Honda:Honda Insight hybrid was an "unmitigated disaster"

pakitt, that's why i got the plugin kit, petrol is just getting so expensive now. If it really does go up to £2/Litre then the kit pays for itself pretty damn quickly...

 

Goes to show you that not everyone in the Blog universe is fully versed on the subject. Let me list just some of the differences:

1. The IMA motor/stator is not belt driven and totally complements the gasoline engine's poor torque at low RPMS. Because of the high energy density design of the unique motor, it produces enough torque to allow significant reductions in gasoline engine displacements.
2. Despite the common assumptions, the start-stop system IS NOT the most significant contributor to fuel economy on a current gen IMA platform. Besides, as extremely low friction designs with cylinder deactivation, the IMA platforms always keep the ICE camshaft spinning with NO FUEL use in glides and deceleration conditions. The engine camshaft only stops spinning when the regen braking must fully transition to hydraulic.
3. Depending on circumstances, gen 4+ IMAs can sustain electric only propulsion at almost any speed (from 20km/h all the way to 100km/h). At higher speeds the electric motor effectively works more like a glide extender as it cannot sustain a steady speed. Sustaining EVGlide at lower speeds is very easy and can be held up to a couple of kilometers of so.
4. IMA hybrid gasoline engines do NOT share engine manufacturing processes and designs with their non-hybrid counterparts. This means their designs are slightly more extensive and intended to be more efficient further upstream in the energy consumption chain. Features like 2 spark plugs per cylinder and unique intake and exhaust management allow these hybrid specific engines to do more with less fuel and more comfortably dabble into the Tier2/Bin3 and even Tier2/Bin2 at almost all temperature operating ranges.
5. An IMA architecture can implement and deliver a very effective electrically driven AC like the one you find in the Civic Hybrid.

I could add more to the list, but the above are the most significant.

Cheers;

MSantos

 

I wouldn't know where to plug it in...
I park in the middle of the road, I live on the 3rd floor and there is not such thing as a plug I can beg my employer (paying!) to plug the car into at the office's car park...
Bicycle...or public transport...or loan.... :Cry:

 

Those are vile prices for gas. At $9/gallon your car costs the same per mile driven as if I drove one that gets around 22 mpg.

Another way to look at it is with our $3.80 if I get 50 mpg for you to pay the same price per mile you'd need 118 MPG at your $9/gas! In Scandinavia they'd need 138 mpg!

 

Welcome to good 'ole Europe!
(never complain that taxes are too high in the US - never - you have *no* idea what high taxes are - none... :Cry

 

You would if you knew me!

 

Yep

So even with a plugin kit it's costing me more per mile to drive than you. Imagine how bad i felt driving my last car getting 36mpg (imperial, less than 30mpgUS)

 

Not true. It's more like IMA = Start-stop + CVT, while the others still are Start-stop + clutch+gearbox.

 

The IMA is great when it works. But I'm now going on my third hybrid battery and not a very happy hybrid owner as the victim of a Honda software update that actually does seem to deteriorate the battery. It was noticable immediately after the update. Yes, I complained to Honda and no they did not listen. Now, one year later and probably less than 5k miles later, the IMA light is on and Honda says I need a new battery once again. I'm absolutely certain my first hybrid battery wasn't bad but might have gotten fried when a car pulled out in front of me unexpectedly when I rounded a blind curve and had to break hard to avoid a collision. The battery stopped fuctioning at that moment and the IMA light came on a few minutes later. The second battery was never as good as the first battery, but the software upgrade they did a couple of months after receiving the battery made the car totally miserable to drive as the assist was never there to assist when needed as the battery was constantly dumping and never charging very well--which was not the way it was before the upgrade. Now, the "new battery" has failed which was no surprise actually. So yet another is on order.

The good thing is Honda has not charged for any of the battery replacements. Yes, that is a VERY good thing. But still, I have not enjoyed driving my car for a year now and having two battery failures in slightly over a year would make me think twice about another hybrid... even though its getting around 65mpg with a bad battery.

1st gen Insight owner bought used 4 years ago with 18,000 miles on it at the time. Now it is around 38,000 miles

 

That's pathetic. I'd get that battery replaced and sell the thing (right now it should still be worth huge amounts of money). Amateurish stuff like this from Honda gives hybrids a bad name. A key reason why your gen of Insight gets such good mileage is that it's absolutely minuscule and super-light. I have wondered sometimes what mileage it would get without being a hybrid.

 

Interesting thought.

I had the opposite thought the other night while watching Top Gear when they took a lightweight Lambo, Porsche and Aston to find the best road.

I was thinking about finding a Gen I or II Prius and stripping it to bare bones to see what kind of MPG performance gains one could get from weight loss.

 

They were probably giving you refurbished packs.