Do you know what Honda Insight owners are talking about recently?

As a welcome gift to our visiting Insight friends, here is a plot of the Edmunds 'head to head' test earlier this year:


Both hybrids performed well and the only time the Jetta TDI showed up was on the return highway trip from Los Vegas to San Bernardino. I suspect the air conditioner may have played a part. Regardless, the Honda Insight did well and I understand one of the Edmunds editors/writers owns one now.

Bob Wilson

 

OK, from your comment:
"All the "data" may be the same (same MPG, ...."
your post was irrelevant to mine. Haven't read anywhere of anyone getting 95-100mpg from a Prius-III yet, but perhaps you are. Or perhaps you didn't comprehend that I was writing about an Insight-I, not an Insight-II.

But hey good wishes to you, hope you continue to be happy with your new Prius.

 

Reading your post is like riding in an Insight, they both give me diarrhea. Now go back to McDonalds little boy!

 

Unfortunately, another another unsupportable methodology,
Fallacy: Appeal to Ridicule

 

Yes we buy Toyota's warranty well below what dealers normally charge and have for years. Linked right from this site.

 

If you have not noticed, 2010 Prius CVT has already surpassed 2006 Insight CVT. That's with the 2008 EPA standard so they can be compared.

2006 Insight CVT: 47 MPG
2010 Prius eCVT: 50 MPG
2006 Insight Manual: 52 MPG

If you ask me, 2 MPG difference is close; ignoring size, weight, safety, performance, refinement, convenience, practicality, etc... Driving a manual to get 2 more MPG is also questionable.

 

The EPA numbers are "estimates" especially for pre-2008 cars where the measurements were done under a different protocol and then "adjusted" to try to bring them into line with the newer protocol. As we all know, these "estimates" are only that: the mpg people actually get may vary significantly depending on how and where they drive.

My sister has a 2005 Insight-I CVT and typically gets 60mpg in it, and this agrees fairly well with what I've seen posted by other CVT owners who try for economy (though I have heard of a few people getting into the 70's in daily driving). Please correct me if I'm wrong, but what I'm seeing here for the Prius-III is typically around 55mpg?? For that small a difference, I agree, I'd much rather have a Prius-III or an Insight-II than an Insight-I CVT.

The MT Insight-I is a completely different cat. Driving it carefully yields huge gains in mpg, probably due to its lean burn capability. I bought mine to commute 34 miles to work and got that route down pat so I could run whole tanks at 100+mpg in the summer. Now that I have retired, I still manage 95-100mpg on 130-150 mile highway trips but running local errands drags my tank mileages down to around 90mpg in the summer. As I said previously, LMPG is 83mpg *, which is a big difference from the EPA rating of 52mpg. And other MT Insight-I pilots have recorded better mpg than mine.

To me, ca 30mpg additional more than offsets the fact that it seats only 2. But 2 seats just is not enough for some, so for them the Prius or the Insight-II is a better choice.

* - When the website lets me post links, I can give complete mpg data.

 

Just because you don't like driving MT doesn't mean we shouldn't.

As a Hondaphile, the car I would most like is a midsize (Prius) in a versatile body style (Prius/Insight-II) with the most efficient manual transmission propulsion system that lends itself to highway hypermiling (Civic IMA MT).

Unfortunately, this beast does not exist, so I have the 2010 Prius instead. But I still like Honda, and the spouse won't give up hers.

 

ONLY problem with an Insight I, is I can't have a new one. I think maybe Honda is working on something similar. If it becomes available and is something like an updated Insight I. I'll get one. I'll keep the Prius for hauling the family around and grocery getting etc, but as I have said before, I'd like a two seat sporty kind of Hybrid, I don't think I'm alone.
Gut feeling is that a CVT would be required for max mileage though. The original insight was a lean burn engine and I don't think that is the current way to go emission wise, and I think the Atkinson cycle may not be RPM flexible and if I understand correctly may not produce much torque. It is harder to "game" a CVT though, so that is a drawback

 

A fact that hasn't been mentioned I think and that works in favour of the Insight-I is that it is the hypermilers dream, so I think I'm not mistaken if I say the majority of Insight-I owners are really mileage freaks (obviously not all in an equal manner), more than the average Prius or Insight-II or HCH public that just drive their car and see the mileage as a bonus.

 

If they could have gotten the gas mileage of the Insight II on similar numbers with the Insight I, I think they would be giving the Prius a serious challenge

 

Great point, though it works both ways: the Insight-I, especially the MT, responds so well to fuel-saving efforts that it encourages people to try to save fuel and converts them into "mileage freaks". Newer hybrids have nicer displays that encourage fuel economy (though the leaves and awards in the Insight-II seem a bit too much!), but their CVT's and greater automation limit driver's options. Some Gen II Prius drivers have gone to great lengths to develop methods that yield great mpg's, but it isn't easy. And some of these methods don't work on the Gen III Prius due to software changes, so they're working on new methods.

Another benefit of driving a hybrid is that it can change the way you drive a conventional car. I used to get 24-25mpg in my Subaru; now I manage 30mpg around town and 34-35mpg on long highway trips, thanks to "training" in the Insight-I.

The Insight-I isn't this hypermiler's "dream car"; some things I'd change:
- replace the electric-assist steering with simple manual steering: no battery drain, and a car this light doesn't need power assist
- electric pump for power brake vac assist
- ditch the antilock system, which is awful
- electric AC like the Prius and HCH have
- less emphasis on aero drag reduction, simply slowing down reduces drag far more (reduced rear seat headroom in the Insight-II to improve aero seems a poor tradeoff to me)
- 2x the battery capacity with plug-in capability, not for EV capability but simply to start every day with a topped-off, warmed up battery

Exactly, that's the gap between "just driving" and consciously driving to save fuel. The EPA numbers have become "what you will get" in most peoples' minds; driver inputs become unimportant, and driving becomes a boring chore.

In a few minutes I'm leaving on a 3-hour drive to Boston that I have done many many times. But seeing what mpg I can manage makes the trip interesting, and driving slower means I arrive far less stressed than when I used to drive it at 80mph.

 

This is a really fantastic idea!

 

I'm almost completely neutral aside from having owned some Honda's in the past and in visiting this site and InsightCentral I see bad things from both sides. I think it's clear that the Prius is better at luxury and a high MPG, but only by a few miles on average for most drivers, yet some Prius owners do everything they can to dog the Insight, as if it wasn't just a few miles behind and in a different class. Likewise Insight owners talk about cheating or whatever an that gives some Honda owners a bad name too. All of this makes hybrid owners look petty, immature and laughable to other folks, believe me. By the way there is a LOT and I do mean a WHOLE LOT of Honda Insight dissing on this site. So much that it's a little scary sometimes.

The bottom line they way I see it is either car, and all the non hybrid specific cars too for that matter (like Civic and Camry hybrids), are capable of getting incredible gas mileage when driven smartly. I'm not trying to sit here on a highhorse and lecture anybody and I've been accused of being self-righteous here before but I think we should all spend less time being brand specific. Whether you want to decrease dependence on oil, clean up the environment, spend less at he pump or all of the above it seems like we're on the same side.

 

Another gift for our Insight visitors:


I would prefer to see more user report samples in the EPA web site or MyHybridCar.com. These are small counts but the trend is promising. But I have one request for our Honda visitors:

Could someone on the Insight team run a series of mph vs MPG benchmarks?
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Typically run at least 10 miles, both directions, after reaching the target speed maintained by cruise control, and average the two runs. Just vary the speed by 5 or 10 mph, 5 mph at the higher end.

The reason I ask is the Edmunds report suggests something happened on the return leg that saw a distinct decrease in efficiency. What we're looking for is a 'knee in the curve' that represents a practical limit to high-speed performance. For example, using 50 MPG as the threshold:

• NHW11 (2001-03) - 65 mph is the 50 MPG limit
• NHW20 (2004-09) - 65 mph is the 50 MPG limit
• ZVW30 (2010-**) - 70 mph is the 50 MPG limit

It would also be helpful if someone could do some hill climb tests to understand what happens at higher power settings. It turns out there is a knee in NHW11 performance that climbing at 55 mph works best. It is possible that the Edmunds return leg may have included some hill climbs at high speed that might have thrown the Insight into an inefficient power region.

Please understand I've asked for the same information from visiting Jetta TDI advocates. It has to do with understanding vehicle performance characteristics using facts and data.

Thanks,
Bob Wilson

 

I think this could have given Prius a serious challenge on gas mileage only, not on price. Honda was already competing on performance with the Civic, and not doing very well in the market, so the Insight-II was positioned on the price side. Unfortunately for Honda, Toyota was well positioned to play hardball on price too.

My Subaru experience is almost idential, though lacking a hybrid during the learning phase, I used a ScanGauge and CMPG. If my Accord Hatchback hadn't already been scheduled for retirement, I'm sure it could have been pushed into the low 40s on the highway.

 

Bob,
I think if you posted this over "there" you would get far more response to it. Pretty sure 95% of them are interested in expanding the knowledge base of all high mileage vehicles.
You NASA or ARMY?

 

You might be right. ...That or post it on Ecomodder, because that place is just crawling with smart guys who understand all that stuff. All I understand is higher MPG's but for me it's more of an art than a science, mainly because I'm not a math guy.