Drove the 2010 Honda Insight Today

In another word, the refinement is lacking?

 

My wife and I test drove an Insight and other Hondas earlier this week, and were blown away by the Prius.

 

I test drove the insight and it is a nice car. My problem is the back seat. I am 5'9" and hit my head pretty good getting into the back. While sitting in the back the top of the window where it meets the door was just above my eye level. Really felt cramped. Turned me off on the car. I bought a 2008 Prius yesterday.

 

It looks like the Insight hype is back firing. How did the sales man tried to sell you? Did you have conversation with him regarding the Prius -- how it compares etc..?

 

I drove an Insight today and put a down payment on one that will delivered mid April.

I didn't feel cramped at all. Instrumentation was user friendly and the tilt/telescope coupled with the seat height adjustment makes it easy to set for many positions. Drove and rode well too. First 3+ mile lap I got about 46.4 mpg in standard mode. 2nd lap in econ I hit 52mpg. The first .3 mile, I kept it at 150mpg and I thought the salesman was going to fall out of the back seat. I ended up at 52 in econ because I played with the paddle shifter and with the blue/green display. It was raining and there were 4 people in the car too.

 

Yesterday I drove an insight and was impressed. Handling was much tighter than my '05 Prius. Though lighter and less technologically advanced, the Insight's major advantage was, for me, the comfort of the driver seat. No unnecessary huge console. Room to spread my big thighs for the long haul.

 

I saw a couple of them last Sunday on the small lot at Kolbe Honda on Reseda Blvd. (LA area) There was nobody looking at them, or for that matter, anything else there either. Haven't seen any on the road yet.

 

We thought about the Insight. Test drove the Prius and loved it. We have a bunch of friends who have them and swear by them, and of course we had read many posts on this forum too. We planned to test drive an Insight before deciding, but then ruled it out and went ahead and bought an 09 Prius and won't look back.

I kind of hate to admit this, but I think our teenage daughter's astute observation was what pushed us forward on the decision. She said, "Mom, I really wish I had waited for the second generation iPhone. Don't buy a car in its first production year. Go with the Prius."

Only time will tell, but I think she's right.

L

 

I also took a drive in the new Insight the other day.

My first impression was of how much the insight looks like the gen 2 Prius - not a bad thing, but certainly not original. As others have noted, interior space is not too great. In addition to the lack of rear head room, front passengers aren't treated to loads of leg room either. The salesperson that rode with me (I guess he was about 6'2") looked pretty cosy even with the passenger seat at its max rear travel. Interior plastics are at the same level as other current Honda's in that they're somewhat brittle feeling. Overall, the interior materials used had a feeling of being made to hit a certain price.

The Insight's interior design is quite pleasant, living up to Honda's normal high standards. Although the "leaf cartoon" economy display is somewhat of a gimmick, the center display overall is bright and provides good basic economy info. The color-changing economy indicator around the speedo display, unfortunately, is somewhat difficult to see on a bright day.

The IMA system on the Insight worked pretty well, but didn't transition as smoothly as the Toyota HSD system, in my opinion. When pulling away from a stoplight, for example, the Insight hesitated for an instant before "deciding what to do". Acceleration was what you would expect, and perfectly adequate for commuting. I didn't take the car onto the highway, so I can't comment on ~65MPH behavior.

The suspension seemed adequate for normal commuting chores; road noise was minimal and handling was reasonable. The body seemed pretty solid with no rattles and the engine was well isolated. Although the Insight felt "lightweight" overall it didn't feel "flimsy".

 

msirach, nice hybrid quiver you have there, I'm jealous! Could use a plug-in next?

 

I drove the insight today on a 10 mile drive, all in the city with heavy traffic. It was very comfortable for me as the driver, position in the seat and seat travel w/ steering wheel adj, and I am 6 feet tall.Passengers were also all very comfortable with good comfort. This car has lots of pep and the engine seemed smoother than my prius. After 10 miles in heavy traffic in economy mode, we ave. 48 mpg. It is a little smaller inside than my prius, especially the leg room in the back, but only slightly less than my prius. I am going to drive a 2010 Prius before I make a decision on which one to buy.

 

To laurenandtoby - Your daughter sounds wise beyond her years

 

I went to the Honda dealer today and looked at the new Insight and sat in it. It looks good. I didn't test drive it because they only had one demo car and one for sale and there was a couple that were very serious about buying it. I'll go back another day and drive the "demo only" car (there was a sticker that literally said "Honda demo only car").
I have a question for those that have driven the Inisight. The car has a CVT and paddle shifters ... Huh??? How is that possible and how did you operate it? Please explain. Thank you.

 

Since you were in heavy traffic, how did you like the engine on and off behavior? Specifically, it needing to startup the ICE just to creep forward?

 

On the Fit, the same feature appears to be a handle to better MPG than on the manual, because it comes with a taller gear ratio than the MT. But hypermiled hiway MPG is still unknown on the Insight.

 

I test drove yesterday. Didn't get into creeping traffic, but all indications were that it needs the ICE to start moving, that is the IMA style. For some reason, Auto-Stop would last only 10-15 seconds at lights, then it would restart. AC was off. I didn't have it long enough to figure why that was happening. I will test drive it again when the new Prius is available.

PS. Remembered that the ICE fired up every time the brake was released, or even almost released. So it will fire up every creep of stop-and-creep traffic. This has always been one of HSD's advantages over IMA. Civic beats Prius only on the highway, only in the hands of hypermilers, and by considerably less than Prius beats it in the city.

 

One of the things that I liked about the insight, was when coming to a stop, and then creeping forward in a line of cars, it was totally seamless. You can barely hear the engine running at idle when letting up on the brake pedal. The car is very quiet driving in city traffic. I did not have the opportunity to drive on the freeway. My first impression was very positive. The car was actually fun to drive. I am thinking about buying one this weekend and keeping my prius as a second car. I have a new prius on order which will replace my 06 Prius.