2016 Honda Cr-v on 2040-cars

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Honda lets us 'drive' the FCEV; PHEV with 40-mile EV range

Blue skies for our children. That's Honda's wonderfully Japanese/English slogan that it uses as a fresh shibboleth to describe the company's plan for the future. It's vague enough to be positive, positive enough to be corporate, and corporate enough to be repeated in presentations around the world. I've certainly heard it a million times. The 2015 Honda Meeting in Utsunomiya, Japan this week was, thankfully, held under a brilliant blue autumn sky, on Honda's R&D track filled with the roar of short test drives in the NSX hybrid and the deafening electric silence of the upcoming hydrogen fuel cell FCEV. But that wasn't all. The amount of technical information Honda offered to visiting journalists during the Meeting was nothing short of overwhelming, which is why I'm glad that Autoblog editor Seyth Miersma was along for the ride. We were both at the same event, but we paid special attention to very different things. You can read his take on the four-motor CR-Z EV and the NSX, among other things, here, and get my take on a bunch of Honda's green news below. Honda calls the FCEV the "ultimate clean performance" vehicle. Honda FCEV: A Short First Crack At Honda's "Ultimate" Vehicle Sure, I got to take a lap in the NSX, but the FCEV was my highlight of the event. This was the first time Honda has let outsiders test drive the upcoming fuel cell vehicle, which the company calls the "ultimate clean performance" vehicle and which is due in the US in next year after a launch in Japan in the spring of 2016. The bad news is that the entire length of the test drive was a measly kilometer, totally straight, with one U-turn at the half-way point. So, even though I went through the course three times (two more than originally scheduled), I can't really say I know how the car drives. What I can tell you is that there are two drive modes, normal and sport, with the main difference being that sport offers stronger regenerative braking and a bit quicker acceleration response. The higher regen level does not allow for one-foot driving, sadly. There's a blue orb that glows in the digital dashboard to indicate the power output of the fuel cell stack (not the motor), so even though the car is fairly quiet as you drive, there's some minimal level of connection between the driver and the "engine." Creature comforts include Honda's excellent LaneWatch and a glossy touch screen for the infotainment system.

Honda thumbs nose at fleet sales, claims it leads in key vehicle segments

Fleet sales are a way of life in the automotive industry. There are many non-retail customers that need vehicles, but going too far can reduce brand image and vehicle resale value. While some of its competitors have fleet sale that account for up to 20 or 30 of overall sales, Honda is bragging that it has the lowest fleet sales of all mainstream automakers for the first five months of 2013.
After calculating new-car registration data from R.L. Polk, Honda says that just two percent of its sales through went to fleet customers compared to an industry average of 19 percent. Even though this means Honda leaves plenty of sales on the table each month, it also claims to have the highest resale value and lowest cost of ownership among its competitors. In terms of retail sales, Honda says that the Civic, Accord, CR-V and Odyssey all lead their respective segments, and it breaks down/brags about its retail sales success in the press release, which is posted below.

These were our favorite cars of 2022

Favorite cars is different than best cars. The idea of "best" can speak to value and overall competitiveness in a given vehicle segment. There's lots of objectivity involved and to do a "best" list right, one really must be very thorough and as scientific as possible. This is not that list. This is about our favorites, so objectivity be damned. If we liked a Challenger Hellcat because it made loud noises or a Honda Odyssey because it made for a particularly special family vacation, fair game. These were the cars that most spoke to our collection of editors and the ones that stayed in our minds and hung in our hearts long after they left our driveway. — Senior Editor James Riswick 2022 GMC Hummer EV Senior Editor, Green, John Beltz Snyder: I didn't particularly expect to like the new Hummer. I wasn't a fan of the Hummer H2 or H3, so I wasn't automatically enthusiastic about this electric reboot. Fast EVs aren't hard to come by — and, in fact, may be too easy to come by — so its performance specs weren't enough to win me over. Despite videos to the contrary, pickups aren't my favorite vehicular format. And its excessive size and weight turned me off ... until I finally got behind the wheel.  This thing is wildly entertaining to drive. Watts to Freedom launch control is a neat party trick, sure, but the novelty wears off quickly. The novelty of Crab Walk, however, has staying power. The rear-wheel steering makes this behemoth feel much smaller than it is — the maneuverability is incredible, and useful. The air suspension provides tons of clearance, including a ridiculously high-riding Extract mode. I can't wait for lesser versions of the Hummer to make their way to market. Give me less power (for less money), but keep the off-road tricks onboard, and I'll be a happy camper. Senior Editor, Consumer, Jeremy Korzeniewski: If I could afford to put one of these in my driveway, I would. Sadly, I can't, so I won't (What's that, Janet? I got the lyric wrong?). Still, I love the dumb thing. Thankfully, I have another choice down below. 2022 Porsche 911 GT3 Associate Editor Byron Hurd: Yeah, duh, Porsches are good. But there's good, and then there's GT3. This is the feeling every performance-oriented RWD tuner is trying to replicate. This is hard, precise, surgical and immensely satisfying. To begin to explore this car on a public road is by itself an admission that you believe yourself to be above the rules as they apply to normal drivers.