were part of my deciscion making process when considering the cargo area. I found it easier to also be able to load stuff in the side doors as well as through the hatch.

So jonessoda are you a Fiat owner lurking on our FFE users group? Its fine but most of us here are owners and thus advocates more than critics of the car.

try this - unite with your people - lol:

https://plus.google.com/communities/115966269255866480388#communities/115966269255866480388

epaminondas said:

So jonessoda are you a Fiat owner lurking on our FFE users group? Its fine but most of us here are owners and thus advocates more than critics of the car.

try this - unite with your people - lol:

https://plus.google.com/communities/115966269255866480388#communities/115966269255866480388

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Oh, going for the personal attacks, now? Is that easier for you than a response to the discussion? You should check out this site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies. That's where you'll find the red herring I talked about earlier and the ad hominem you've bought yourself into just now. If you leave these things out of a discussion, you'll come to a resolution sooner, and fewer tempers flared.

I don't usually entertain personal attacks, but if you must know, I own both cars, so I feel qualified to speak on the positives and negatives of each.

epaminondas said:

Oh, going for the personal attacks, now?

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I didn't see a personal attack. Nobody called anybody names or disparaged anyone. He simply directed you to the Fiat forum. But, you are still welcome here too.

Please guys, let's keep this civil, and don't over-react. It is very difficult to detect tone and intention in text. Assume the best rather than the worst.

Ok you two, let's just move on. Wattsup has it right. It's easy to misunderstand text, let's not assume the worst about other posters.

wow - pretty cool that you own both jonessoda. You have a great day to day lab for seeing the differences good and bad!

WattsUp said:

epaminondas said:

Oh, going for the personal attacks, now?

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I didn't see a personal attack. Nobody called anybody names or disparaged anyone. He simply directed you to the Fiat forum. But, you are still welcome here too.

Please guys, let's keep this civil, and don't over-react. It is very difficult to detect tone and intention in text. Assume the best rather than the worst.

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I get very passionate in discussion (not to be confused with emotional), so it can seem abrasive. I do my very best to dismantle any argument, and I tend to be pretty aggressive about it. I can definitely see how it can rub people the wrong way, especially in a written format. I assure you that is not my intention.

In college I dated this girl who was really into speech and debate. So, naturally, she would practice on me by starting arguments all the time. Unfortunately, she was very good at it and I would get destroyed, even if I was right. So, I started studying up on techniques so I could have a fighting chance. Needless to say, we didn't date very long. However, to this day, I still practice some of those same techniques, and that was over 10 years ago. So, if you ever think I'm arguing like an a-hole, blame her.

epaminondas said:

wow - pretty cool that you own both jonessoda. You have a great day to day lab for seeing the differences good and bad!

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Yeah. Someday I hope to own more than one EV. Then, I can put stickers on each one that say, "My other car is electric".

WattsUp said:

. Assume the best rather the the worst.

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Agreed! It is way too easy to feel defensive and miss the point. There has never been a car I owned that was perfect in every instance for hauling stuff. Things are long, or tall or square or oddly shaped and didn't fit in one car yet did in another, even if the overall 'square inches' of capacity was larger or smaller. Heck, even my Ranger had its limits! The real question isn't the space, it is what do you plan to use it for? Mine fits grocery bags, ( but I did have to remove the 'organizer' to make the best use of it, like others have posted). That was a great tip. I can put the organizer back in for a level floor if needed or fold down the seats for more room there, so many possibilities, and if that doesn't work, I can find a different way to haul stuff, like maybe a hitch and light platform. really, it is just about being creative and working with the possibilities of any given car. Just like the side door use or the better capacity of a Fiat for certain items. Or the utility of a hard surface on the back of the seats to put things on.
So now we know both the FFE and the Fiat 500e have good utility for their size and have minimized the intrusions as much as practicable, given the platform used for both, so all is good!

WattsUp said:

Yeah. Someday I hope to own more than one EV. Then, I can put stickers on each one that say, "My other car is electric".

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This is an awesome idea.

I've recently been having to consider the FFE range, as I have a day trip coming up that won't allow for charging and so we'll have to take my wife's '03 CRV. A second EV - or even my next one - needs to have a minimum range of 150 miles. Daily charging is fine in most cases, and I really want to be all electric, but the occasional day trip of 75 miles with no charging is a problem.

Let's see - sort of back on topic - way up there somewhere somebody asked why the Fiat has a flat floor and why didn't Ford do the same?

Because Ford made a design decision - be able to manufacture their electric car on the same line as an ICE car. It was a choice they made. Everything else follows from that decision.

Why no flat or lower or bigger battery? Because there is no place else to bolt it into the car. They also probably saw a synergy in using the same or similar battery pack to other Fords. There are two packs in the FFE and the one in the trunk looks a lot like the one in they Energi cars.

That's the reason the pack is in the trunk.

Thanks Wattsup for diffusing that potential argument.

Another note on battery placement. Weight! You Don't put that extra weight behind the rear wheels! It must be over and forward of the wheels to maintain proper balance front to rear. On the Fiat, the wheels are right at the rear of the car so battery placement can be forward of the rear wheels. Tesla got past it by making the whole floor the battery. The leaf was designed as an Ev so also incorporated the battery placement, but the Focus is a bit of a compromise due to it's being a mass produced ICE vehicle that was reworked to accept EV battery packs and components. What amazes me is Ford was able to make a design that integrates so well that they can produce the EV in the SAME LINE as their ICE counterparts, rather than pulling an ICE car out and redoing it like say a Shelby was. I think Ford is the first to produce an EV alongside the ICE without adding cost to have a whole separate production facility. I find it an elegant solution and great design work to accomplish that! :mrgreen: