I picked up my new Opal Silver Blue 2006 HCH three days ago and finished the first tank today, which is what I was waiting for before writing a review. I'll edit this if I think of anything else to add, and of course I've only been driving the car for a few days so take that for what you will.

Pictures: side, side, rear, rear, front, front, nighttime shot of the interior controls.

Steering: Excellent and much better than I remember of the first-generation's. It's exceptionally smooth with no dead zone and a tight steering ratio; cornering is very easy with it.

Braking: Uneven. With constant pressure on the brake pedal, the car decelerates at a good pace until it gets down to a certain speed, at which point the braking suddenly lets up alot. So I press harder and it decelerates at a good pace some more until I get down to around 5 mph, at which point it lets up once again. It's quite disconcerting the way it suddenly does this; you can run into the car in front of you if you don't quickly respond with more pressure on the pedal.

Acceleration: Excellent. Not only can the car spring quickly from 70 to 80 to 90 if you need it to, but the wonderful thing about the CVT is you can choose to accelerate at 3000 rpm, at 4000 rpm, at 6000 rpm, etc. It just depends on how hard you press on the gas pedal and you can keep the engine at a constant rotation as you accelerate, or even let the engine decelerate while you accelerate. It's really weird. Of course higher RPMs means faster acceleration, while lower RPMs means increased fuel efficiency (although it's always going to be fairly low anytime you accelerate or go uphill, regardless of speed). And it's impossible to hear the electric motors; the only way to tell they're on is to look at the gauge on the dashboard.

Cruising: Good. The ride is very quiet for an economy car and it's extremely smooth. Speed bumps are not spine-smashing the way they are on some cars, either. I did notice a sense of slipperiness on the highway, mainly when turning gently like to follow a curved section of the interstate, but that's probably tire-related and it's possible mine were underinflated a little. In any case, replacing the tires is always an option if it comes to that.

Exterior design: Very good, though obviously this is subjective. But you can see how it looks for yourself.

Interior design: Perfect. This too is subjective, but I love everything about it. I won't dwell on too much here since you can see pictures of it yourself, but the two front cup-holders are large, deep, and very sturdy, and they don't obstruct anything. The center console is huge and the top can slide forward to act as an armrest. It covers one of the cup-holders but it's high up enough that nearly all drinks can still fit in the cup-holder even so. (But you can't access that drink until you swing the console cover back.) There's also an uncovered storage space in front of the shifter, good for storing candy or a cellphone.

Additionally, the seats are comfortable and the view out the front windshield is excellent (impressive, considering it's so heavily slanted). And the nighttime illumination is excellent; all the controls are lit up in a unique teal color. This includes those mounted on the steering wheel, although they're much dimmer than the others, but probably on purpose.

One interesting feature is that there are three modes each for automatic door locking and unlocking. By default the doors neither lock nor unlock automatically, but browsing through the instruction manual revealed the alternate modes, the activation of which you will never figure out in a million years without seeing the manual. It involves a very bizarre ritual each time you want to change the current mode, but you only have to do it once. The locking modes are: disabled (default), when you reach 9+ mph, or when you shift out of Park. The unlocking modes are: disabled (default), when you use the key to turn the engine off, or when you shift into Park. I mention this because I thought it was missing until I discovered it was simply disabled, and I think the available options are an example of the thought Honda put into the vehicle.

Mileage: Saved for last because I really don't have enough data to comment on this. My first tank was 37.9 but I averaged 32 mpg for the first half, and started out just getting 27 mpg. I averaged over 36 mpg only during the last quarter; the engine simply needed to break in. I expect improvements over the next few tanks, but we shall see. (Note: Others on this forum already reported results between 41 and 54 mpg for the first tank.) On this tank, I'd drive on the highway at 80 mph when possible, though traffic confined me to 70 mph a number of times, and I'd go roughly 10 mph over the speed limit on other roads. I accelerated usually at 3000-4000 rpm. I never used any hypermiler tricks and always kept up with traffic (or passed it).

I will mention that using A/C appeared to make little or no difference, even though the instruction manual warns that it can hurt FE alot, and the engine runs nearly all the time. Do not expect this car to behave like a Prius; the motors are used just for assistance. It's possible to run the car at a slow and steady speed without the engine but it's difficult to enter this mode and it requires a steady and slow speed and a level road, so few people will ever really get to use it. Basically it feels like it was thrown in there only so people can call the car a full hybrid, but I wouldn't say it is.

Miscellaneous: I remembered one drawback: the radio antenna. Its reception is crap. Radio stations that came in clearly in my previous car are staticky at best, literally pure static at worst. A station might come in clearly in one area but turn to static 10 miles away. Hopefully this could be fixed by replacing it (it's a bit stubby, after all); the worst-case possibility is that the battery is causing the interference and there's nothing that can be done about it.

 

Is the braking more uneven than that of the HCH-I (from what you can remember)? It took me a while to adjust to the time points at which regen would kick out and leave me only with regular brakes (and thus having to quickly add just a little more pedal pressure), but now I don't even notice anymore.

 

I remember the first-generation HCH having very smooth braking, though I had complaints about the Prius' brakes. Possibly it needs to break in more but I doubt it.

 

Nice review, CGameProgrammer. I'm curious, what kind of mileage are you hoping to get with your driving style once it's broken in?

I haven't noticed the non-linearity with the brakes, but I might just be subconciously adjusting for it. I'll watch for that.

 

I would like the average to be firmly in the 40s, especially when driving on the highway. I suppose I'm not really that far from that target, but the highway mileage can still be discouraging, especially considering I've been driving with a light foot... just enough to keep from decelerating below 77 mph basically. However I looked at my tires just now and they might be underinflated, so on Sunday I'll go get them checked and inflated. Break-in very obviously was relevant as well since I never get the 27 mpg I was getting for a while during the beginning of the first tank, and I assume performance will improve further...

 

anything beyond 60 mphs is a waste, lucky in canada everyone is happy with 60 ahem... 100 km/h ;P

stop fighting that areoydanmic drag! stay in 60's in hwy and 35 in city for best FE!

 

Yes, the faster you try to go, the more the air trys to stop you.

D=Cd x A x r x V^2/2

D= drag
Cd= coeff of drag
A = area
r = air density
V = velocity

Big big difference going 80 than 60mph....especially with head or cross winds...

 

True, I was able to get 51 MPG on my 35 mile commute (all freeway) by doing nothing more than setting the cruise control at 65. The car did the rest on it's own

 

Hey Guys; Thanks for the Updates:


Terry

 

I really didn't see any significant improvement from going 60. Well I'll keep you posted.