I got a manual transmission 2006 Civic DX-G at the end of May, and have since put on over 10500 Km. During that time, I have averaged 6.87 Litres/100 Km on the whole 10500 Km, 5.71 on a 3000 Km road trip and as low as 5.24 on some sections of the road trip. So I certainly have no problems with the gas mileage.
However, since I first got the car the throttle has produced a slight jump between acceleration and deceleration (feels like an automatic transmission shifting), rather than the smooth ability to set a speed that I have been used to on other cars (all non-Honda).
You notice this the most trying to maintain a steady speed on downhill sections. Backing off on the throttle slightly to maintain speed results in a slight notching of the engine into engine braking. As the speed drops, a slight increase in the throttle, to maintain speed, results in a slight jump in the engine, and the speed rises too high. There appears to be a small area of the travel of the throttle so that slight changes in the throttle position do not change the engine speed, at a constant load, but moving past this point will jump the power up or down (sort of like a point of histerysis in the power curve).
During the road trip I noticed that it was difficult to maintain speed as terrain changed, and slight changes in slope, insufficient to require engine braking to hold speed down, could have significant changes in road speed, if you were not continually watching the speedometer, in the range of more than + or minus 10 Km per hour at a road speed of around
100 Km per hour. This required a higher driver attention load to stay around the speed I wanted to be going. I saw a lot less of the scenery than I would have in any other car I have had.The questions I raise are:
- Should the throttle have this "shifting" effect, or should it be a smooth transition of more or less power.
- Should the car speed range through such a wide range without constant attention, with slope changes small enough to not really be noticable to the driver?
And if this effect is not normal, what could be done about it. I have already mentioned this to the dealer, who had it road tested, and indicated that it was normal for a manual transmission.
Tom