from what i see, it had the best gas mileage than any of the hybrids??

 

Hi D Town; The Insight was meant to be mainly a proof-of-concept car, never to be mass-produced. The 7-year production run was longer than originally planned. It was made in Japan in extrememly limited numbers, first at the Togachi plant, then the Suzuka plant.

Reasons for ending the Insight are: limited demand for a 2-seater. Extrememly high costs for R & D, tooling, and manufacturing processes (entirely new procedures for getting aluminum to bend into compound curves). Body & chassis are aluminum, very expensive.

With such small production quantities, Honda never expected to even approach recouping the development costs. It's primarily a car to demonstrate what Honda is capable of, and coming out near the turn of the century (celebrating the year 200) it was the green, trendy thing to do.

 

The big reason
- low sales. in some cases the monthly sales were in the single digits.
These low sales occurred while the Prius had sales in the tens of thousands.

Why low sales?
- The insight weird looking. come on. what about those rear wheel covers?
- It only has two seats combined with less than 100hp. Most people who are willing to settle for two seats want something with more power, not more mpg.
- Two-seats limits it to you and one passenger. Most people may not want that limitation.
- It had new technology. People were concerned about battery life.

We have a family of five, and the Insight is perfect for my daily commutes when I am alone. But we do have a second vehicle for when we need to carry more passengers.

 

All very insighful answers, thank you!

They could possibly bring it back, with a slightly more appealing design?

How come it had such great mpg?

 

I was also under the impression that Honda is moving a lot of their plants to Canada and closing the plant that made the Insight.

 

I do believe that Honda plans to put the engine into the Fit and sell it (as a Hybrid…of course) at around $16,000.

 

Yes, but i think the biggest issue with the moving of the plant and the Insight, is that the Insight is made from aluminium.
I hope the Fit Hybrid comes soon. I think it will appeal to a larger amount of people than the Insight because of the passenger load.

 

Honda Fit Hybrid (5 seat compact)

• Est. release date: Mid-2007
• What we know: The Honda Fit subcompact 5-seater is being introduced in the U.S. market in 2007. With a base MSRP of a little under $14,000, the automatic fit gets an EPA estimated 31 city/38 highway at a LEV II smog-forming emissions level. According to a HybridCars.com interview with an industry source, the Fit will be outfitted with the Insight’s hybrid drivetrain (the Insight will be discontinued in September 2006) and will be introduced in mid-2007 in hybrid version with an expected mpg in the low-to-mid-50s.

I was wrong about the cost.......base MSRP of a little under $14,000

 

wooooooooow!

 

Honda introduced new Small Hybrid Sports Concept at Geneva 2007.

Ken@Japan