Four Season Insight

I love my Honda Insight.  I love its minimalism.  I love its modern look.  I love the function over form engineering dripping from every aluminum widget.  And I love what it stands for: the first shot in the War for Sane Transportation.

What I do not love is driving it in Wisconsin Winters.  See, the original Bridgestones are still on the car.  They have 80k miles on them and will have enough tread to go another 50k at this

 rate.  They were specifically designed to be low rolling resistance, i.e. they are as hard as iron.  This makes them noisy, interesting in the rain, and downright unfun in snow.  They may have been fine new, but rubber compounds degrade over time and after 7 years mine have little grip left.  Last year during snows I would take our Forester to work, but now Sprout is in school and Mia needs it to take him in.  Though only one week of December is behind us we already have had 3 snows of over 2". Big Win for the aquifers, but my commute this time of year starts at 3:30am and roads are typically unplowed.  3 commutes with the only way to make a 90 degree turn consisted of grabbing the E-brake (every time) to swing the tail around once the front lost grip were enough to convince me I needed to do something or end up in a ditch-or worse.

Enter my new budget WinterForce snow tires.  You know you are a die hard hybrid driver when you mount knobby snow tires and think "my, these tires sure are quiet!".   Other than making my beloved Hybrid look like a Tonka Truck I am very impressed.   I did alot of reading about dedicated snow tires back when I was looking at rally racing my Evo 8 (yes I traded a modified 350 whp Evo 8 for a Honda Insight) and they were always billed as having surreal traction.  I must say that so far I am blown away by the difference!  

Case in point-today I went to visit the Hoop House north of town.  The property owner drives a Tacoma pickup and it wasn't until I entered his driveway that I remembered he doesn't plow.  The ruts were deep enough that I left a flat mark as the Insight's ground clearance was not sufficient, and then I ended up parking off the driveway in 8" deep snow covering the ice from last week's sleet storm.  After checking on the plants [The -4 degree night on Wed did the radishes in, but the beds are not frozen yet.  Outside air temp was 3 degrees, but despite it only being 9:30 am interior temp was already 28 degrees.  Spinach, mache, and claytonia are all small but fine!] I returned to the car and realized I was going to have to back up 250' or attempt a 3 point turn in the deep snow.  3 days ago I would spin all of 1st gear across plowed intersections, but despite cutting trail through deep snow I never spun a tire! 

I am sold: the Safety alone make it worth while.  Adding incredibly sticky tires has certainly hit my mileage... to the tune of about 10-15%.  But then again, the Forester gets 30 mpg on a good day, and with my "knobbies" on I was able to run errands today and still eked out 49 mpg.  I'll take it.

-Rob

Stumble It!

Hypermiling Returns!

Had the Insight in the shop this weekend while we visited family and my alma mater in South Dakota.  It had developed a periodic hesitation at light throttle (the sweet spot for mileage) that was getting worse.  My hunch was the EGR valve, and I pleased to find I was right.  I was wrong, though in thinking it was under my certified warranty-and the part is $220.  Ouch.  While it was in I had the tranny fluid changed as well as the engine fluid (it is cold and I am getting lazy).  I had them swap the tranny fluid for full synthetic and plumbed the engine full of Mobil 1 (as usual-it is good for 5% in mpg).  I have been looking forward to getting the more slippery tranny juice in for 20k miles.  And yes, I should get out more.

The results are fantastic, if based on very circumstantial evidence.  The 30 mile trip out (we live in the boonies-30 miles from a Honda dealer) was 62 mpg, trip back with the hesitation fixed and slippery new oils everywhere was almost 74 mpg. The mileage was impressive enough, but the feel is what has me jazzed.  It is almost as if the car has no static friction anymore.  I drafted semi's (as usual) to boost mileage, but this trip I was racking up 100+mpg on the inclines.  I held 110+ for over a mile on a very slight downhill.  I'm terribly excited about this!

On the less hyper mileage front I was able to beat the EPA again in our beloved Forester.  This Holiday's trip to South Dakota netted 31.5 mpg sustained for the 1000 miles.  The EPA says it should only be good for 28.  I love Foresters: AWD, enough power(170hp, but gobs of torque where you need it) to tow 8 whiskey barrels, 5 star safety rating for the kids, they can haul 160lbs of greyhounds in the hatch, standard roof rack for lumber, and we got our 2006 very nicely equipped for under $19500 with 1.9%.  Compare that to the hybrid 'utes which get similar mileage, but without the AWD for $6-10k more.  The Auto Industry needs to wake up and give us a 40mpg vehicle capable of moving 7 adults and/or towing 4000lbs.

The significant exception is the Toyota Highlander which gets slightly better mileage but can tow twice as much and can seat 7 in theory.  If I wasn't drooling over a used Passat Wagon TDI (38mpg and 250 ft/lbs of torque, but dang are they holding value!) which I will convert to veggie I would be looking for one of those used for my preferred Mulch Towing Vehicle.  However as we get closer to Someday and our farm I will most likely hold out for either a diesel truck to convert or an old carburetter truck that I will convert (along with my BCS) to run on "E100" that I hope to distill in my backyard from Sunchokes.  And no I am not kidding.

Good to have my Honda Insight back to full health again.  Would like to see another 90+ mpg commute before Winter sets in!

-Rob

Stumble It!

Honda Diesel?!

I know I have been off the energy posting kick lately in lieu of my market garden, but a rainbarrel client I delivered to today actually had a biodiesel distillery in his garage so naturally we talked that up for a bit. He assured me that Honda was less than a year away from releasing their rumoured diesel line so I figured Google and I had a date this evening. Here are the results:

Apparently Honda has been selling a diesel Civic in Europe for years that gets 43 city and 55 hwgy-but the marketing dorks don't think it will sell here because the German diesels of the 80's flopped. Business Week had a decent, but dated, article about it last year.

That provides some history, but it turns out that you can just go to Honda's site and read up a some on it as well. At right is their new i-DTEC engine. It is a 2nd generation 2.2 liter diesel that passes both Euro 6 and the even tougher Tier 2 EPA ratings for diesels. No specs are listed yet, but the other photos on the site show what looks to be a smart little turbo which should push the power ratings up into the 200hp/300lb-ft range-enough to power a CRV, Pilot, or (be still my heart!) an even Odyssey minivan with a bit more boost (or hybrid assist?). They are claiming that efficiency is improved-so we could be expect mileage for deisel Civics to beat the current hybrids, and CRV/Odyssey's to get mid/high 30's.

Honda is touting the i-DTEC in conjunction with their Honda Tourer concept, which looks like a slightly warmed over Mazda 6 wagon. That is not a bad thing as the Mazda is a prime seller and easy on the eyes. If Honda brings this state side we could be looking at a Camry Hybrid beating sedan/wagon with better power (I could tow barrels with it) and the ability to (I am conjecturing here) run on B100 with a true carbon neutral fuel print. If Honda keeps the weight an drag coefficient down, 40+mpg seems doable. This concept at the Frankfurt show was very, very polished-essentially a running prototype-my gearhead says we are looking at the 2009 model with some cosmetic changes.

Now if Honda has half a brain, it will partner their i-DTEC with their i-MA hybrid system and eck out an Insight beating Civic (65+mpg) that can run on pure B100 for essentially zero carbon emissions and reclaim their crown of King of the Hyper Milers. Put the iMA into their full line and you would find a 30% boost across the line-50mpg Accords and CRV's, and 40+mpg Minivans and Pilots-or a 70+mpg Fit. While I am wishing, nake the whole line plug in to boot!

Sticker price on this would be very high, which is the deal breaker, but come on Honda: Give Peace a Chance!

-Beo

Stumble It!

New MPG Record!

Its official-I am a Centurion!

Last Friday on a return trips from a garden install (yes I install gardens using an Insight!) I achieved the insane 102.2 MPG over the same 17 mile commute that I had previously achieved the impressive 92.8 numbers of LY.

Other than being able to apply all the subtle learning's that I have gained in the past 14 months of hypermiling, the single biggest difference is so simple as to be embarrassing. My commute has a 5 mile stretch that is hilly. Now I have always said that my record runs are not normal driving-I rarely break 55mph and I use back county roads, creeping up hills and coasting down them. But as these are public roads I would also always keep the speed over 45mph or so. That is absolutely fine with the exception of 3 of the hills that I must dip pretty hard into the throttle to maintain 45mph up the steeper inclines. For some reason this time I thought "Why not just throw the blinkers on and climb them at 100mpg?". What the hell! Actually on only one did I have to resort to the blinkers to get someone to pass as I crawled up at 39mph (in a 55 zone), but the mental shift of not having to dip into the gas engine was enough to earn me inclusion into that elite status of the 100+ MPG club.

I know this was a purely academic exercise, but the proof is there- 100mpg commuting is possible with current technology. Sure the commute took longer, but I made it from work to home, in an internal combustion powered car and averaged over 100mpg.

Be the Change.

Stumble It!

Insight Update: Return of the Hypermiler

So I am continuing to try to make the best of the heat, this time in getting back to hypermiling in the hybrid. Back when the weather was actually seasonal, I accepted the reality that my mileage was going to be crap (55-60mpg) for the winter as the warm-up mode of the engine took half my commute. That combined with the absence of the sun was enough to convince me to return to taking the freeway to work-the mileage was about the same even with the higher speeds, and the scenery the same.
But now its 50 degrees again, and yesterday I had to make 2 extra trips home during the day to care for my sick family (influenza all around and my 3yr old has mild pneumonia). So on the first trip home I decided to take my time and hit the backroads again.
Results? 91.4mpg on the trip out, and 88.7 (damn my lead foot!) on the way back in. So for my 34 mile round trip I used barely more than a 1/3 of a gallon. I am off my game though, (severe cramping in right calf) so if I mean to hit 100mpg this year I need to get serious again.
The kicker is that the 91.4 was probably a record run-but I had run a few errands in town first which hurt the trip mpg. The fact that I was hitting 125mpg in stretches I typically can only get 110 in was very encouraging. The new ecu and synthetic oil may do the trick!

-Beo

Stumble It!

Insight Update

So Honda discontinued the Insight in September of this year. Though terribly disappointing, with sales a pitiful 1000 cars ytd it is not a shock. I understand that to the typical consumer the benefits of an additional 10mpg over a Prius is not worth giving up the back seat, and that $19k for a commuter car is steep, but as I approach the end of my first year as an Insight owner I can't help but think that they are wrong.

As I have written before, trading my Evo 8 (basically a race car w/plates) for my Insight Hybrid (I still refer to it as my human race car) was both the cause and effect of a huge shift in my world view. First of all you are smaller. Certainly smaller than a Hemi Dodge, smaller than a minivan-heck you look up at Ford Focuses. I have found this to have a very calming effect on the ego. Next you are, well, slow. Wait, that isn't true. You are fast enough. In my 8,000 miles I have never once needed more power. I have driven the freeways of Chicago at 85mph, I have passed semi's on 2 lane highways, and I have driven thru sustained 45mph headwinds and massive sheets of rain. Having just enough power means that you start using just enough acceleration, in fact I coast alot. Again-very calming. My favorite feature is still the autostop. Back when the sun existed I would coast to a stop with the windows down, the ECU would kill the engine, and I would sit for a few breaths on my rural road commute and just soak up the crisp morning air and birdsong. Hybrids make me unhurried. Suddenly by giving up 230hp, I gained just enough power to stop to smell the roses.

This is my first winter in the Insight, and apparently the engineers were very concerned about the hybrid driver staying warm enough. The closed loop mode of that teensy 1000cc motor is brutal on mileage as the ECU dumps fuel into the engine trying desperately to warm up the coolant enough to produce heat. I have a 19 mile commute, and it take about 12 of those to get the Insight out of "warm up" mode so that it will get decent mileage again. The long and short of it is that for those first 12 miles I am getting about 45mpg, and even getting my typical 70 the last 6-7 only nets me about 55 total trip. This explains why the total lifetime mileage on the car is 59.5 and not the 70 I was used to getting-for 5 months out of the year I will be averaging under 60mpg. In the last 1/2 tank I have come to terms with that, and have stopped frantically staring at the mileage gauge in a vain hope to see it best 60mpg. And yes, I know I am a geek.

A year can change at. Last December I was dreaming about imported German Suspension kits and racing slicks, while also feeling terribly guilty about what the money should be going to in our family. Now I am installing a new compost bin at our church, researching deep mulch gardening, and attending study groups on Swedish Sustainability Models. Buying the Hybrid removed a lot of the dichotomies in my life-and allowed me to more fully embrace a more simple lifestyle and stop trying to be something I thought I wanted to be. How many of our societal problems share the same simple solution?

Be the Change.

Stumble It!

Back in the Saddle

62.5

Not a number I think of much, but given the fact that it represents the miles per gallon on the trip home with my refurbished and beloved Insight I am elated to see it shining back at me from the dash. It was also literally double the number that the rental Chevy HHR put up on the same trip.

As a refresh, over 3 weeks ago a field mouse had eaten thru much of the engine harness on the Insight, taking out a fuel injector in the mix. That little rodent ended up causing over $3000 worth of damage-even with used parts. The wiring harness was toast, so that was replaced. When it was all hooked up it became apparent that the ECU unit had shorted. Another week to source one, and then after that was in and we discovered that the bad ECU had sent enough nastiness thru the system to fry the first catalytic converter. The first 2 repairs were under my comprehensive insurance (thanks State Farm!) and the third was under my Honda Certified Warranty. Let it not be said the hybrid caused the 3 week turn around-each part had to be approved by the insurance-adding 4-5 days each time.

Of course the battery was dead when I picked it up, but once it was recharged (20 miles under light charging) it appears to be running smoother than ever. Like 110mpg around town in 4th gear, and a steady 75mpg while accelerating up the very slight incline in town.

It's good to be back!

Stumble It!