Ford gives top-selling Focus a major makeover

9:03 am, February 24, 2014

FORD’s top-selling Focus has been given an extensive make over to make it as premium as ever before.

The Blue Oval has restyled the looks, updated the interior and added new technology to maintain the car’s position as Britain’s best-selling family hatchback.

The 2014 New Focus receives Ford’s new corporate face with a slatted grille, slimmer headlamps and a new bonnet to give a lower and wider appearance.

To the rear the previously oversized lights have shrunk and there’s a slightly altered boot lid.

The inside has received a big makeover too. Gone is the old Focus’ fiddly centre stack and in its place is a much clearer and easier to use arrangement. The stack is dominated by a new eight-inch touchscreen which handles all the usual features such as sat-nav, Bluetooth, air conditioning and Ford’s clever MyKey. New Focus also debuts Ford’s new Sync2 system which has 3D mapping and Michelin guides. The whole interface is really smartly designed too, with nicer graphics and colours.

Speaking of graphics, New Focus also gets easier to read dials thanks to clearer typography, better quality switches and dashboard plastics (some models even come with a leather covered dash and heated leather steering wheel) and a very VW Golf-like sliding compartment on the centre console.

Under the bonnet, New Focus gets a range of tweaked engines with the range boasting 19 per cent lower fuel economy figures than the previous car. New Focus also debuts Ford’s new 1.5-litre EcoBoost petrol engine (available in 148 and 178bhp guises) and a new 1.5-litre TDCi diesel engine (94 and 119bhp). They’ll also be a 99 g/km CO2 version of the clever 1.0-litre EcoBoost, and Ford also promises it has worked hard on making the already-excellent Focus handle even better with the 2014 New Focus.

There’s a raft of safety features available but the most nifty is Ford’s new hands-free Perpendicular Parking technology. It helps drivers reverse into spaces side-to-side with other cars, so embarrassing supermarket car park manoeuvres can be banished forever.