Time surely flies. Three years have passed since the second-gen Ford Kuga – which made its debut as the Ford Escape (for the North American market) at the 2011 LA Auto Show – has been in the market, and so a mid-life cycle facelift is coming up, as the photos show.
Our spy photographers caught a disguised C520 facelift mule on evaluation rounds, and the rather opaque front cladding reveals a new bumper design, with the most obvious change being a new grille aperture that will revise the SUV’s front end to fall in line with the current family face, albeit with a different, upturned orientation.
New headlamps – complete with LED DRLs – are also to be found, and the rear provides a glimpse of a fresh tail light design, which means there’s a revised tailgate under that dressing.
The spymen also revealed that the interior (primarily, the centre stack) of the the mule was also covered, which should mean that a spruced-up console – and the likelihood of a SYNC 2 or newer SYNC 3 large-screen infotainment system – is on the cards.
Word is that the facelift will bring along a change in entry-level powertrain as well for the unitary all-wheel drive five-seater – currently, the baseline C520 is equipped with a 1.6 litre EcoBoost turbocharged DI four-pot, which is available in 150 PS and 180 PS state of output tunes (ours is the latter).
The facelift – due out in the market early next year – is reportedly set to replace that with the newer 1.5 litre EcoBoost unit, which is essentially a downsized version of the 1.6 but features similar horsepower and torque outputs as the existing mill while offering improved fuel economy and lower CO2 emissions.
C520 Ford Kuga, 1.6 litre EcoBoost pre-facelift
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