21/03/08

• Price19,295-£29,245
• We like...Smooth ride, huge space
• We don't...it's huge, and a sweat to drive in tight spaces

Load-lugging family Ford rides and drives as sweetly as every other Mondeo

Think of this not as an estate but as a Mondeo with a very, very big boot. That’s exactly how Ford has made it: just as fine to drive and smooth riding as every other Mondeo but with space enough to jam a sofa in behind the driver.

And that’s quite an achievement. Once you build a car that has serious load-carrying ability, there must be compromises. It’s difficult – and expensive – to make an estate drive and ride as sweetly as a saloon. Ford, however, has done just that. Whether there’s just the driver and a sandwich aboard or five six-footers plus their gear, the Mondeo has the space and toughness to cope. The base for a terrific estate is there in the saloon, which has a beautiful evenness in the weight and response of wheel, gears and brakes. The Mondeo estate, if anything, feels even better, loping along the motorway at the legal maximum, hushed and riding the bumps with a sureness most rivals can’t get near.

We know that spending over £24,000 on a Ford is crazy when, by its third birthday, its second-hand value will have dropped to just £8000. And its 222g/km of CO2 emissions will punch company car drivers in the tax bracket. Mid-range Mondeos make much more sense, whether you’re spending your own cash or the company’s, and the diesel ones are the very pick, to drive, for fuel economy and because they hold more of their value over time. Even so, settling into the leather-and-suede chairs of our range-topper feels tremendous and that 2.5 T motor is peachy: calm until you stir it, when it becomes one heck of a speedy hauler. Whether you’d want to bankroll its 30.4mpg fuel thirst is debatable, though.

The back seats are as comfortable as the front and, as they should, they drop neatly to create a flat floor and a long, square-shaped bay. The previous Mondeo was big for a family estate and the new one’s grown. It’s an enormous car now, so big that it feels a handful whenever you weave it across a congested car park. Even so, its chief rival, Vauxhall’s Vectra, is no larger outside yet offers more load space.

Still, the Mondeo’s big enough and, if you need to carry five grown-ups plus luggage, we can’t think of a better way to do it.

Why not search for a used Ford on motors now! We have thousands of quality Fords to choose from covering all models.

• Engines2.5, 5cyl
• Power216bhp
• 0-60 mph7.7sec
• Economy30.4mpg
• CO2g/km169
• Insurance groupsgroup 14
• EuroNCAP
• Airbags6
• Seats5

Motors.co.uk value verdict: