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Honda electric Fit

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Richard230:
My newspaper published an article by the LA Times reporting that Honda's new all-electric Fit will have an estimated EPA-approved range of 82 miles, compared with the Ford Focus EV range of 76 miles, the Nissan Leaf's range of 73 miles and the Mitsubishi i-MiEV's range of 62 miles.  The Fit is fitted with a 20-klWh battery pack and will take about thee hours to recharge at 240 volts. The EPA rates the car at 118 mpg equivalent and estimates the annual fuel cost at $500.

protomech:
Too bad it's lease-only. And $400/month is rather expensive compared to the Leaf (which was just bumped down to $290/month) .. though that's oversimplified, I don't know what upfront cash is required for either.

protomech:
Fit EV is $389/month for 36 months (total $14004). No upfront cost that I can see, lease payment covers all maintenance and collision insurance.

Notably, Honda is not making a lease-end purchase option available. These will likely end their lives crushed like the EV1. Pity.

Nissan Leaf SV is $289/month for 39 months + $2999 up-front (total $14270).

skuzzle:
It's pretty clear that only the reason the Honda Fit EV exists is to satisfy (get around) California rules.  I think someone might have already linked this or a similar article from this forum... if not here's an interesting article:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/major-automakers-producing-fake-electric-cars-to-meet-california-emission-standards/

Car Loss:

--- Quote from: protomech on June 07, 2012, 05:25:47 PM ---Fit EV is $389/month for 36 months (total $14004). No upfront cost that I can see, lease payment covers all maintenance and collision insurance.

Notably, Honda is not making a lease-end purchase option available. These will likely end their lives crushed like the EV1. Pity.

--- End quote ---

Not too shabby, I suppose.  But then again I'm a single male, and pay high insurance.  Maintenance?  What maintenance?

Given that the EV business is still in, umm, flux, leasing and crushing isn't unexpected.  Any year, some battery update may render the entire field obsolete.  Of course, the odds in any one year are greatly against this (just look at solar cells).  But big companies like Honda (or especially Nissan) and GM won't bet the farm on something too different, and it kinda makes sense if you look at it from their point of view.

Of course (here comes the tinfoil), there's the possibility that something deeper is going on, like skuzzle mentions.  Speculation is that GM wanted the EV1 to fail, since much better NiMH cells were ready (offered to GM by Ovonic) but GM refused to upgrade from Lead-Acid, and compacted them instead.  Still, I don't foresee anything upcoming soon being as big of an improvement over today's Lithiums, as NiMH was an improvement over Lead-Acid.  Really, plastic tubs of lead?  And acid?

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