Gauge Match
By Chris Walton, Chief Road Test Editor
Date posted: 08-03-2008


Consider this: The 2008 Toyota Prius base model costs 50 percent more than the 2008 Honda Fit base model. Then again, the Prius is 50 percent more fuel-efficient than the Fit when you look at the EPA's figure for combined mpg. So how does this add up?

You could save $8,425 right now by buying a $15,420 Honda Fit instead of the $23,845 Toyota Prius. Of course, if the price of gasoline goes higher, then the Prius with its EPA combined estimate of 46 mpg will pay you back for your investment sooner than you'd expect. Then again, the Fit with its EPA combined estimate of 30 mpg doesn't carry the same penalty of higher financing charges, insurance costs and taxes as the more expensive Prius, plus the Toyota will be needing a new $2,585 battery pack when the odometer shows 100,000-150,000 miles.

Which car is best? It sounds like the kind of question for one of those money magazines. Yes, we've painted ourselves into a bit of a projected-cost corner with this comparison of the base models of the 2008 Honda Fit and 2008 Toyota Prius, but we think we can get out without stepping on too much wet paint.

It's, Like, Driving, You Know?
Driving a Toyota Prius is kind of the same thing as bowling with a Nintendo Wii. Sure, a Prius has four wheels, two pedals and a steering wheel, but it doesn't have the same bite of reality as hurling a 16-pound Brunswick Fury Pearl down the lane.

To start with, its key isn't even a key; it's a smooth, rubbery fob that you stick in the dash. Press the On button, various lights appear at the base of the windshield, and you jiggle a joystick protruding from the dashboard to select a gear.

You'll notice there are no distinct gear selections as you've grown to expect with forward progress. Instead, the Prius wills itself down Main Street, or perhaps it's drawn to the other side of town by a tractor beam. Occasionally, the gasoline engine will wake up with a twitch, and shiver like it just got goose bumps. "Did you just feel something?" your passengers will ask.

But the Prius isn't all that slow when you press the accelerator to the floor. Through a complicated, continuously variable planetary gearset, the Prius can simultaneously dump all its available electricity while maxing the gasoline engine's output of 75 horsepower at 5,000 rpm. With a combined/blended output of 110 hp, zero to 60 mph will take just 10.1 seconds (9.7 seconds with 1 foot of rollout like on a drag strip).

When the "Slow! Kid Zone" speed bump arrives, you'll press the brake pedal and notice a slight whirring sound and gentle, linear slowing. That's the regenerative brake function at work, which is effectively like winding an electric motor backward to make electricity. Then right before you almost rear end your neighbor's Camry, there's a moment of perceived horizontal free fall when the Prius switches to traditional mechanical brakes between 5 mph and zero. Our best stop from 60 mph consumed 125 feet.

Light Effort
As you begin to twist the Prius' steering wheel, you'll find little resistance. This electric-assisted power steering has a 19:1 steering ratio, one of the slowest we've ever seen. You need to spin the springy wheel almost four times around to do a U-turn in 34 feet.

It turns out the Prius is rather nimble despite its woozy Novocain-filled controls. The base model 2008 Toyota Prius doesn't have electronic stability control, and our skid pad results show 0.78g in lateral grip compared to a 0.71g registered for a Prius with stability control. The base model Prius weaves through the cones at 63.3 mph compared to the frustrating fight with stability control that's required to get a 61.3-mph run in the upmarket car.

Riding down the highway, the Prius is remarkably capable at soaking up bumps and seams. The Prius is surprisingly svelte at 2,936 pounds despite its battery pack. Compared to the Fit, the Prius maintains a substantial, planted feel over more surface textures. And quiet tires and slippery aerodynamics help make the Prius comfortably hushed, registering just 70 dBA at 70 mph.

Fun To Drive?
The all-knowing electronic screen that sits atop the Prius' dashboard has two different pages showing your instantaneous, accumulating and average fuel economy, as well as where the driving power is coming from and going to. And guess what? Looking at it (responsibly, of course) will affect the way you drive.

Driving becomes "The Economy Game, brought to you in three parts by Toyota." It's nearly impossible to resist counting how many little green cars you've earned that represent how much electricity you've generated. Or how many times you can stack up blocks, maxing out the 100-mpg bar graphs. Or learning the greatest indicated speed you can reach before the gasoline engine starts up and begins knocking down the mpg bar.

Our score? Over 675 miles in the Prius, we averaged 42 mpg, with a best result of 51 mpg on one tank. In comparison, the Fit returned an average of 28 mpg over 800 miles with a best tank of 38 mpg.

The Prius is fun to drive in a strange, arcade-style way. It feeds your sense of social responsibility and you become a weenie hypermiler.

Fit for the Fight?
Which brings us to the base model 2008 Honda Fit. There's a reason it costs $8,425 less than the Prius. For starters, it's not chock-full o' expensive tech and 168 nickel-metal hydride batteries. Unless you're really good at mental gymnastics, playing the Fit's version of the Economy Game only happens with a calculator in your hand at the gas station.

So there's that, and the Fit doesn't have a keyless remote or cruise control or aluminum wheels or audio/HVAC buttons on its steering wheel or floor mats or even map lights. Frankly, we were half expecting to find four window cranks when we popped open the Fit's doors.

The Fit does have great interior packaging, however. With all the seats up, it offers 7 cubic feet more cargo volume than the Prius; once the seats go down there are 12 cubic feet more. The Fit's second-row seat bottoms flip up to accommodate tall items like a bicycle as long as it measures less than 50 by 50 inches.

There's even a way to convert the second row into what Honda euphemistically calls "Refresh Mode" that was characterized by one of our editors as "Business Class Seating."

So what you get for $15,420 is a small car with a big interior that's powered by a high-revving four-cylinder engine that earns above-average fuel economy. But it's hardly a penalty box, and you might be happy to learn all of its driving dynamics will be familiar.

Not a Good Sport
To be honest, though, the Honda Fit doesn't put its best foot forward with this budget-friendly model, largely because of its automatic transmission. Like so many automatics in this efficiency-minded age, the Fit's five-speed strives to get to top gear as soon as possible.

At freeway speeds, it's so reluctant to downshift from 5th to 4th that you lose patience and pin the gas pedal to the floor...and there goes your fuel economy. Then the transmission decides you're in a really big hurry, so it skips over 4th to 3rd. Adding insult to injury is the fact that there's no way to manually select 4th gear as the PRNDL mirrors its programming with either D or D3 positions.

Repeat this profanity-filled fiasco several dozen times, and you'll be convinced to opt for the available manual transmission for less money, or the Sport model's paddle shifters in concert with the automatic for a little more. The automatic doesn't do the Fit any favors for acceleration either. With its 109-hp 1.5-liter inline-4 driving the front wheels, the Fit arrives at 60 mph in 11.4 seconds (11.1 seconds with a 1-foot rollout like on a drag strip).

The base model Fit has narrower tires than the Sport model, so our best efforts resulted in a 0.75g orbit around the skid pad and a sporty-feeling 62.3-mph pass through the slalom. (In comparison, a Fit Sport produces 0.80g lateral acceleration and a 67.5-mph pass.) Put the brakes on and the 2,517-pound Fit comes to a halt in 131 feet.

The True Cost of Ownership
Thanks to a proprietary function called Edmunds.com True Cost to Own (TCOSM), we can answer the $8,425 question when it comes time to determine the relative value of the 2008 Honda Fit and 2008 Toyota Prius.

Is it more financially beneficial to buy a Prius base model for $23,845 or a Fit base model for $15,420? The EPA says the Prius earns 46 mpg in combined city and highway use, while the Fit's combined rating is 30 mpg. If you drive 15,000 miles a year, the Fit will consume 174 gallons of fuel more than the Prius. If you drive the same number of miles over the course of five years, Edmunds.com TCO calculations predict the five-year aggregated fuel costs will total $11,480 for the Fit and $7,911 for the Prius, or a difference of $3,569.

This means the Prius would still be $4,856 shy of breaking even with fuel-cost savings alone.

Here's the math: Difference in purchase prices minus difference in fuel cost = perceived difference in operating cost. That is: $8,425-$3,569 = $4,856.

But the Edmunds TCO also accounts for financing charges, insurance payments, taxes, regular maintenance costs and repairs, so the cost gap between the Fit and Prius over five years is even greater, an out-of-pocket difference of $5,351. In other words, choosing the Fit over the Prius would mean you'd still be ahead by $3,074 ($8,425-$5,351 = $3,074).

We're working on a side-by-side version of TCO, but you can look at each one individually for the 2008 Honda Fit and 2008 Toyota Prius. Extra points if you know how to manage split-screen viewing.

Guzzle-lator
So how long does it take to break even on your investment in a 2008 Toyota Prius? We have another proprietary tool called the Gas Mileage Savings Calculator. It uses some TCO data, and also offers you the opportunity to input your typical monthly mileage, your ZIP code, two different vehicles and your best guess at the cost of a gallon of gas to see how many months it would take until that magic break-even point occurs.

For the purposes of this particular comparison, we input 1,250 miles of driving per month (the same 15,000 miles per year as above), a price of $4.49 per gallon of gas (typical for Santa Monica, California), this 2008 Toyota Prius and a 2008 Honda Fit for the trade-in sale value.

It takes 189 months or more than 15 years to break even on fuel. And that's well beyond the battery-swap schedule. As the tool notes, "You will not save any money by trading in your current vehicle for the fuel-efficient vehicle you have selected."

And the Winner Is...
At this point, our usual 100-point comparison-test score card would appear, well, pointless. But be that as it may, the 2008 Honda Fit still comes out on top in this comparison by a slim margin of 1.9 points. Usually we declare such a close finish the equivalent of a tie, but the Edmunds True Cost of Ownership makes the 2008 Toyota Prius the obvious runner-up.

As our score sheets indicate, the Honda Fit earns points for its obvious price advantage, decent fuel economy and remarkable interior packaging. Even by heavily weighting fuel consumption at 30 percent of the total score, the Toyota Prius can't manage to overtake the Fit's lead in the scoring.

So the 2008 Honda Fit is our choice. When it comes to the complicated issue of small-car goodness, sometimes the simple answers are the most effective.

The new 90 PS 1.2-litre petrol delivers fuel economy of 5.1-litres per 100km average, and the 100 PS 1.4-litre does 5.3-litres per 100km, which are exceptional claimed figures. Both these engines are i-VTEC engines, but may not be confused with a Type R i-VTEC motor.

08/19/2008 - TORRANCE, Calif.

The completely-redesigned 2009 Honda Fit is set to go on sale August 26 with a Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) starting at $14,550, plus a destination and handling charge of $670, American Honda Motor Co., Inc., announced today. The Fit Sport, equipped with additional premium features, is also set to debut with a starting MSRP2 of $16,060, plus destination and handling.

The Fit is designed to lead the subcompact segment with a quality feel and a multi-functional interior. The Fit has become more refined for 2009 with a sportier demeanor through improved suspension, steering and body rigidity enhancements; an improved rear Magic Seat®; and a high level of standard safety equipment, including the addition of the Advanced Compatibility Engineering™ (ACE™) body structure and front seat active head restraints. A new, more powerful 117-horsepower, 1.5-liter i-VTEC 4-cylinder engine further improves the Fit's high-revving, fun-to-drive character.

"With the all-new Fit, Honda is offering premium features and advanced technology within a high-function, small vehicle package," said Dick Colliver, executive vice president of American Honda. "Customers who choose the Fit are choosing superior refinement and premium quality, along with value and economy."

Dimensionally compact on the outside with an overall length of 161.6 inches, the interior provides a surprisingly spacious passenger volume of 90.8 cubic feet and a rear cargo volume of 20.6 cubic feet. The seats offer multiple seating and cargo-carrying configurations - tall object mode, long object mode and utility mode - in addition to the standard five-passenger mode.

An improved rear Magic Seat provides one-motion dive-down functionality without having to remove the rear seat head restraints to folds flat into the floor, creating a rear cargo volume of 57.3 cubic feet. Dual-stage, dual-threshold front airbags, dual front-side airbags with passenger-side Occupant Position Detection System (OPDS) and side-curtain airbags are standard equipment on all models.

The engine produces 117 horsepower at 6600 rpm and 106 lb-ft. of torque at 4800 rpm. A 5-speed manual transmission is standard and a 5-speed automatic transmission is available. Steering-wheel-mounted paddle shifters allow for manual gear selection on the Fit Sport equipped with the available automatic transmission. The Fit equipped with the available automatic transmission achieves an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) city/highway fuel economy rating1 of 28/35 miles per gallon. The Fit with a manual transmission and Fit Sport with either a manual or the available automatic transmission achieve an EPA city/highway fuel economy rating1 of 27/33 miles per gallon.

The Fit comes with standard amenities such as air conditioning, an AM/FM/CD audio system with four speakers, MP3/WMA playback capability, Radio Data System (RDS), auxiliary audio input jack, power windows, power mirrors and power door locks. The Fit Sport adds alloy wheels, an underbody aero kit, rear roofline spoiler, fog lights, security system with keyless remote entry and cruise control. The Fit Sport audio system provides six speakers, a five-mode equalizer and a USB Audio Interface .

For the first time, the Fit is available with the Honda Satellite-Linked Navigation System with Voice Recognition on the Fit Sport, featuring a 6.5-inch screen and more than 7 million points of interest. Models equipped with the navigation system also include Vehicle Stability Assist™ (VSA®), also known as electronic stability control.

The front MacPherson strut suspension and torsion beam rear suspension settings are tuned to provide a sporty, solid and dynamic driving experience. Upgraded by 1-inch on each model, larger 15- and 16-inch wheels (Fit and Fit Sport respectively) are shod with 175/65 R15 84S (Fit) and 185/55 R16 83H (Fit Sport) tires. The standard anti-lock braking system (ABS) with electronic brake distribution (EBD) uses 10.3-inch ventilated discs in the front and 7.9-inch drums in the rear.

More Fun Than 400 Goats
By Erin Riches, Senior Editor
Date posted: 08-19-2008


We meet up with the 2009 Honda Fit in Los Angeles at the Getty Villa, a sprawling treasury of ancient Greek, Roman and Etruscan art overlooking the Pacific Ocean. It's pleasant up at the villa and the parking's free, but we're not sure why Honda has chosen this spot to introduce the redesigned Fit, which can't even be optioned with a sarcophagus.

Then the Getty's vice president of communications Ron Hartwig tells us, "We use a herd of 400 goats annually to clear the slopes around the Getty Center. We have some 650 acres, and the goats are environmentally the best way to do it."

And although it smells less, the 2009 Honda Fit has more in common with the hoofed lawn crew than the Getty's Victorious Youth, circa 300 B.C. This subcompact hatchback represents a simpler, cheaper and, most likely, greener solution to getting around than whatever you're driving right now. It's small and cheerful, something that you can grab hold of during this hyper-rational frenzy about fuel prices that's making you think about kicking your gluttonous V6 Accord to the curb.

"We've always recognized challenging times like these as an opportunity for growth," says Dan Bonawitz, vice president of corporate planning and logistics for American Honda Motor Company.

And so after initially expecting to sell perhaps 33,000 examples when the Honda Fit first appeared in the U.S. in 2006, Honda now expects to sell 85,000 examples of the 2009 Honda Fit when it arrives in dealerships in September. So odds are you're going to know someone who owns a second-generation Honda Fit.

So It'll Be Kinda Popular
Odds are that you might even be that someone. After all, you've heard from our drive of the new-generation Fit in Japan that this five-door hatchback is now a bit bigger than the original. It rides on a 98.4-inch wheelbase (2 inches longer than before) with its wheels pushed about an inch farther apart at either end (58.7-inch front track; 58.1-inch rear track). The 2009 Honda Fit also stretches 161.6 inches from nose to tail (up 4 inches) and 66.7 inches from shoulder to shoulder (up 0.5 inch).

Yet when we approach the pack of 2009 Fits lined up in the driveway at the Getty, they're not all bloated and scary — the new Fit remains a subcompact in scale. Passenger volume is only fractionally larger at 90.8 cubic feet compared to the previous model's 90.1 cubic feet. Even so, we're vastly more comfortable sitting in this new Fit, as its standard tilt-and-telescoping steering wheel has made the driving position far more suitable for people on this side of the Pacific Ocean (no more arm extenders). An extra inch of rear legroom makes it pretty hospitable in back, too.

Although maximum cargo volume is now rated at 57.3 cubic feet (a massive increase from the car's former rating of 41.9 cubes), we suspect Honda has merely taken the '09 measurement with the front passenger seat reclined flat for surfboard transport. The gas tank is still mounted under the front seats, so the rear seats can still fold up or down, too. Curb weight has increased only 50-60 pounds, depending on transmission choice.

As Light as a 2,500-Pound Feather
Honda officials throw caution to the wind and let us drive their new budget, front-drive subcompact on the back roads of the mountains above Malibu — the good ones, actually, as we know from long experience. We immediately notice that the 2009 Honda Fit has the same adroit handling as the old Fit.

Honda also says the new Fit is 164 percent more rigid than before, the product of a million small changes, among them increased use of high-tensile steel, the adoption of more robust frame rails, an additional front frame member and stiffer rear suspension mounts.

The chassis engineers have also fiddled with the suspension geometry, increasing caster up front to improve steering feel and adjusting the toe and camber in back to improve the car's cornering character. The rear torsion-beam axle gets longer trailing arms with larger bushings, and the bottom line is better ride quality, says Honda.

As we wind our way through the mountains, we find ourselves thinking that the Honda Fit remains the most entertaining and communicative subcompact hatch short of a Mini Cooper. We also notice that the Fit's tail now tucks in more readily when you dive into corners, which makes the little Honda even more fun.

Minimalist Running Gear
Like the '08 version, the steering of the 2009 Honda Fit has electric assist as well as much the same ratio (12.7:1) as before. Honda has switched to a simpler and evidently more rigid three-point mounting system for the steering rack, but we can't detect much change as we hold the sporty, three-spoke steering wheel borrowed from the Civic.

Wheel sizes are larger, with 15-inch steel wheels and 175/65R15 Dunlop SP31 tires on the base Fit and 16-inch alloys and 185/55R16 Bridgestone Turanza EL470 tires on the 2009 Honda Fit Sport. Alas, these 16s are skinnier than last year's 15s, which were 195/55R15s.

Honda has also attempted to improve brake pedal feel for the 2009 Honda Fit by fitting a smaller-diameter master cylinder with a longer piston stroke, along with a more powerful brake booster. But the brakes themselves still consist of 10.3-inch ventilated front discs and 7.9-inch rear drums. During our little party on Mulholland Highway, braking performance proves mediocre — just like the old Fit.

Still a Small Fry
Maybe you thought Honda would consult the Nissan-Scion playbook and stuff more engine into the 2009 Fit? Ah, but that would negate the efficiency advantage of driving the smallest Honda. So welcome back to last year's 1.5-liter inline-4 with its single overhead cam and four valves per cylinder.

There are substantial changes inside the engine, though, the biggest being the adoption of i-VTEC, which is two-stage variable valve timing and lift for the intake valves. Previously, the engine simply shut down one of the intake valves on each cylinder below 3,400 rpm, creating a torque-enhancing swirl effect.

Output edges up to 117 horsepower at 6,600 rpm, compared to 109 hp at 5,800 in the original Honda Fit. Meanwhile, the peak torque rating barely changes. You get 106 pound-feet at 4,800 versus 105 lb-ft at the same rpm in the first-generation engine.

Do not be deceived, though. The torque curve is flatter and meatier than the old Fit's.

Torquey Enough To Lower Your Pulse
We know this because we're all relaxed while driving around Malibu, short-shifting our 2009 Honda Fit Sport with its five-speed manual transmission when we feel like it and carrying on light conversation with our passenger. Honda officials won't give acceleration estimates but promise the '09 Fit will be quicker at our test track.

For the Fit Sport, the optional five-speed automatic transmission includes shift paddles on the steering wheel, along with regular and Sport shift modes. (Honda predicts that 70 percent of Fit buyers will take the automatic.)

The manual gearbox has shorter overall gearing for quicker acceleration, but it costs 1 mpg on both EPA cycles, as Honda is predicting 27 mpg city/33 mpg highway.

When the Fit Sport is equipped with an automatic, its fuel economy remains the same with 27 mpg city and 33 mpg highway. The only winner here is the automatic-equipped base Fit, which uses a more conservative shift program to get a rating of 28 mpg city/35 mpg highway.

Honda officials concede there would have been more mpg improvement if this car came with the continuously variable transmission (CVT) used in the Japanese-spec 2009 Honda Fit. But the CVT, they say, is better suited to Tokyo gridlock than high-speed U.S. freeway traffic. "Americans aren't very patient," one American Honda official observes.

Costs More but Still Worth It
With destination charges included, you'll pay another $600 for the base 2009 Honda Fit, whether you get the manual ($15,220) or the automatic ($16,020). Expected to account for 70 percent of volume, the Fit Sport costs an extra $790 with the manual ($16,730) or $840 with the automatic ($17,580).

The Fit Sport comes standard with an iPod-friendly USB port, along with map lights and a driver armrest. Budget another $1,850 if you want the 2009 Honda Fit Sport Navi. Priced at $18,050 with the manual and $19,430 with the auto, this new high-line model adds a touchscreen navigation system and stability control. It's only expected to account for 10 percent of sales, and says Senior Product Planner Jeff Swedlund, it's aimed at the growing audience of "downsizer customers moving in for the size and weight of the vehicle and the [lessened] environmental impact."

We're not quite comfortable with the idea of paying $19K for a Fit (not when the Mini Cooper exists), but in base or Sport trim, the 2009 Honda Fit is an excellent small car. Not only is it extremely useful, thanks to its unique packaging, it's genuinely fun to drive. Unless you're going to buy a used car, this is about as good as it gets for $16,000.