I read through all 7 pages of content here. Are we sure this is an FE? It has a soft top. FE comes with a MIC top.
And thanks for the ET visual. That's stuck.
They are already rolling around with Badlands with MT. I would suspect it has to do with engineering the right gearing or speed calibration. Or that Ford just doesn't want to sell MT with Sas.
I wasn't going to add it, but then I read a thread that pointed out the advantages to being out in the wild and not losing your keys by leaving them in the car. So I'm a convert. It is ugly, but I'm ok with that for the convenience of it.
From what I have seen from Ford and heard from my dealer, the seats in the Badlands will be manual. The black 2-dr Badlands running around as a display model has leather, is manual, and has a rubber floor. In reviewing the various seat options on B&P, only the navy pier leather offers power seats.
I'm one of the lucky ones. What I want I can build now and be set. BL, 2.3L, 7-speed, soft top, high package. And for the price I had calculated prior to B&P.