Honda Insight 1.3 IMA SE Hybrid (Hilarious car review!)

Times Online UK ^ | May 17, 2009 | Jeremy Clarkson

[Crazieman]

Much has been written about the Insight, Honda’s new low-priced hybrid. We’ve been told how much carbon dioxide it produces, how its dashboard encourages frugal driving by glowing green when you’re easy on the throttle and how it is the dawn of all things. The beginning of days.

So far, though, you have not been told what it’s like as a car; as a tool for moving you, your friends and your things from place to place.

So here goes. It’s terrible. Biblically terrible. Possibly the worst new car money can buy. It’s the first car I’ve ever considered crashing into a tree, on purpose, so I didn’t have to drive it any more.

The biggest problem, and it’s taken me a while to work this out, because all the other problems are so vast and so cancerous, is the gearbox. For reasons known only to itself, Honda has fitted the Insight with something called constantly variable transmission (CVT).

[Crazieman]

Verdict: 1/5 stars. Good only for parting the smug from their money

[pnh102]

This looks like a brazen ripoff of the Prius. And no I would not drive either car, or any hybrid vehicle.

[toomanygrasshoppers]

ping

[Slicksadick]

Clarkson writes auto reviews like Ann Coulter, very funny stuff.

[reagan_fanatic]

The nickel for the battery has to come from somewhere. Canada, usually. It has to be shipped to Japan, not on a sailing boat, I presume. And then it must be converted, not in a tree house, into a battery, and then that battery must be transported, not on an ox cart, to the Insight production plant in Suzuka. And then the finished car has to be shipped, not by Thor Heyerdahl, to Britain, where it can be transported, not by wind, to the home of a man with a beard who thinks he’s doing the world a favour.

LOL!!

[al_c]

So ... did the reviewer like it? /s

[VeniVidiVici]

A CVT? Gag. Most counter-intuitive technology ever developed. I really didn’t think I’d mind it much - till I drove one.

I couldn’t get out of the car fast enough. If I had bought it I would have gone batty within months.

[wbill]

Laugh out loud funny.

And the sound is worse. The Honda’s petrol engine is a much-shaved, built-for-economy, low-friction 1.3 that, at full chat, makes a noise worse than someone else’s crying baby on an airliner. It’s worse than the sound of your parachute failing to open. Really, to get an idea of how awful it is, you’d have to sit a dog on a ham slicer.

[Attention Surplus Disorder]

Jeremy is undoubtedly the guy who’s the host of “Top Gear”, the British car show which I’d try to catch when I was in Europe in 2005. You don’t have to have any particular interest in cars, he’s hilariously funny.

[Oldexpat]

Honda has given up on the hydrogen car and will not be selling any more hydrogen stations for home use. It just takes too much electricity to make hydrogen. It is a great fuel, but unfortunately it doesn’t grow on trees or come out of the ground.
Maybe, with enough nuclear power, you could make hydrogen and pipe it around, but that is way way off.
On the other hand..natural gas is available and is a good motor fuel. Pipeline already exist and all we need are more filling stations.

[Gay State Conservative]

It’s the first car I’ve ever considered crashing into a tree, on purpose, so I didn’t have to drive it any more.

Reminds me a bit of a review that the host of "Top Gear" (a great BBC car show) gave to a Renault.He didn't like it and made that clear during the review.To wrap things up he said (in that great British accent of his) "and like everything French,it smokes".Great line,IMO.

[businessprofessor]

It is a fantastic car. I encourage every leftist to buy one. I will recommend it to my leftist friends. The car is ideal for my leftist brother-in-law.

[mnehring]

Jeremy Clarkson is one of the funniest car writers on the planet.. kudos for still not bowing to the smugism of the enviroweenies.

[Crazieman]

Apparently this review is by the host of Top Gear. The same guy

[Heatseeker]

But let me be clear that hybrid cars are designed solely to milk the guilt genes of the smug and the foolish.

Pretty much sums it up.

[mnehring]

Clarkson writes auto reviews like Ann Coulter, very funny stuff.

You should hear him rail on about government regulations of driving and parking in London and on taxes..

[mnehring]

Same guy.

[Frantzie]

He is on in America on BBC America w/Top Gear. Hated Bush, most Americans and America. regularly bashes America to pander to his bosses at the “all white people are evil” BBC. Somewhat funny but a fat pompous arse.

James May on Top Gear is the funny one.

[mnehring]

Here are his other articles.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/system/topicRoot/The_wit_and_wisdom_of_Jeremy_Cl/

[Petronski]

Must-read Britwit!

And the sound is worse. The Honda’s petrol engine is a much-shaved, built-for-economy, low-friction 1.3 that, at full chat, makes a noise worse than someone else’s crying baby on an airliner. It’s worse than the sound of your parachute failing to open. Really, to get an idea of how awful it is, you’d have to sit a dog on a ham slicer.