![]() ![]() Still, there's room for five adults to ride in moderate comfort. Since the Civic sedan has a trunk, it can't hold as much as the Prius hatchback, particularly because the hybrid batteries reside in the back-thus, you can't fold the rear seats flat. The 2,750-pound Civic is rated as a compact car by the EPA, and despite weighing 100 pounds less than the Prius, the Civic Hybrid is actually slightly longer than its Toyota counterpart. Honda also makes a model with an electronically controlled continuous variable automatic transmission that better uses the engine's available torque, but it's even slower and eats up 4mpg of the hybrid fuel economy advantage. Our real-world fuel economy test yielded 41.6mpg, much better than the standard Civic, which is rated for 36mpg and 44mpg (city and highway, respectively) by the Environmental Protection Agency, but well off the pace set by the Prius the Prius can go for a 550-mile journey on a tank of fuel. Equipped with rear drum brakes, the Civic stops in just 135 feet from 60mph, a good 20 feet shorter than the Prius, which can be the difference between an accident and driving away. Its MacPherson strut front and double wishbone rear suspension hug the road, but at 60mph, the car registers an annoyingly loud 75dBA (decibels adjusted), with a lot of road noise transferred into the cabin. The Civic Hybrid can get to 60 miles per hour with a little wheel spin in a leisurely 12.1 seconds-1.8 seconds slower than the Prius-but compensates by being able to go from 30mph to 50mph in 4.9 seconds (the Prius took 7 seconds). ![]() The Civic's engine freely revs to its 6,000rpm redline and has a throaty exhaust note that will thrill car buffs, especially compared to the Prius's quiet efficiency. As a result, to get going, you have to gun the engine and gingerly slip the clutch pedal of the five-speed transmission out so as not to stall it. The IMA concept seems straightforward and sensible on paper, but on the road, the Civic's gas engine doesn't produce enough torque at low engine speeds, even with the assistance of the electric motor. In other words, the motor is as an electric turbocharger that boosts the Civic's gas engine from 85 horsepower to 93 horsepower when needed. ![]() It's different from a full hybrid power train unlike the Prius-which has two power plants (gas and electric) that work alone or together-the Civic's gas engine is the star, and the electric motor is a supporting actor who occasionally takes the stage. The driving force behind Honda's hybrids-Civic, Accord, and Insight-is a technology called integrated motor assist (IMA), wherein a small electric motor gives the car's 1.3-liter gasoline engine a little help. With a price of $19,900 ($20,415 delivered), the Civic Hybrid with a five-speed manual transmission costs $6,000 more than an entry-level Civic but comes in at about $1,000 less than the Toyota Prius's base price. True, the Civic Hybrid goes farther on a gallon of gas than its nonhybrid version, but it's slow and, in most areas, comes in a distant second to the Toyota Prius. But after putting hundreds of miles on a Civic Hybrid, we think Honda would have done better by starting with a blank slate. The company added an electric motor to a downsized version of the Civic's drivetrain to create a mild hybrid that's kinder to the environment. Rather than start from scratch to create an all-new hybrid vehicle as Toyota did with the Prius, Honda took a more conservative route by hybridizing its popular Civic. ![]()
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