How do you like the acceleration of the Insight? Is it good enough to get around town without getting constantly honked at by other people? Just wondering because I'm looking for a more economical + cheaper insurance daily driver for college usage. TIA

 

being the first one they made for production it is a very good car for daily usage.
they have brought out the new civic ima which is a lot better and no loss of room.
hope this helps

 

cnn did an investigation, and the price difference between a civic hybrid and a regular civic is only justified if you plan to drive 200k miles in the car.

 

I had a 5 speed Insight as a rental for a week in Phoenix. Here was my experience:

With the battery charged, it was actually kind of fun to drive with the A/C off. The electric assist gave it some low end go, the kind that you could leave it in 4th gear and still accelerate ok from 30mph on, and the engine would rev nicely to make it enjoyable to bang through the gears when wanting to zip from a light.

With the A/C on, it was ok, as long as you had a charge. BUT, in 100+ degree weather, that charge didn't last for long in the city in stop and go, and when the battery depleted all of the sudden (a common problem with the insight since the guage is somewhat an estimate of the charge), it was misarable...I would pray when getting on the highway at that point.

For long mountain runs up hill when I headed to Flagstaff, I actually got to experience the down shift arrow, a rare occurance. Basically, if I left it in 5th and tried to maintain 70+, the battery would deplete half way up, and I found it wanting me to shift down into third and hold a hi rev while getting passed like i was going backwards.

On the way back, I went ahead and down shifted ahead of time to forth, and found myself able to preserve the battery long enought to make it most of the way up before be asked to put it in third.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and as long as you learn how to regenerate and maintain a charge, it will get around just fine.