Were the economy what it was a year and a half ago when Wall Street was in full Go-Go-Mode, it’s doubtful anybody seriously shopping for an all-new Prius would give Honda’s new Insight a second glance. Sure, they look an awful lot alike, but understand, these are two starkly different automobiles. Different in size: Dimensionally, the Insight is a confirmed compact while the new Prius has expanded its interior volume enough to place it somewhere midpack in the midsize category. Different in hybrid technology: What they mainly share is battery chemistry. And different in cost, with a price spread big enough to drive a couple of mortgage payments through. Unfortunately, the economy has subsequently put this sort of simple thinking into a coffee grinder and pressed the top down.
Today, most folks’ household budgets are getting the fine-tooth-comb treatment, and the sound of having most of the Prius’s mileage bang for a lot less buck has a rather nice ring to it. And to complicate things, Honda has baited its Insight’s hook with bodywork that’s so Prius-like it borders on copyright infringement.
A while ago, our late friend and Toyota hybrid guru, Dave Hermance, admitted Honda’s Integrated Motor Assist (IMA) was the better approach for low-cost cars (though he was quick to add that Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive gains the upper hand as size and price increase). Well, Honda has finally pulled the trigger and built Toyota’s worst nightmare.
The Insight is the car your accountant would recommend-and maybe demand after reading that disastrous 401K statement of yours. Imagine paying $24 for a fill-up that gives you a 435-mile driving range. That got your interest, didn’t it? With a base price of $20,470 and a combined EPA mileage rating of 41 mpg, the Insight has to be the ultimate financial hedge against this wacko economy and seesawing oil prices. Whatever the hell happens, you’ll endure it nicely in an Insight.
And so should Honda. Powered by the pancaked combination of an 88-horse,1.3-liter four-cylinder engine and a 13-horse electric motor masquerading as a flywheel, the Insight’s mild hybrid machinery would at first appear to be fairly typical IMA fare. But it isn’t. Honda has gone berserk with the details, wringing cost out every way it can: miniaturizing components, axing the Civic Hybrid engine’s third i-VTEC cam mode, cutting the piston’s costs in half, and shrinking the battery pack. The result is that the Insight’s “hybrid premium” has been slashed 40 percent compared with the Civic Hybrid’s. Wow.
Unfortunately, the cost-cutting is equally apparent on the road. In addition to its road noise (higher than you’d expect even in a sub-$20,000 car), the little engine adds a distinctive racket all its own when you put the stick to it. And the ride isn’t exactly spongeville either, as was astutely perceived by my three-year-old rear passenger strapped in his car seat: “Dad, you’re driving really rough!” It’s the car, young dude, it’s the car.
Sourced via motortrend.com