News Report re: Hybrid Accords

With regular gas having just edged above $3/gallon where I live, my opinion is that car buyers are idiots. A guy up the street has two Hummers in his driveway. TWO! And two large SUVs in his garage, as well.

Where I live, the Honda dealers *never* have any hybrids in stock. There have been waiting lists ever since before the first hybrids arrived at the dealership. You can't even test drive them -- there are NONE available.

So, if there is surplus supply somewhere, they really ought to be shipping the unsold vehicles to places where demand exceeds supply.

That's probably because the two Hummers won't fit in the garage .

The Accord Hybrid is not a real hybrid. It is a V6 with a small electric assist motor that can add 2 or 3 mpg at most. And that is probably on a good day.

Honda should have built this vehicle with the I4 motor and just made it a bigger version of the Civic Hybrid. Instead, they made an expensive hotrod (0 to 60 mph in 6 sec!).

Real hybrids have electric motors that can drive the vehicles by themselves and electric A/C, electric power steering.

Lynn

Well, it's got that thing on the back that says "Hybrid Synergy Drive." That's gotta be at least 3 by 5 centimeters. You can read it from at least a couple of meters away.

Elliot Itinerant Curmudgeon

What does a Hybrid "look like"..? Why should it look any different than an ordinary car..?

Honda's original Hybrid looked so odd, it's no wonder they couldn't sell them.

The Honda Accord Hybrid looks like an Accord. The Honda Civic Hybrid looks like a Civic. The Toyota Prius is unique--it does not look like any other car. When almost anyone looks at a Toyota Prius--they know that it's a Toyota Prius Hybrid car. The reason the Honda Insight Hybrid was not popular is because of the poor design and the lack of power. The Prius has much more power and has a better design than the Honda Insight.

That is certainly true of the 2004-current Prius, but the 2001-2003 Prius is hard to tell apart from the 4-door Ford Focus Sedan. Some Focus cars don't have the rear spoiler, the Prius has a battery vent on the left "C" pillar, and the logos are different. The color options have some overlap, but there are different colors available between the two. That's about it.

Mike

"Michael Pardee" wrote in news:jPednRDsm snipped-for-privacy@sedona.net:

It seems that hybrids are not getting the advertised mileage,because people drive differently than they anticipated,the cost of a hybrid is significantly higher than a normal auto,for a couple of reasons for low sales.

I agree that Honda missed the mark on the Accord Hybrid. It made for a fun car but not attractive to the mainstream Accord shopper. I think the 4 cyl outsells the V6 by 4 to 1 already. If they wanted to go the hybrid hotrod route, they should have done the RSX or Civic Si.

I don't agree that a "real hybrid" has to be able to run off electricity alone. The Civic nearly matches the Prius in mpg even though it was not purpose built as a hybrid and it uses much less expensive batteries and motor. I know a woman who owns an Accord Hybrid and claims it gets about 38 mpg on the highway.

Toyota is selling all they can make, with most areas still putting buyers on waiting lists.

The problem is that no car has ever gotten the advertised mileage. The EPA has told us since the '70s, when they started the fuel economy testing, the numbers were "for comparison only" and "your mileage may vary." Some people just ignore what they don't want to hear, I reckon. At any rate, the problem of "YMMV" will probably worsen as better fuel economy becomes common. My rough estimation is that a passenger car or even light truck could reach somewhere between 100 and 200 mpg in low speed driving on level ground. I was looking for the link to a recent track competition, where I recall a stock Prius turned in over 100 mpg in very unrealistic conditions, but don't see it just now. If we weren't operating engines in such incredibly inefficient ranges we could be doing that today. But the gasoline goes to more than moving the car in real life. Cold engines and catalytic converters have to be warmed up, the passengers have to be warmed or cooled, electricity must be generated for lights, fans, and big honkin' amplifiers (sorry - I got carried away!) These parasitic factors already sap up to 20% of the EPA figures for most people. What will the public think when the EPA says 113 mpg - as Toyota is credibly rumored to have as a goal - and Joe Consumer is making dozens of half mile trips to the corner store on every tank and complaining how he was lied to?

Mike

Heh... As the populace is "dumbed down," one can only (rational thought processes required) that there are just too many people on the planet. Just think.. If the world's population were to be cut in half tomorrow, most of the current "crisis" issues would simply vanish..

JT

(But let me stay!)

Maybe it depends on which half remains ;-) Since I've already admitted to being in the half that opens the "do not open" housing my fate is probably sealed. The test will be marked by three billion people simultaneously looking at a doodad and saying in a variety of languages, "Hey! What's this?"

Mike

I agree with you. The woman is probably telling the truth. If people drive an Hybrid or almost any car in a special way--they can get much better MPG than most people get. I read an article that gave "tips" on how to get better than average MPG in a Toyota Prius. It involved keeping an eye on the speed and the special gauges in a Prius. It was my opinion that it took all of the fun out of driving. It involved lots of WORK to get really lots of MPG. I prefer driving without having to worry about those kinds of things. Driving should be FUN--not work. Jason

I believe the hybrids are still only made in Japan so they probably don't make much money on them even at extra high price. Also gas mileage rating went down this year.

My wife gets around 28 mpg crawling in stop and go traffic to work. Without the electric motor and battery you could not have autostop with ac running so it is a hybrid.

IMO Honda completely missed the boat on this one by going for a "performance hybrid". Nobody needs even higher performance than the V-6 Accord already offers, and the price of the Hybrid Accord is a show stopper. Why pay the price on an Acura TL to get a Honda sedan?

Hybrids should be about great fuel economy, and the Accord hybrid real world economy is little better than the 4 cylinder Accord.

IMO Honda would do much better selling a high economy 1.8 L turbocharged version of the Accord instead of the silly V-6 hybrid. With the new focus on fuel economy we are going to see more use of smaller engines with turbochargers. Even Honda is about to get into the turbo act with the new Acura RDX.

John

Total BS. I consistently get fuel economy results with our conventional engine cars which are well within the bounds of the EPA test results. Our V-6 Accord fuel economy ranges from 24-30 mpg depending on the highway/local mix. Our Acura TSX is getting 25-32 mpg in our use. EPA test numbers on those cars are 21/30 for the Accord and 22/32 for the TSX. In my case, the correlation between EPS test and real world use is right on the money.

Something is screwy with hybrids in particular in that their real world mileage is so different from the EPA test numbers.

JOhn

John, I agree with you. The new Honda Fit will get 33 mpg in the city and 38 miles on the highway. It's my opinion that lots of people will buy the Honda Fit or Toyota Yaris (for about $15,000 per car) instead of overpriced Hybrids. The cost of a Toyata Prius is about $23,000 per car. Do you agree? Jason