Honda Accord 2.0T

Posted by: @dev

 I had a chance to drive this car yesterday. It was brand new with 4k miles on it. I feel that Honda has made a big mistake with this car. It was too fast for it to be safe in my opinion.  I wish they would have beefed up the suspensions and tires to handle this level of performance. Just because you can make passenger cars with the same level of acceleration  that was only available to serious sports cars 15 years ago doesn't mean it's a good thing to pack it in a commuter  car. Just punching the gas at 10mph made the front wheels spin violently.  When I would give it gas for overtaking It didn't feel sure footed and stable. 

 Average cars might be faster now but it doesn't mean that average drivers are any more safe with handling it. 

 

I got one of these as a loaner car from my Honda dealer. I agree completely!

Interesting observations. Reviewers seem to like them, even compliment the suspension, but I'd take that with a grain of salt anyway. 

What the masses call good handling and what we call good handling are probably very different things. Does the car deserve better suspension? Probably. But the masses want comfort and will most likely never try to use this extra power in anything other than a straight line. 

You guys disliking the suspension reminds me of my past 98 Accord V6. It was only 200hp but the J30 made plenty of torque down low. Lots of fun in a straight line but dear God forgive me if I entered a corner a touch too fast. Let's just say it was definitely best in a straight line. Having been exclusive to 4 cylinders before, that thing also was my own personal nightmaret to work on. Been exclusively 4 cylinder ever since too.

What I mean is not so much with better handling suspension. All it takes is for someone to be driving and decide to punch it for more power and the car will lose control and be a big mess to recover.  The car has 275 ftlbs of torque in a compact car has its down low. There is nothing wrong with having power as many luxury sedans have tremendous amounts these days  but they are RWD/AWD and are built well for handling power.  This car feels exactly like my old Honda Accord and just doesn't have the structure for that level of power on demand. How this probably differs from the V6 is in the weight to keep traction and the fact that the V6 needs to build its power gradually.  

did you try it with summer tires or was it cheap all seasons?
i feel like it's the fault of the tires. too narrow. too low-rolling-resistance-y because of MPG targets.

i'm not particularly seeing the problem unless there's a heap of torque steer. 

Posted by: @refirendum

did you try it with summer tires or was it cheap all seasons?
i feel like it's the fault of the tires. too narrow. too low-rolling-resistance-y because of MPG targets.

i'm not particularly seeing the problem unless there's a heap of torque steer. 

I assume factory all seasons. The car had only 4k miles on it.  It doesn’t matter much if you can fix it with suspension or tires as most who buy it are purchasing this for commuter duty but I felt It should not be sold this way. At minimum it needs traction control to stop wheel spin which it didn’t seem to have.The turbo kicks in very low dumping all of its torque early in the rev range. The dynamics of the car just didn’t have the stability if you punched it as I can see it end up in the trees because the front end is extremely twitchy with that level of power.  It felt even worse than over inflating the front  tires on the Spyder. 
I have driven cars that have much more power then this but the car as whole was able to support it even on all seasons.  
The owner who bought it is a bit of a speed demon but not a good driver and he also agreed.  

All cars have traction control. You probably didn't notice because it was good. Nothing like the 2000's power cut TCS.

Posted by: @haloruler64

All cars have traction control. You probably didn't notice because it was good. Nothing like the 2000's power cut TCS.

The traction control on most cars are on by default. This car was spinning its wheels all over the place and there was nothing to contain it. I could have been almost stationary and kept the wheels spinning indefinitely  as I couldn't get the power to the ground. Im sure better tires would help but that defeats the purpose of this car because its for commuter duty. The interior felt high quality but the drive felt cheap.  I wasn't expecting BMW but its like nothing changed with Honda compared to my 16 year old Accord. I would buy a used low millage Lexus ES over this and save some cash.   

 I think I know what the problem is with this car. The engine is suppose to be the V6 equivalent for Honda  compared to the base but it has more power especially down low. It's probable that a heavier engine would fair better because this lighter engine barely has any weight over the wheels. It felt as though the front wheels were lifting if you are accelerating from a 40mph roll. 

@dev I drove one as well.  Yes it is easy to smoke the tires at low speed, but the faster you go, the more power you need to feel a certain level of acceleration.  None of the Accord versions are what I would call lightweight and performance is proportional to Power/weight, not Power and not proportional to engine torque.  See this to understand the equation of motion of a vehicle related to engine power and torque:  https://rothautomotivescience.com/power-or-torque/

Dave

Hello. I really have to say that I am with Dev on this one. To me, forget performance metrics, that is not what I am referring to. My thought is that if you punch it from a stop, a lot of people are going to be in trouble trying to retain control. If you can, that is good and it is not surprising because we are car people. Not everyone is. The service manager at the dealership said he had a couple of people remark about getting in trouble with the car for this reason.

Exactly, forget the performance metrics. This car doesn't feel right at its power level, it could but it was poorly designed and cheaply built for it.  I felt more secure with turbo Spyder on factory tires then this.  You could easily be going 50mph punch  throttle and lose control in certain situations where there are road imperfections. There is a reason why many so called show offs that buy sports cars with more power than they can handle end up totaling their car even though the car could handle the power.  This thing is a death trap and could land a  person who decides do punch it in trouble because it makes most of its power down low like a bigger displacement engine.  

Sure many of us could handle driving this car and have some restraints but many cannot as there are some really bad drivers out there. I certainly would not give this car to some young kid and that is not what the Honda Accord is supposed to be about. It is a compact Econo car for the masses, it doesn't matter if they throw a wing on it and call it a sport model its still suppose to be an easy to drive safe boring commuter car for the masses. This is not to say an M3 is the same thing its not, at least the M3 is designed to handle the power level by the way it was designed.  

pretty sure the civic is the compact econocar for the masses.

also, Accord's gotta compete with other honda offerings and toyota and mazda. The civic lineup already set a bar of sorts as do the corolla and camry, and the accord is supposed to fit into that midsize sedan class that's upmarket of the civic and  corolla.  it's a japanese train of thought to make sure their products don't look bad on paper.  test drive the camry with 300hp and the Mazda 6 with 225 hp and see if they also come across similarly. i think they will.

2019 model year:
Camry base: 200 - 300 hp

Corolla: 130 - 140 hp

Mazda 3: 185 hp

Mazda 6: 185-225 hp

Civic: 155-200 hp

CTR: 300hp

Accord: 192-252 hp

I have driven a Camry v6 and a Lexus ES with 270hp two years ago.   Both cars were stable. This new Honda wasn’t. It has 275ftlb of torque and it comes on early in the rev range plus it feels like there isn’t enough weight on the wheels. I have driven an older v6 Accord with the 250hp engine and it was just fine and in control, actually that car felt lazy and wasn’t very responsive, just as boring as the ES. All three cars are forgiving including the handling as you can’t really get into trouble as the soft suspension plunges hard and squeals loudly.  Power build up is also predictable and precise. This new Honda feels poorly executed but one thing I will say it’s not boring but in a bad way. 

Modern traction control allows for some wheel spin at low speeds. However it does not allow for a loss of control. Start going sideways, or sliding, and it jumps in. And doesn't cut power, but actually regains control while allowing you to drive. That just sounds like a quality TCS system. Experienced a few like that. Porsche's TCS on the 2014 Cayman I drove was even less aggressive. Could kick the rear end out and even do a 180 in place without it cutting in, and it was 100% on. That doesn't mean it will let you crash.

I forgot to mention. I have also driven a 2018 Honda Civic with the Dream Works turbo engine that makes 174hp and 164ftlb of torque when my friend bought it. I was underwhelmed with the power delivery but it was stable. I felt my four cylinder Honda Accord with 160hp was just a little slower but had better engine feel because the CVT on the Civic sucks.  I have driven other cars with CVT and I’m staying clear as it feels annoying with the exceptions of a Prius.