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2015 Honda Fit production gets underway in Mexico

After two years of construction, Honda's new factory in Celaya, Mexico, has officially begun production of the all-new 2015 Fit in North America. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and Honda President and CEO Takanobu Ito both attended the opening and watched the first Fit roll off the line at the $800-million plant. Later this year, Honda will add production of its new Vezel small crossover to the new facility, though the latter is expected to be marketed in North America under a new name.
The Celaya factory will specialize in building subcompact cars by employing cutting-edge tech to use less material and less energy during production. Honda is still constructing a $470-million transmission plant on the campus to build continuously variable transmissions in the second half of 2015. When it's finished, it is expected to have an annual capacity of 200,000 vehicles and employ 3,200 people.
With the facility's completion, Honda now has a 1.92-million unit annual production capacity in North America, and it claims that when Celaya reaches full production, 95-percent of vehicles sold in the US will be built in North America. The new Fit has already proven quite popular in Japan, and now we will have to wait and see if North American buyers embrace it as well. The first new Fit customer cars will hit the roads later this spring, and as Honda spokesman Steve Kinkade tells Autoblog, all Fit models sold in North American will be built at the plant. Scroll down to read the full press release about the Fit and its new Mexican home.

2015 Honda Fit earns 5 Stars from NHTSA

Honda's emergency redesign of the new Fit's front end not only had a positive effect on its scores from Insurance Institute for Highway Safety – it recorded a Top Safety Pick after being retested – but it helped the compact hatch record an impressive NCAP five-star safety rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Those are two significant achievements for the Fit, and surprise, surprise, the Honda was quick to tout the news. "The Fit shows that owning a smaller car doesn't mean you need to skimp on space, comfort or crashworthiness," said Honda's VP of auto operations Art St. Cyr. "Honda's commitment to the safety of our customers and other road users is second to none, and the Fit demonstrates this commitment in a powerful way." Check out the official PR on the NHTSA announcement, available below. All-New 2015 Honda Fit Achieves Highest Overall Vehicle Score from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Feb 2, 2015 - TORRANCE, Calif. Subcompact Fit achieves both an NCAP 5-Star Overall Vehicle Score and an IIHS TOP SAFETY PICK rating Fit is the fifth Honda vehicle for 2015 to achieve top crash safety ratings from both from IIHS and NHTSA The spacious, fuel-efficient and versatile 2015 Honda Fit (http://automobiles.honda.com/fit/), has received a 5-Star Overall Vehicle Score, the top score available in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) New Car Assessment Program (NCAP). The Fit, completely redesigned in 2014, earns both a TOP SAFETY PICK rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) and a NCAP 5-Star Overall Vehicle Score from NHTSA for 2015, making it even more of a standout choice in its segment. "The Fit shows that owning a smaller car doesn't mean you need to skimp on space, comfort or crashworthiness," said Art St. Cyr, vice president of auto operations at American Honda Motor Co., Inc. "Honda's commitment to the safety of our customers and other road users is second to none, and the Fit demonstrates this commitment in a powerful way." Already the benchmark subcompact in terms of passenger and cargo space and innovative features, occupant safety features for the 2015 Honda Fit are further enhanced through the next-generation Advanced Compatibility Engineering™ (ACE™) body structure. The ACE™ body structure improves frontal crash energy management through a wider range of offset and oblique collision modes.

2017 Honda Accord Hybrid comes with $300 price hike

The 2017 Honda Accord Hybrid went on sale at US dealerships today with an MSRP of $29,605, or $300 more than the 2016 model. Among other new bells and whistles, the sedan, which is available in three trims, includes features such as front and rear parking sensors, remote engine start, heated rear seats, and rain sensing wipers, not to mention the "elegantly contoured" aluminum hood. Honda Sensing driver-assist features are now part of the standard equipment package, while the EX-L version includes touchscreen interface with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto capability. Honda revealed details about the model in April, saying at the time that it had a combined fuel-economy rating of 48 miles per gallon. Honda notes that rating can't be compared to the 2016 model-year's fuel economy because of "new more stringent ratings requirements enacted by the US EPA," though has estimated that, apples to apples, the fuel-economy of the 2017 version is up about four percent. That, even though the car's horsepower is also increased about eight percent to 212. The new price tag means the Accord Hybrid will start about $1,600 higher than the Toyota Camry Hybrid. That model kept its pricing at $27,625 for the 2017 model year. Regardless, Honda is hoping to goose its hybrid sales with the updated model. Honda and its Acura division's hybrid sales through May plunged 79 percent from a year earlier to 1,975 units. Last year, Honda sold 11,063 Accord Hybrids, down 21 percent from a year earlier. By comparison, Toyota sold 30,640 Camry Hybrid's last year, marking a 22 percent drop from 2014. Meantime, take a look at Honda's press release below. Related Video: Honda Launches 2017 Accord Hybrid: America's Most Sophisticated, Powerful and Fuel Efficient Midsize Hybrid Sedan Jun 15, 2016 - TORRANCE, Calif. Next-generation two-motor hybrid powertrain with class-leading 212 horsepower and top-in-class EPA fuel economy ratings of 49/47/48 mpg1 Dynamic new styling and advanced features including standard Honda Sensing™ technology, plus available Display Audio with Apple CarPlay™ and Android Auto™ America's best-selling midsize sedan bolsters its resume for 2016 with the arrival of the restyled and reengineered 2017 Accord Hybrid, America's most powerful and fuel-efficient midsize hybrid sedan, launching today at Honda dealerships nationwide.