Photo: Ford
February 2015 saw the arrival of the Focus RS on the hot hatchback scene, turning it on its head thanks to a couple of reasons. But in April 2018, the Focus RS story will come to an end for a little while because the third-generation Focus is going away.
Production of the Focus RS, as per the Ford Motor Company, ends on April 6th at the Saarlouis Body & Assembly plant in Germany. This is the factory where the Focus RS is built for the entire world, from RHD markets such as the United Kingdom to countries where hot hatchbacks are coming back in fashion, places such as the U.S.
Introduced for the 2016 model year, the Focus RS from a four-cylinder engine with 350 horsepower and up to 470 Nm (347 pound-feet) of torque during overboost. A serious piece of equipment through and through, the 2.3-liter EcoBoost is teamed up with a good ol’ manual gearbox that numbers six forward gears.
The party piece of the Focus RS, however, is the Ford Performance-tuned AWD system. Developed to deliver “class-leading cornering speed, thrilling performance, and unbridled driving enjoyment,” the all-wheel-drive setup features a driving mode the Ford Motor Company incorrectly refers to as Drift Mode.
Instead of making the car drift, Drift Mode shuffles 70 percent of the engine’s torque to the rear wheels, then up to 100 percent of that get-up-and-go to either side of the rear axle. It thus enables torque vectoring, which with the right input from the driver, makes it easy to persuade the vehicle into doing the power oversteer stuff.
Working in conjunction with the electronic stability control system, Drift Mode knows how fast the car is yawing. As long as the driver’s inputs stay ahead of the Focus RS’ electronic brain, the system allows the hot hatchback to oversteer. However, failing to keep up with the yaw rate sees the ESC step in to take over control.
All in all, the Focus RS will be dearly missed once production in Saarlouis ends on April 6th. But this isn’t the end of the RS-ified Focus, for the fourth-generation model is up for the go-faster treatment as well. Can you imagine what’s the next step in terms of hot hatchbacks after this generation of the Focus RS? It sure is a tantalizing proposition for the Ford Motor Company to massage 400 ponies out of the newcomer, alright!
Introduced for the 2016 model year, the Focus RS from a four-cylinder engine with 350 horsepower and up to 470 Nm (347 pound-feet) of torque during overboost. A serious piece of equipment through and through, the 2.3-liter EcoBoost is teamed up with a good ol’ manual gearbox that numbers six forward gears.
The party piece of the Focus RS, however, is the Ford Performance-tuned AWD system. Developed to deliver “class-leading cornering speed, thrilling performance, and unbridled driving enjoyment,” the all-wheel-drive setup features a driving mode the Ford Motor Company incorrectly refers to as Drift Mode.
Instead of making the car drift, Drift Mode shuffles 70 percent of the engine’s torque to the rear wheels, then up to 100 percent of that get-up-and-go to either side of the rear axle. It thus enables torque vectoring, which with the right input from the driver, makes it easy to persuade the vehicle into doing the power oversteer stuff.
Working in conjunction with the electronic stability control system, Drift Mode knows how fast the car is yawing. As long as the driver’s inputs stay ahead of the Focus RS’ electronic brain, the system allows the hot hatchback to oversteer. However, failing to keep up with the yaw rate sees the ESC step in to take over control.
All in all, the Focus RS will be dearly missed once production in Saarlouis ends on April 6th. But this isn’t the end of the RS-ified Focus, for the fourth-generation model is up for the go-faster treatment as well. Can you imagine what’s the next step in terms of hot hatchbacks after this generation of the Focus RS? It sure is a tantalizing proposition for the Ford Motor Company to massage 400 ponies out of the newcomer, alright!
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