Recently the government fleet I work for added 10 more hybrid vehicles to its large fleet. Seven of these hybrid vehicles are of the hybrid electric car variety. The other 3 are trucks or light duty sport utility hybrid vehicles. The most interesting hybrid electric car was the Honda civic hybrid. This little car costs around $23,000.

One of my biggest concerns about hybrid vehicles is the future maintenance of the battery pack and related systems. Honda has addressed this concern by adding an 8 year 80,000 mile warranty on the battery back up system and components. Another addition to this hybrid electric car was the standard continuously variable transmission or (CVT) this coupled with the idle-stop feature that temporarily turns off the engine at stops really makes driving this vehicle very different then your standard automobile.

For example from a stop the electric motor gets you going and then the gas engine starts up and takes over the bulk of the work. Then as you are driving the hybrid electric car goes faster without shifting gears. The transmission varies the required torque as opposed to shifting gears. To me this is very odd. I’m sure I could get used to it over time. Driving around town reminded me of driving a snowmobile that also incorporates a CVT transmission.

This is what really interests me from an engineering point of view the electric engine is very thin about 3 inches wide and fits right between the engine and the transmission. They use this motor as an engine starting motor that sounds and feels like no starter motor I have ever felt before. It starts the engine quickly and quietly, also very smoothly. The placement of the electric motor allows the hybrid vehicles battery packs to be charged by engine braking. This explained is that when you are slowing down the electric motor turns into a generator to charge the batteries.

The gas engine part of the equation is also interesting. The 1.3-liter, 8-valve, i-VTEC 4-cylinder engine is rated at the ultra low emissions level. This means that tail pipe emissions are near 0, which is impressive in it self. This little engine uses the ultra low friction concept to increase efficiency. This simplified is the engine turns over with very little effort. Also my fleet company will have to buy a new kind of engine oil for this vehicle. The engine oil is a synthetic grade with a weight of 0w-20. This thin oil aids in the low friction concept. The engine coupled with the hybrid electric car motor is rated at 110-horse power.

This hybrid car will not win any drag races but it moves as well as its full gas engine cousin. Now on to the nuts and bolts. What is this hybrid vehicles fuel economy rating. The Honda sticker states you will get 49- 50 mpg. Our initial testing has confirmed this.

The vehicle is getting the same MPG as our Toyota hybrid electric car. And about 20 mpg more then our electric/gas powered trucks. Am I going to run out and buy one? The short answer is No.