Everything I Loved and Hated About the 2023 Ford Expedition Timberline

This week, it's the Ford Expedition Timberline. The Timberline is Ford's off-road focused trim for its three-row Timberline SUV, offering upgraded tires, off-road ready software, and other changes for right around $87,000. It wasn't cheap, and there's a lot to talk about, so let's get on with it.

Love: Got stuff? It'll fit

This kinda seems like a no-brainer, which is why it got left out of the review. You can literally fit anything you want in the Expedition. While I didn't get to test it, Ford even offers an extended wheelbase version of the SUV. At 5'8", I am able to lie flat without my feet touching the bottom of the third-row seatbacks. It's impressive.

It also eliminates the need for a truck. Yeah, you might muck up the carpeting in the back of this thing if you put anything in it, but it'll sure fit. Most noticeable, aside from the ridiculous length, is the headroom. Even taller adults nearing 6 feet could likely sit completely upright with the seatbacks folded down. If you need to move things, the Expedition makes an excellent argument for itself.

Hate: Big enough to fit literally anything

This is not exclusive to Ford. This is just an avenue to discuss this point. I said it in my review: Ford is a business filling a need and providing a product. So is anyone making a car in this segment, and perhaps this is the eyes of a younger man wondering why people need more than a backpack and a small hatchback to live their lives. But I think the Expedition is part of a problem in America.

This is a problem that inhibits sightlines, and studies have shown you're more likely to kill a pedestrian in extra large trucks and SUVs. You can't see the person driving next to you a lot of the time. You can't park among them either. I truly believe driving a big car like this down the shopping strips of suburban America isolates us from each other and breeds small-mindedness. The world needs less of that. We need to be reminded other people inhabit it and that sometimes we have to be nice to those people by not taking every inch of road for ourselves. Perhaps Ford and others ought to stop making these, and instead of filling a need, should instead be telling consumers what they need.

Love: Raptor power

Without big cars, we wouldn't have the Raptor. And without that, we wouldn't have the 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6 that powers this thing. It makes the Expedition Timberline truly fast- faster than most cars you’ll encounter on a commute. It makes 440 horsepower and 510 lb-ft of torque. Yes, it's got to move more than 5,000 lbs, but the Timberline sure doesn't feel like it weighs that much when you stomp on the gas.

It even, in some very small ways, sounds like the Raptor. There's just a little bit of that trombone timbre in the car's voice, and I quite like that. Raptor models are loud, brash, and somehow even more antisocial than this huge SUV. Toning that down a little while keeping most of the power is quite nice.

Hate: Ford autosteer

Skip this one if you're not down for a rant about something very minor. I hate Ford's autosteer. I don't hate it because it is bad at steering automatically. In fact, it's actually pretty good at that, and you can tell Ford, as learned from BlueCruise, letting some of that trickle down to other systems. But it has not learned how to feel my hands on the wheel.

For whatever reason, and this is true of every Ford I've tested in recent memory, the wheel cannot figure out when your hands are on it. I don't know why. But the result is always the same- you end up shutting off something that Ford says is there to keep you safe and save you energy. So, you just use the other driver assist features, knowing you're paying for one that doesn't work. It's not great. Rant over.

Love: Vertical infotainment layout

I am so, so very late to the party on this one. Everyone was singing the Blue Oval's praises for this when the Mach-E debuted, but I still haven't driven one yet. Or any other models with Ford's new vertical infotainment layout. Tesla popularized it, and I see now why it's so popular.

Infotainment in a new car is at its best when it integrates smoothly with the most important piece of silicon in your life: your phone. So, the vertical layout makes a lot of sense. It's just win after win. You can see "further" up the road on a map, you can stack different interfaces in a more logical way, and brands save money by eliminating buttons. Still, give me climate control buttons or give me death. But that's a discussion for another time.