Hello-

My wife and I just put a deposit on a 2006 and we live in the mountains in NC. I have seen many threads on the hybrid forums about highway driving in the mountains but I missed or cannot find any threads from owner in the mountains. Many of my road have a steep incline from a dead stop and can climb for two or more miles. Before we pay the balance I would like to get a feel if a hybrid is the best car for the mountains. I at first was thinking a diesel would be the better choices but up in the mountains gas and especially diesel is much more costly then near major cities.

I know that the software will keep the SOC from going too low so I feel that battery life may not be shortened but we worry that we may be running uphill mostly on this small motor after a few miles of climbing. I believe this smaller motor is designed more for steady state cruising then for climbing steep hills. In short a hybrid may get high gas consumtion and at the same time hold up two lane traffic.

Am I way off base on thinking buying a hybrid may be a mistake?

 

Mark;
There is always the down side of the climb! The little ICE runs well in the hills. With the CVT shifter it manages very well. You may see the rpm up around 5000 or so ,depending on how much of a hurry you are in. Your FE will be down on the up-side but you will get it back comming home. One thing to watch for is once the pack is fully charged you loose your regen breaking and the car can coast like crazy and it takes more pressure on the peddle. My wife had trouble with loosing the regen braking. She figured she was in a run away! Spooked her a bit. Try one out for a day or rent one for a week-end.
Cheers
Hal

 

Thanks Hal-

If the ICE can make the hills and keep up with the slower traffic then we would be happy. I assume that that the hybrid has the stock Civic brakes and has to handle the extra battery weight. When you say coasting down hill and regenerating power- are you talk about that any motor compression braking is gone since the valves are open and the battery has maxed its SOC so you are just on brakes at some point in a long down hill. If so this is great to know since my wife has always driven a stick and depended upon motor braking. So I have this correct?

Thanks for the insight--- do you live in the hills?

 

The brakes on the HCH actualy give shorter stopping than the 4 wheel disc brakes. Actually the valves close when engine is off. Hard to figure ,but they do! When you loose regen braking it does tak more pressure, but you become accustom to this over time. Its just something new. The HCH2 is a fun car to drive, allways something new to learn and try! I have had mine for two yrs. and have no problems in the mountains, even max.ed out in wt. The car handles well in the twisties to. The ride is a bit on the firm side. The car has never required a repair since purchase. Only 35,000 Kilomiters thou.. And I do live in the mountains! Hal

 

Hal-

Seems like I have more reading to do. So what type of mileage do you get in summer and winter?

Thanks again- we look forward to keeping our HCH for a long time.

 

Hi Mark;
My driving is allmost 100? highway ,so I do very well. Lots do much better. In the warmer mths. the car allways manages 50 + mpg US. In the winter mths. 45 mpg. I normally travel in the range of 55 to 60 mph. If you can keep your speed down around 50mph you can achieve very good #'s .H

 

Hal-

That is amazing for the mountains even on the highway. I thought the long climbs would have killed the mileage much worse even though you can coast on the downhill. I am looking forward to seeing what mileage my wife gets-now I wish I had one.

 

My best tank ever (62.4mpg) was on a camping trip up to Rocky Mountian National Park where we drove the HCH up to 11,000 feet loaded with camping gear. On another camping trip, we did some light duty "four wheeling" on some of the steep roads to get to the camp ground which dropped the SoC down all the way to one bar, but it went right up hills that I was pretty worried about. I have a post about this trip with pictures if you search.

On the way down, we frequently bounced off of max charge. As Harold noted, engine braking is great up until you hit your max, and then the car likes to roll pretty quickly--this takes about 1-2 miles of downhill depending on how many bars you start the hill with. You can shift into "L" at any speed though which will rev your engine way up and help keep your speed controlled. However, the little 1.3L engine doesn't have a lot of friction (generally a good thing, except on hills), so I find myself using the brakes more on the HCH than other cars (manuals) I've owned in the past.

I'm of the school of thought that says you NEVER use your brakes in the mountains--always use your engine--so the HCH has been a little bit of a learning thing for me. That being said, I've done descents from the top of Trail Ridge Rd (the highest paved Hwy in the US at 12-something thousand feet) down Boulder which is 5-something and the brakes felt fine the whole way, so my paranoia has been completly unfounded.

Back to the mileage though--my WORST tank has also been in the mountains (37.2mpg). This was with myself plus two biking friends on a trip to Idaho Springs with DH bikes on the roof. Between the weight and the increased air resistance, it was a lot for the little engine to cope with so it spent a lot of time in the 4,000rpm range on the way up. If you are driving a fully loaded car, or if you are intent on driving the speed limit, your mileage will suffer hugely in the mountains.

Most of my tank notes on my mpg log (click my signature) note how much of the tank was spent in the mountains so you can see a range of the mpgs. My general commuting is in the foot hills, so even if it doesn't specifically mention a trip to the mountains, all of my driving involves lots of ups and downs.

 

Great info! I will search for your thread and check your mileage charts. Getting 37 in the mountains would be perfect. We were looking hard at TDI's when we first felt we needed a new car for Kathleen. Just seemed the right tool for the job with all the torque they have. But Kathleen really wanted to get a car more eco friendly so it came down between the Prius and the HCH. Of the two it was no contest for me factoring all points including the looks and the blindspot. We were willing to give up a few mpg to gain less blind spots and to not draw attention to our desire to drive a hybrid. Now that we have heard from actual users I feel more comfortable believing that we made the correct choice.

thanks again to you and Hal.

 

We picked up our car in TN and drove it to our house in NC. Amazing - we got 56 mpg going through the mountains and over 200 miles we averaged 46 mpg driving. Much of this was from our house to places we had to go in town. Sort of got into the glide and the coast down hill pace. Also found that if I keep speed up rather then drive slow I got better mpg because I carried more speed through the mountain turns. The steering is very precise. All this with the Uniroyal-TigerPaw tires that the dealer put on to meet the "Certified" requirements. He had no idea about low rolling resistant tires that Honda would recommend. He just puts on the correct size and "equal quality" tires.

The car is very quiet until you get over 3K rpm and then a strong whirring noise comes up- not sure if it the CVS transmission or the assist motor. Also when breaking down a slow hill in the mountains we get a clicking buzz sound that the dealer service told us is due to the auto stop relay. We hardly ever hear it stopping on a flat road. Not sure if these are common noises but unlike our regular cars the HCH does get noisy above 3K rpm but is very very quiet under 3K.

I only wish we could charge up the traction battery at idle like the Prius since the hand book says we need to charge it up every 30 days or it will hurt the battery. I know Hal and other have said it should not deplete that fast-- Am I wrong about not being able to charge up the traction battery by idle. I gave the key to a neighbor but I do not like the idea that he may need to drive it if we cannot get down to NC in 30 days.

Thanks again for everyone's input