2013 Ford Fusion gets stop/start as $295 option

Ford Motor Co. is bringing its Auto-Start-Stop system to the United States, the first time it has offered the system in this country in a nonhybrid application.

The $295 option will be offered only on 2013 Ford Fusions powered by a 1.6-liter, four-cylinder EcoBoost engine, which Ford predicts will be the top-selling Fusion engine. The option will be available roughly a month after Ford begins producing Fusions in Hermosillo, Mexico. Job 1 for the Fusion is scheduled for September.

Stop-start technology, which Ford already has used on hybrids, saves fuel by shutting off the engine when the vehicle comes to a stop in traffic or at a red light. Ford estimates customers who buy the Fusion with stop-start will save $1,100 in gasoline outlays over five years of driving.

Ford expects 10 to 20 percent of Fusion buyers to take the option, a Ford spokesman said.

Ford has offered stop-start systems on several nonhybrid European models since 2010, beginning with a diesel-powered Focus. The European cars had manual transmissions. In a manual transmission application, the motion of the clutch pedal turns the engine on and off.

For the automatic transmission-dominated U.S. market, Ford needed a different solution. With Auto-Start-Stop, the engine stops when the driver depresses the brake pedal and starts again when the driver's foot lifts off the brake.

"It takes less than a second from the time the customer lifts their foot from the brake and the engine is ready to launch the vehicle," says Birgit Sorgenfrei, Ford's Auto-Start-Stop program manager.

Since automatic transmissions must maintain hydraulic pressure to keep their clutches engaged and ready to send power to the wheels when the engine starts again, Ford added an electric pump to the transmission, along with a beefed-up starter and a more robust 12-volt battery, Sorgenfrei says. The battery is supplied by Johnson Controls, which also supplies the battery for the standard 2013 Fusion.

"The key challenge was to make this seamless for the customer," Sorgenfrei says. "We need to make sure the response of the vehicle is according to customer's expectations."

Getting there involved more than just a few hardware modifications. Ford added additional software to make sure the car's normal electrical functions aren't interrupted when the engine is off. That meant making sure that the air conditioner keeps the cabin comfortable on hot days when the vehicle is stopped in traffic and that the radio console and instrument cluster don't shut down.

Says Sorgenfrei: "The software's got to make decisions on when to turn off the engine, when to turn on the engine. We want to be sure the battery is healthy."

By Bradford Wernle- Automotive News