Did you consider the Honda Clarity before your Prius Prime?

Yes. I considered the Clarity Plug in. But I will never again buy a first model year.

The 2018 Prime is my 3rd Prius and my 7th Toyota. We still have a 1999 Camry with 300000 miles on it. And it runs great.

But in two years as new Plugin Hybrids come out I will look at the Clarity and the new Toyotas.

Blue

 

99 Camry v6 owner with 250k miles and still going strong also. Took it to Vegas last year - 300 miles at 90+ MPH no problems

Had a 30+ year old Celica that I just sold last year - original owner - still passed smog and drives fine (although not as quiet as before).

IMO buy a Toyota if you plan to keep it more than 10 years. I have never owned a Toyota that had a major issue such as a transmission or engine rebuild. Unfortunately the same can't be said for.. other.. brands.

 

i wish we could say the same for gen 3 prius.

 

I considered. I used to have 2 Hondas as wife prefer stiff riding. But unfortunately Honda quality is almost a joke now with transmissions (for Odyssey/Pilot/MDX), engine (VCM), brake rotor issues.

Also Clarify is so new and I have no confidence at Honda quality and reliability at all, I decided to pass.

Price is also a minor factor as there is no deep discount. I still have Odyssey and Accord, I don’t want to have another Accord. So I am in this forum now.

 

Yeah but Prime is entirely made in Japan. I trust and have had EXCELLENT reliability from all my plug-in Prii!

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AChoiredTaste.com

 

Although it wasn't necessarily a goal of mine, all three Toyotas that I have owned (all purchased new) were made in Japan. A 1992 Camry Wagon (only the sedans were made in Kentucky), a 2002 Prius and a 2006 Prius. I still own the 1992 Camry Wagon and the 2006 Prius. With the combined cargo capacity of my two current vehicles I could start a delivery service.

 

I personally did not consider the Clarity while shopping for a Plug-In, even with rebates the price was too high. I was considering taking a look at the Plug-In Ioniq but they were not available in my area yet. When all was said and done it was hard to beat the 2017 Prime with all the rebates and incentives right now. Sure I would rather have a little more EV range, but it gets me back and forth to work on EV which is all I can ask for.

Being made in Japan was just an added bonus all my Toyota's have been and I've never had one issue with them in all my years of ownership.

 

Or a used car lot!!

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AChoiredTaste.com

 

I did consider the Clarity when I bought Prime in Feb. But based on my bad experience with Acura MDX (trans issue) and the excellent reliability of the Prius platform (my friends), I decided to take the chance with the Prime, even though it was the first year model. My daily commute to work is only 4 miles one way... So the extra EV range of clarity was not that appealing to me. It's been two months and I love the Prime. And yes, it's still snowing in Iowa.

 

For what it's worth, the Clarity PHEV is made in Japan, and has no transmission to fail Country of manufacture doesn't have much to do with it though - Japanese Fits weren't stellar, and many US-made Accords have been, so YMMV.

On topic, I'm looking at the Clarity and Prime. I like the overall efficiency of the Toyota though, which is why I'm hanging out around here.

 

We choose our prime because it was supposedly cheaper to maintain and the Toyota dealer was friendlier and offered us soft drinks, coffee and even cookies.

We also got a loyalty bonus from our old 2008 Toyota Corolla
Nor do we have the Clarity in Ottawa we only had the Hyundai Ionic and Chevy Bolt.

We did not get the Ionic due to Hyundai's reliability.

And the prime suits us more than the bolt. (Range, Cost, Loyalty)

Our Prime was built in Japan you can tell by the first few letters of the VIN

 

Also consider that neither the Clarity PHEV or the Prime can operate as a 100% EV. They are 'Limited EV's'.

You have ice cold engines starting and burning fossil fuel for simple, normal operations.
Thus the 10k mile oil changes REGARDLESS of miles of usage on that oil.
That is wasteful and an added expense to TCO.

What's so hard about a smart Oil Life Monitor?

 

Efficiency wise Clarity is not bad considering its size. It is basically a plugin hybrid Accord comparable to Camry hybrid.

But as a owner of 2 Honda's and been an owner of 2 Honda's for past 20 years, I have had enough with them. They have major problems with transmittions, brakes, engines. Their smaller vehicles used to be reliable but I have no confidence at their turbo engines at all. So I decided to pass it. I may consider it when I decide to trade in my 09 Accord.

 

Are Honda hybrids as good as Toyota's? Remember the battery failures of the Civic hybrid?

 

Perhaps that should be asked:
http://www.superhonda.com/forum/f139/

I understand why but get a little tired of non-Prius advocates coming here to troll for customers. Next time, I might get a little sarcastic along the lines of:

An old man, a boy & a donkey were going to town. The boy rode on the donkey & the old man walked. As they went along, they passed some people who remarked it was a shame the old man was walking & the boy was riding.

The man & boy thought maybe the critics were right, so they changed positions.

Later, they passed some people that remarked, "What a shame, he makes that little boy walk." They then decided they both would walk!

Soon they passed some more people who thought they were stupid to walk when they had a decent donkey to ride. So, they both rode the donkey.

Now they passed some people that shamed them by saying how awful to put such a load on a poor donkey. The boy & man said they were probably right, so they decided to carry the donkey. As they crossed the bridge, they lost their grip on the animal & he fell into the river and drowned.

The moral of the story? If you try to please everyone, you might as well kiss your nice person good-bye.​

Bob Wilson

 

My experience with the Gen 1 Insight, and my Lead Guitar's experience with Honda Civic hybrid says no, Honda hybrids, so far have not been up to Prius standards. I really like the Honda Service, even better than the Toyota. Honda however has more mechanical problems than does the Toyota.


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AChoiredTaste.com

 

I just purchased my PPA on 3/31, and I did consider the Clarity as a choice at the time. I had taken my 15 year old Honda Civic out to the dealer for its 320K service... and saw a Clarity in the lot. I had never even heard of the Clarity before... and the wife instantly liked it for the roominess. Not prepared to by a car at the time, I started doing research on Clarity.

The big draw for me was the claimed 47 EV miles. The wife liked a roomier car. Consumer Reports thought the Clarity was ok as a hybrid, but it was designed as a modular kind of car... as they have EV, HV and gasoline versions... but the HV electric driving miles were about 20% less than claimed. I was a bit shocked to see that the EV driving rage was only about 340 miles. Even my 15 year old Honday Civic can go about 410 if you're driving only highway at the time. So my thoughts on the clarity were generally positive (good or better EV range) but not enthusiastic.

When it came time to actually purchase a vehicle, several weeks later, I drove by Honda first, to see it again, but there were none on the lot. So we drove down the street, saw the Prime Advanced on the lot, and since it was exactly what I wanted, including color, I purchased that day.

That's my Clarity / PPA story.

 

GM has one, and it can let the oil go up to two years in a Volt.
I understand Honda also has one, but I haven't heard anything about it in regards to their PHEVs.

The battery issues were because Honda pushed them too hard. These were the NiMH packs in some models. No issues have been reported with their Li-ion packs.

 

I wonder how effective that oil analysis is? A proper oil analysis is done in a laboratory by a professional.