WestWashEdge

Haedgy, For the door edge guards, I used the Xpel product (3/8" wide) with some 3M installation instructions I found on YouTube. The tape is already sticky (no water or other activator needed). The tape itself installed as advertised, but time will tell how well it stands up in the long run. It is pretty tough, but not very thick. It seems fine for those times the door accidentally softly brushes/bumps another object, but not much protection for a door flying open into an obstacle. It is also probably good for protecting the one edge of the rear doors that sort of form part of the fender where rocks from the tires could hit that edge just right and chip the paint. The one thing I didn't like was the quality of the cut on the tape roll. One side was a clean cut, the other was not clean-- almost like a dull blade or multiple cut attempts were used. Made me wonder if the stuff, which I ordered on Amazon, was cut from bulk by a fly-by-night outfit of some kind. I had to cut my length, then examine the tape and use the clean cut side on the outside edge of the door. The 3M video showed placing the tape on the outer edge of the door, and running all down that side, then folding the tape over. I overlapped the door edge with more than half of the tape on the outer door side so that not much was left to fold over to the inside edge of the door. I was worried that too much overlap on the inside would run up on that weld/adhesive bead and not seal well or have a tendency to lift off and come undone on the inside. Overlap on the inside must have been only about 2-3mm. The 3M video also showed a trick to deal with the sharp corner on the rear door. I originally thought I was going to need two separate pieces of tape but I was able to use one piece using the technique where you turn the tape 90 degrees to the side and pull tight as you round the corner. (I'm not describing it well- you need to see the video). One caution is that pulling too hard causes lines that look like fracture lines to appear and you probably need to either live with that or start over. The door sill protectors were cut from bulk 3M paint protection film, the type that requires wetting and the alcohol solution to get it to work. My learning curve came from not reading care instructions after installation where they talk about the bubbles that will eventually go away. I watched plenty of installation videos where they describe squeegee technique for avoiding bubbles, but they didn't really mention that a few are unavoidable. Apparently the film is porous in spite of appearances to the contrary and the water/alcohol should eventually disappear. Not realizing this, I got impatient and really used a lot of elbow grease and pressure to force the bubbles to the edge of the film. This did some damage to appearance of the film. It is barely noticeable on the one door sill, but I still know it is there and might need to deal with it some time. I was eyeing the lighted brushed-metal "Edge" sill plates and wondering if I can apply the protective film to those and what would it look like. A week into ownership and scuff marks are already appearing on the brushed metal sill plates! I plan to install a bumper protector, but have not decided on which one yet. People have written that the Ford OEM one is very thin-- makes me wonder if it is nothing more than a thick decal. I'll have to look up the Dawn protector you mentioned. The pics suggest it is pretty robust and not just a decal.

I'm sure that we will eventually become accustomed to the dark interior. I can't wait to get my floating space cave on the road for a night trip with the family. I'm expecting a gray cargo area mat to arrive this week. If that works well for functionality and appearance, then we will go ahead with getting the gray foot well mats next. Spent some time this weekend putting clear door edge protectant tape on the trailing edge of the doors. Worked out pretty well. The best part was figuring out that I could use the wife's computerized scrapbooking paper/vinyl cutter ("Pazzle") to cut patterns out of some bulk 3M paint protection film I sketched-up and cut four rectangle door sill protectors and installed them too. I had a bit of a learning curve, so I might need to redo the first sill I attempted. I've included a couple pics of the new machine as we began our white-glove inspection before taking delivery at the dealer.

Hello All, Another new 2016 owner reporting in. We just purchased a 2016 Silver Ingot Titanium Edge 2.0l (302A & Driver Assist too), which will be the wife’s daily driver. So far loving the vehicle, although we felt like we had to compromise on the ebony interior. Both my wife and I were adamant that we would never buy a car with an all-black interior. Every rental car I’ve driven recently had all black interiors and I always got frustrated with trying to find dropped items, etc. It felt like driving a cave around. I’m thinking about getting gray fitted floor mats to help with this specific concern since some kind of weather-proof mats are a must out here during a wet Western Washington winter anyhow. The huge sunroof helps too. Maybe our eyes are just getting old. We almost fell in love with the Murano tan interior, but the Edge won out in the end. After spending some time looking over these forums, I’m anxious about the possibilities of finding water in the foot wells or having the adaptive steering fail. Hopefully these are rare issues with Edges built on or after 3/29/2016 (our build date). By the way— it was nice finding such an informative and helpful group of people contributing to this forum. I’m already thinking of trying to find a way to make better use of the daytime running light setup. I wonder if the reflector portion of the headlight assembly can be repurposed to be a second set of high beams that are activated with the OEM high beam setup (or even separately with a dedicated added control) However, I would not want to burn out any control module outputs or relays with whatever modifications/additions that would surely be necessary to do this. It just seems like a shame to waste that portion of the headlight assembly on DRLs that only come on at times when the signature lights already serve the same purpose. My wife and I spent some time in a parking lot with a few garbage cans to simulate conditions for parking assist usage- in a torrential downpour. Pretty impressive capability although it will take some practice to make effective use of the system—it freaks out the wife a little especially when other vehicles with impatient drivers start to enter the scenario. The adaptive cruise control is very cool too. I’m looking forward to our first road trip where we can make good use of this feature. Here’s to many happy miles with the Ford Edge!