In terms of tools, you’ll need an OBDLink EX cable. Designed to work with FORScan coding software, it seems to be worth the premium over cheaper cables. After all, accidentally bricking a control unit while writing is a lot more expensive than just buying a better cable. Next, it’s time to remove and strip the steering wheel to install the new buttons. It’s not a terribly difficult procedure, just a bit of a fiddly one. Word to the wise, you’ll want to have your battery disconnected for about 20 minutes before tearing in because jostling a powered-up airbag is a bit like playing hot potato with a live hand grenade. When it comes to pulling the steering wheel, Maverick Truck Club forum member Bushpilot has detailed the process while Tyvemattis has an excellent write-up on gutting a steering wheel to install new switches. If you’re more of a video learner, here’s a great video from YouTube user KaytuDoesStuff on swapping out those steering wheel switches. You could pay tribute to the Doof Warrior from Mad Max, fill the entire truck bed with Jello, haul home an ill-advised but unequivocally awesome engine swap for you project car, mount a vehicle tent and go party up at a music festival, go to IKEA and buy enough flat-pack furniture to furnish an entire studio apartment, haul home a plaster bust of yourself that you commissioned from a local art college student, the possibilities are almost endless. Best of all, you’ll be hauling in comfort thanks to your fancy new cruise control. Not only is it egregious, it’s just down right shady. It should be required on all new vehicles under the guise of emissions control; for fucks sake we mandated cameras because people can’t a. Control their kids from getting run over and B. because poeple can’t look behind their cars anymore. What a shitty and shady thing to do in order to get dumb people to spend $3000 more than they need to. Second… I remember my dad pulling steering wheels off of 70’s cars… I think it was to align the wheel…. anywho’s….. his method involved a sledge hammer. My personal feelings aside, I get that it’s a popular option. I get that Ford, much like every car manufacturer, wants to up-sell vehicles with popular option packages rather than stand-alone options in stripped-down entry vehicles. They have their reasons for doing it this way and, while it’s not something I agree with, it’s how they make money selling cars. However, Ford should be looking at this from the perspective of making it a popular dealer-installed option. At $175 retail for parts and probably less than an hour labor, I could see this being a pretty popular $300 option that the dealers can make bank on with other possibly popular Maverick accessories installed at the dealer much like Stellantis does with a Jeep Wrangler. GM is pretty awful in the controls and the actual staying around the speed you want in my experience. Ford is OK. Controls are OK and the speed is good. Toyota is my favorite. The controls are all on one stalk, Press the button on the end of stalk for on/off, up for faster, down for slower, pull back to cancel. You don’t have to take your eyes off the road. Toyota: Want to temporarily disengage? Yank this lever as hard as you want. VW: Carefully slide this small control on top of the stalk, but not too far or you’ll shut the entire system off. I refuse to believe VW ever focus-grouped their controls. Same reason they put dial labels that the driver can’t see. I don’t know all your reasons but if you haven’t used it in decades maybe give it a try again. Its a lot better than it used to be. I remember trucks that would break the tires loose on a hill in the rain when it down shifted too hard. Those days are long gone though. The main issue is the Maverick has the first electric motor Ford has ever built in house. Something about this necessitated the use of a similar but slightly different transmission than the Escape Hybrid. Upshot of all that is that Ford decided that was all the new they could stomach in the launch of a volume leader like the Maverick. In a couple of interviews, they have explicitly said an AWD Hybrid will be coming, its just a question of whether its in the mid cycle refresh or just a new option on the existing model. Changed that with ForSCAN. Sport really livens the truck up. So now I have a quick turbo truck that fits in a standard parking space. It’s the perfect car On my base model Escape Hybrid, I was able to enable Lane Centering which is usually reserved for the top trim. I was also able to enable traffic sign recognition, which is typically only available in Europe. And all of that was without adding any hardware. My daughter’s Cruze is not as easy. Besides having to buy an entire steering wheel… you also have to get it programmed (if it can even be done). Does anyone know of a similar forum for GM? What I really want is a truck + a shit box to drive around. But the price of those are nutso….
