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Over the last few years with the rising cost of petrol, road
tax and environmental concerns I had been looking at replacing my gas guzzling
luxury Saab 9000 Aero with something a little more sedate and cheaper to run. I
had not thought much about Hybrids until I came across a website
www.insightcentral.net extolling the virtues of a virtually unknown (to me) car
which achieved amazing economy (83mpg combined UK cycle). I read almost
everything on this informative site, and found out the “Honda Insight” as it was
called, introduced in 1999, was an Aluminium, ultra light, futuristic looking,
ultra low emission, petrol electric, two seater (Hybrid). Note the Insight is
not a true "Hybrid" even though it has a petrol/electric power plant, because it
cannot run on electric drive only, the electric motor assists the IC engine. The
UK cars are classed as "petrol" on the registration documents, and are not
exempt from emissions test during the MOT like the Toyota Prius.
I knew some had been sold in the UK, but not how few :o until I wrote to DVLA in
April 2005, who told me there were only 257 registered in the UK, and of these
only about 70 were genuine UK spec cars (there are some subtle differences), the
rest were imports. I convinced my wife we should test drive one, and see if we
could fit in it! I am 6’4” and my wife is 6’1”. After a few months searching on
the UK Honda website and Autotrader in late 2005 a Blue 2001 25,000 mile UK spec
car came up in Lancashire at the Lancaster Honda dealer for £6999. We zipped
over in the Saab and to our surprise we could fit in it easily, and liked the
quirky styling. The car had been traded in by a very happy owner who I later
corresponded with, he had just bought a brand new Insight, and one of the last
new UK Insights to be sold in the UK. Sadly Honda stopped production of the car
in mid 2006 with less than 15,000 produced in total, the current Civic IMA
alternative is not a patch on it.
On the 100 mile drive home in my new toy, I as an inexperienced owner managed
80mpg, whilst the Saab guzzled three times a much fuel. It had to go, and did a
few days later. I quickly realised after a few days that a new obsession was
going to consume me in the future, “Hypermiling” i.e. achieving the best mpg I
could whatever the cost! Over the next few months with info gleaned from helpful
owners worldwide, I built up lot of experience with all the cars little tricks
and quirks. The manual version of the Insight has a feature called “lean burn”
which enables the engine when warm to operate with an ultra lean air/fuel ratio
of upto 25:1 for quite long periods. This effect also includes a catalyst purging 5
second rich burn cycle every couple of minutes to clear the Cat of Nox built up,
but captured during lean burn. The effect of this clever system means mpg can be
pushed to over 100mpg for long periods on suitable roads/terrain at speeds of up
to 65mph. My mpg steadily improved into the high 80’s and then low 90’s over the
next few months, and we trundled down to the Dordogne in France for a touring
holiday in the car. It cost £100 in petrol for our two week trip of nearly 1700
miles at an average of 95mpg. (I've since completed a number of other touring
holidays including one to the Western Islands and Scotland when we
averaged over 100mpg)
After this revelation in economy motoring my wife’s fairly frugal Vauxhall Corsa
also had to go, so a search started for a second UK car. I found a 2002 regd
65,000 mile UK one on E-Bay in early 2006 and sniped it for £6200. We duly drove
down 200 miles in the blue Insight to collect the new yellow one, our Insight
convoy on the way back was probably a UK first, and had drivers rubber necking
at the strange sight. The Corsa went the same way as the Saab and sold a few
days later. We now owned three vehicles, two UK Insight’s and my EV all tax
free. Post March 2001 Insight’s are in emissions band A <100g CO2/Km (80g/km in
fact), and tax is free (Also exempt from congestion charge in London at present). Pre March
2001 cars fall into the £110 tax trap as do early Toyota Prius models. Make sure
you buy a post March 2001 manual car if you can.
In search of ultimate mpg I found it was vital to run only the 165/65R14 low
rolling resistance Oem Bridgestone tyres which had been created specially for
the car. Non Oem tyres are an instant 5-10mpg mpg hit. They aren’t expensive at
only £35.00 each, but need to be pumped up to a rock hard 50-55psi for ultimate
economy.
Achieving good Economy in any vehicle is not rocket science, it’s simple physics
we can all appreciate, slowing down is the biggest plus, and I drive now at
40-55mph. The Insight drag factor of 0.25cd, the lowest for any production car
in the world helps, as does it’s light weight (850kg), LRR tyres and strange
aerodynamic rear wheel covers. The high tec 1.0L 3 cylinder Vtec 67bhp engine is
a work of art with con rods like matchsticks to reduce weight, and a 10kw
permanent-magnet brushless DC 3 phase motor serving as the integrated flywheel.
The integrated motor assist or IMA electric motor assists the IC engine when the
load is high during acceleration and hill climbing, normal cruising power is
provided solely by the IC engine, deceleration or braking forces the motor into
regeneration mode and the energy is captured in the 144v 120 D cell Nimh battery
pack for the next period of high demand.
The electric motor does not drive the vehicle on it’s own at anytime. In fact
the battery pack, made up of 120x6.5ah Panasonic Nimh D cells capable of 100A
discharge, and 50A charge rates, only allows a usable capacity of 4ah for longer
life, so even if a pure EV mode was available, range would be very limited, to
perhaps a couple of miles at most. (Insight enthusiasts worldwide including
myself are investigating additional battery capacity projects)
As my wife and I gained more experience with the cars our mpg settled down over
our daily commutes to high 90’s for me (13 mile commute) and high 80’s for her,
(my wife only has a short 5 mile commute to the train station, sadly on a very
bad road for cycling, and this is a problem as the car does not get warmed up
during winter) The Insight burns so little fuel, there is not much spare heat in
the engine to warm the interior on short journeys. In fact both cars have most
of the radiator blocked off during winter giving a 10mpg improvement over standard (Another
trick gleaned from users worldwide).
Another way to improve mpg has been to add a warm air intake to the cars, using
the waste heat around the exhaust manifold. A higher temp at the air intake
improves combustion efficiency at the expense of power, exactly what these cars
are about, and the opposite of what a lot of people try to achieve by forcing
cool air into the intake to increase charge density and power.
I have installed (01/08/07) an additional computer giving full control over
the integrated motor control system, this allows full electrical assist or
regeneration on demand, overriding the conservative Honda settings. This extra
subtle fingertip joystick control has improved mpg by about 10%, as assist can
be used more aggressively to overcome hills without recourse to increased fuel
consumption, this extra battery power used can then be replenished gently on
more suitable terrain during the journey. The system is called MIMA (Manual
integrated motor assist) full details can be obtained from Insight Guru and
creator Mike Dabrowski’s website at
www.99mpg.com.
In the future I plan to install a 2L thermos system to retain hot engine coolant
between journeys, a straight lift from the Toyota Prius which uses the system on
versions sold in some regions to improve economy. Basically after a journey hot
coolant is pumped from the engine into the 3L thermos, when you start the
vehicle the next day the hot coolant is pumped back into the engine before it
starts, instant interior heat, increased efficiency and faster warm up time. I
have the parts, just need to get time to fit it, I will be very interested to
see what difference it makes to my wife’s five mile winter commute mpg figures.
I also plan to install a bigger Li-Ion battery pack, making my Insight a PHEV
(Plug in hybrid electric vehicle) This will push mpg towards 150mpg and
beyond!!!
What’s the car like to drive?
Well it can be driven fast making full use of the 10 second
0-60mph time and 115mph top speed,
or it can be driven very conservatively like I do to achieve maximum mpg. Driven
hard 2nd gear is good for 72mph at the 6200rpm rev limiter, and is the main
overtaking gear, 3rd to 5th are all long legged fuel savers. You can drive it
comfortably from 30 mph in 5th gear, and I rarely change gear once in top, the
electric motor providing the additional torque to make this possible. The IC
engine turns itself off below 20mph when approaching junctions with the clutch
depressed or stopped to save a few more drops of precious fuel, and it
automatically restarts using the IMA motor when you engage first gear to move
off. The normal rear springs are quite weak, and the load carrying is limited to
about 400lbs as standard with a lot of bottoming out when carrying two heavier
than average 15st UK giants!
I swapped the rear springs for those from a scrapped Daewoo Matiz, these have
the same free length as the Insight one's, but are thicker and about 30% higher
rated. No problem with my rear end now! The car will under steer when pushed
hard into corners, but no more than any other front wheel drive vehicle, and
certainly much less than the Saab I used to own. The car has no toe in or out at
the front (for economy) and steering on rutted or lined roads is entertaining
until you get used to it :shock: as it wants to follow these imperfections.
Parts and servicing are no more expensive than any other Honda, their reputation
for reliability is second to none. There are no Non-Oem after market parts
available due to the very limited production numbers, so every thing is genuine
Honda and usually arrives the next day from my helpful local dealer. An oil
filter and 2.5L of the sewing machine like 0W-20 synthetic oil every 9000 miles
is about it, at a cost of around £35.00.
A great 15minute dealer video on the UK Honda Insight is available here
Honda Insight Dealer Video
A great 35minute technical video on the UK Honda Insight is available here
Video
about the technical details of the Insight.
A couple of other useful links here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_Insight
http://www.evo.co.uk/carreviews/evolongtermtests/19405/honda_insight.html
In conclusion I could never go back to “Normal” mpg ever again, I have been well
and truly spoilt. The cars are fantastic low speed (45-60mph) long distance
tourers. Some American owners make even my impressive UK 100mpg+ figures seem feeble
in comparison, as crusing at low speed unhindered on the flat central plains in
high temps gives a few US "hypermilers" well over 100mpg per US gallon (3.78L)
in daily use! Some even keep the fuel gauge pegged at it's maximum 150mpg for
mile after mile. With petrol in the UK passed £5.00 a gallon, now is def the
time to buy an Insight if you can find one.
My cars lifetime fuel consumption is 93.7mpg over 95,000 miles, and climbing
slowly as my hypermiling techniques counteract the previous owners heavy right
footed driving style. If you can make do with a lightweight, rust proof, two
seater coupe, want to stand out from the crowd in a car that looks like it came
from the Gerry Anderson props dept, and save lot's of money I can highly
recommend them! If you want a ride in one, and are up in North Yorkshire drop me
an e-mail, it would be my pleasure. Hat’s off to Honda for designing such a
unique futuristic and impressive vehicle. Peter Perkins 10/05/08 |