I'll agree with most points. Stop and crawl traffic is a bit annoying as is high throttle acceleration. For me 99% of driving is reasonable traffic and highway - where it does great. Stop and crawl clearly favors the Prius and TCH. It is really not that jerky when the engine stops and starts but you do notice it most of the time. I do think that the electric assist comes on just fine when you accelerate so that comment I don't agree with.
Average driver does not care as much about drivetrain issues I think.
I will say that the Prius does the same high revs during brisk acceleration (as any CVT would)- I can't say which is more harsh but it was definitely an issue in the Prius also. I don't really know why the HCH engine would rev more harshly than any other Honda but it does seem to.
A pretty fair assessment overall, I think, and I applaud the writer for describing the driving experience. My city driving isn't as aggressive because I've learned that in my conditions there is nothing to be gained.
When I have to give lots of throttle to get up to speed to a freeway, I do hear the engine cranking, but it is still muted. Maybe I'm not the best judge of this, as my last car experience (smart fortwo cdi) had engine noise galore at all speeds, so I'm in heaven now with the relative quiteness of the Civic Hybrid. It's a luxury car at an economy car price.
BTW, I can "feel" the CVT engagements, engine stop-starts, and cylinder activation/deactivation, if I pay attention. When I ignore the IMA's activity, the car is quite reasonable in driver feel and hardly any different from other automatics.
neat article on HCH2 from Australia
