Impressive Civic DTEC
IMPRESSIVE: WORTH THE PRICE TAG, TRUMPING ALL THE CLAIMED ROAD NUMBERS
Fuel consumption is a pleasure in this easy-to-drive hatch from the UK.
Iknow I promised you a full road test of our long-term Honda Civic Hatch 1.6 i-DTEC for the end of October. But thanks to the lovely state of our roads, especially after a spell of summer rain, our Honda had more square and battered wheels than round ones.
And this was making the normally pleasant driving experience of the Civic a rather unpleasant wobbly one. So unfortunately we had to wait for the 18-inch sport alloy wheels to be repaired and fitted back to the car before I could make a booking for Gerotek and strap my Racelogic VBOX test equipment to the Honda.
Now obviously this is not a high-performance type of test. You are never going to look at this car for outright hot-hatch performance. The soon-to-be-released Civic Type R will be taking care of these needs for the performance junkies. The 1.6 litre i-DTEC engine has a displacement of only 1 597cc, a compression ratio of 16:1 (which produces a moderate 88kW of power at 4 000rpm) and maximum torque of 300Nm at 2 000rpm.
What these figures translate into is a car that is very easy to drive, with you not having to make much use of the six-speed manual gearbox once up and running on the open road. The 300Nm of torque makes for early gear changes and a relaxed attitude all round. My only complaint is I would like to see a decent automatic transmission being offered to make it the perfect everyday cruiser.
And speaking of perfect for everyday, this turbo diesel is only available in full-house executive grade. This means you get as standard leather and heated seats, Bluetooth, dual front, side and curtain air bags, vehicle stability control and hill start assist, LED daytime running lights and reversing camera. This goes with normal luxuries like electric windows and air-conditioning to make travelling in the Civic a pleasure.
What is also pleasant is trips to the petrol station. Well, as pleasant as it can be when paying well over R13 for a litre of 50ppm diesel. At least here you should easily average less than 6 litres per 100km between fill-ups. Our test average at the moment is sitting at 5.83 litres per 100km, but the last two tanks have seen this drop to the low 5s and I am sure this is where it will stay on a long-term basis.
If you were to take this car on a long trip to the coast and back, this figure should improve even more. Unfortunately we never did, but I doubt anybody will get the Civic down to its claimed average consumption figure of just 4.1 litres per 100km, even on the open road.
The engine has been specifically designed for European market requirements of high performance, excellent fuel economy and low emissions – attributes important to the South African market as well. The 1.6
...I would like to see a decent automatic transmission being offered to make it the absolute perfect everyday cruiser
litre i-DTEC is exclusively built at Honda’s European manufacturing facility in Swindon, UK on a new purpose-built diesel-engine production line. This line is capable of producing up to 500 diesel engines per day, equating to one engine every 138 seconds (based on a two-shift pattern).
The turbo employed on the 1.6 litre i-DTEC is a fourth-generation Garrett unit, which features variable nozzle design. Furthermore, the turbo’s rotational speed is precisely controlled by the car’s electronic system, resulting in minimal turbo lag. With a maximum boost pressure of 1.5 bar, the turbo provides an optimal combination of low to mid-range pull and high-speed performance.
Back to our actual test session at Gerotek. Like I said, this is a small 1.6 litre car with moderate power, but as impressive as it is on the road it is even more impressive against the clock. Our Civic came in better than claimed in all the road test numbers.
0-100km/h is done in 10.47 seconds, versus the claimed 10.6 seconds. The quarter-mile sprint was done in 17.50 seconds at 128.68 km/h, the longer 1km in 31.94 seconds at 164.14 km/h and the top speed was recorded at 211.83 km/h at 3900 rpm in sixth gear, versus a claimed 202 km/h.
I can tell you there are many other family-orientated hatches on offer with more power, but they won’t keep up with the Civic 1.6 i-DTEC, and won’t match the low fuel consumption either. But it has to be said that at R340 900 the Honda is by no means the best priced option on the market.
If you are shopping within a strict budget and can’t stretch your finances to consider the Honda, that’s fine.
But if you can get there, I would suggest you put the Civic 1.6 i-DTEC on your shortlist and take it for a test drive. You will be pleasantly surprised by what you find in terms of quality, feel and performance.
The final instalment in this long-term evaluation will be on Wednesday, November 26 before we get our hands on the new Honda Accord for the December holidays. – markjones@citizen.co.za