Video: 2018 Ford Expedition Review

acks capability and room like few cars from any body style seem to be able to do. Now in terms of passenger space, there's just a ton of it. Taller adults should have no problem fitting in the Expedition now with lots of space to stretch out your knees and pretty good adjustment range for the driver's seat. Seeing as this is a very similar cabin to what's in the F-150 pickup truck, there's tons of storage space. I mean, you can stash things up here on top of the dash, in this two-level glove compartment, up here ahead of the cup holders, in the cup holders themselves, on these two sort of bins alongside the console, and in the console bin itself. just tons and tons of space. Now, in terms of cabin materials, the Expedition has soft touch materials in all the important areas, where your arms and your elbows fall. Generally, everything's low gloss and nice to look at. There are some kind of rough edges and seams along certain parts of the interior in our limited grade test car here and Ford really needs to move past some of its parts bin pieces, things like really small buttons here for the climate controls and kind of a very rubbery, flimsy-feeling turn signal stock. Some other technologies that we really like, though. Ford's Sync 3 system, its multimedia system. Very simple, very easy to use. The roominess doesn't stop in the first row. This is the second row. I'm six feet tall and that's where I would sit to drive. Decent leg room leftover, good headroom, and a nice, high seating position. And that's with the seat slid all the way forward. If you slide it back, that's just an absolute ton of room. The seats actually split individually when they slide. and there's a dedicated set of latch anchors for parents with young children that need carseats. They can put the kid in the center seat and have this seat slid forward to be closer to mom and dad with the outboard seats slid all the way back for other passengers. Now, speaking of those outboard seats, getting to the third row is a cinch, thanks to seats in our test car here that just release forward at the touch of a button for sliding walk-in access to the third row. Nice, big gap here, little area here for anybody to grab onto. Can't ask for much more. You can't ask for much more out of a third row either. Now the Expedition's ace-in-the-hole in recent history has been an independent rear suspension. That means the floor can sit a lot lower than it would sit with a live axle in typical truck-based SUVs and what that means is that you just sit really nice and high off the ground. I've got tons of space now to actually not have my knees up in the air, which is often what you get in the third row for any SUV and good leg room leftover. That's with the seat all the way back. If you have the seat all the way forward, the middle seat, like it is right here, just tons of room left over. Certainly not a situation you'd ever get in a Chevy Tahoe or Suburban or a Nissan Armada. All of those have really tight, kind of low to the floor third rows, in comparison. In the Expedition here, with amenities like power reclining seat backs, air events, lots of USB ports, really, there's just not a bad seat in the house. (laid back music) Now that independent rear suspension can't hide the Expedition's truck-based roots, so you do get some shimmying and bounciness over really rough pavement, but overall, a fairly comfortable experience. The drive train is another strength in the Expedition. It's a 10-speed automatic transmission that pairs with a turbo-charged V6 engine. That's Eco Boost in Ford speak. Plenty of power, good, decisive shifting, as well. We loaded four adults in here with a week's worth of luggage, had highway passing power to spare. Now towing capacity tops out at more than 9,000 pounds. We've climbed 6% grades in the expedition with a 5,500-pound horse trailer attached. Don't go looking for that V8. This turbo six handled it all just fine. Cargo space in the expedition, 20.9 cubic feet behind the third row. That's comparable to what you get in a Ford Explorer behind its third row. You get the Expedition Max, that's an extended length version of this SUV, that gets you up to 36 cubic feet behind the third row. That's a 72% increase. No matter what, though, a huge dose of practicality. Check out what our test car has here. Second and third row head restraints that drop with the push of a button in the second row on the head restraint itself. The push of a dashboard button actually drops them back here for the third row. Really nice view out the back, when you have them all down and buttons back here from the cargo area that drop both rows for maximum cargo volume, with one touch of a button. You don't have to hold anything down here. You can drop them and walk away and get whatever it is you needed to throw in there. Very convenient. Big truck-based SUVs used to be all the rage, but smaller crossover models have really relegated them to specialty vehicles for people who need serious cargo and passenger capacity. The Expedition certainly does all of that well with a big helping a family practicality thrown in, but it's going to cost you. This redesigned starts at around $50,000. You get all the way up to an Expedition Max Platinum 4x4 and it tops out close to $90,000. The Expedition redesign here really is an extraordinary vehicle, but with pricing like that, you got to make sure you really need everything it can do. (laid back music)