The Honda Hybrid Family Road Trip 2013: Honda Hybrid CR-Z Mini Review

We all know that RON95 petrol and Diesel price increased by 10% since 4th September 2013. It's now the time for everyone of us to get a Hybrid Car!! Don't know what's a Hybrid Car? Not sure if you need it?? Guess what?!? Honda Malaysia is currently running a campaign "THE GREAT HONDA HYBRID DISCOVERY". Basically, Honda is having a chance for you to 'rent' a Honda Hybrid car for 3Days 2Nights before you decide to own one. Sounds cool isn't it?? All you need to do is to join The Honda Hybrid Family Road Trip.

Honda Hybrid CR-Z

And hey yo!! Little Slowbrogal is one of the participant of The Honda Hybrid Family Road Trip in Johor. And my date was Honda Hybrid CR-Z!! It's a sport car yo!! Can you hear my excitement?? So what do we do with the car for 3 days 2 night? Drive the car down all the way to the South - Johor Bahru! Too bad, the car isn't allowed to enter Singapore though. *wink*

Take me home for 3 Days and 2 Nights

So, I went to show off my Honda CR-Z at The Honda Hybrid Family Road Trip in Johor Bahru. Make those people who're there for test drive jealous! (Joking la..) The RED CR-Z is really stealing all the limelight though.

We reached Honda Hybrid Roadshow Tebrau City, Johor Bahru around 1.30pm and the sun is just so hot. But we were greeted by the magnificient exhibition hall and booths.

Honda Hybrid Family Road Trip

If you're bringing your kids to the roadshow, just bring them over the kids play zone so they won't bother disturbing you while you're enjoying the hybrid journey. Or you can even do some shopping of getting an environmental friendly products over there.

Eco- Vendor Booth and Merchandise

I jumped into the huge exhibition hall the moment someone told me there're air-cond in there. (That's typical Malaysian!) Inside the exhibition hall, there's The Hybrid Discovery section where you can learn everything about Hybrid Cars. I won't be telling you in detailed what's it is about because I want you to explore yourself. It's a different experience and you'll get to learn a lot about our environment and of course how Honda Hybrids works.

Hybrid Honda Discovery

Did you see me challenge myself touching on the screen? They'll show you the video about important parts of Honda Hybrid Cars and you have to remember where it is. I won myself some merchandise from there. =) There have lots of games and Q&A session for you to win some goodies back home. Guess what did I get? PS: I gonna thanks Samuel for winning a huge Honda merchandise umbrella for me which cost RM69 one.

Too much info and our brain stuck?
Picture credit: Suresh

Noticed the bicycle on top of the picture? It tells you that two is better than one. That explains the power of the motor Integrated Motor Assist (IMA) and i-VTEC engine in the Honda Hybrid Cars. Double power, double performance. In a basic way of explaining, hybrid means a combination of two or more. The hybrid is running using both the engine that runs on fuel, and also the electric motor which run on electric.

People wonders why is it that using both is being environmental friendly? It is considered as a waste of energy right? In fact, the car does save the environment as it save more fuel. How does it do so? When the car is on standstill, in a conventional car, the car is getting the power 100% from the burning of the petrol. However, in the hybrid, the car engine burn less petrol as the engine does not need to work that hard thanks to the help of the electric motor that supply the power to assist the engine. When the car reach high speed where the engine efficiency is high which means it is burning less petrol compared to standstill acceleration, the motor is turned off to save power. When the car decelerates, the motor is charged to ensure that the electric supply is enough. The repeating process of this means all time low fuel consumption and also a electric motor that never runs out of battery. How's that sound? After getting enough lessons on Hybrid Cars, now it's time to show you the real car!

Honda Hybrid: Jazz, Insight, Civic

I was talking to one of the Honda salesperson, he told me that we can get rebate of if we place order now from the Honda Hybrid Roadshow. The rebate was: CR-Z RM6000, Civic RM4000, Insight RM4000 and Jazz- RM11,500. Apparently, Honda Jazz Hybrid is one of the most-sellable car. Why? Because after rebate it's only cost RM72k! That's very cheap for a Hybrid car, you know!

And if you're tempted to get one, place your IC and get yourself to test-drive on the spot! You'll get a free T-shirt!

We decide to....run into the test drive zone.

We hang around the roadshow until night when there're artist performances like Gina, Oh Centaku, Soo Wincci etc. Before the artist performance, there're DJ's who play games with the audience to win some hard cash home. Guess who took RM50 home??

Bottom left: That's when you see Samuel won an umbrella for me! =D

There are also food and drinks given out for free!! A bunch of kids (us) are happily queing for cotton candy!

Sidney and Ashley, where did you guys went?
Picture credit: Suresh

Ah ha! Here they are. A complete group pic!
Picture credit: Samuel

Of coz cotton candy couldn't satisfy our tummy, so we drive our Honda Hybrid out to look for food!! Isn't the car look so stunning even at night??

Night shots taken at Danga Bay

And we found a place to eat as much as we wanted too! Steamboat buffet for RM21. They told me it's very cheap in JB because you can't find this kind of price in KL anymore. (Then you guys should come down JB more often)

L to R: Ashley, Suresh, Samuel, Me, Jillian, Sidney
Cameraman: Don.

There are a few colors available for Honda Hybrid CR-Z. And the test-drive unit I got was the stunning Milano Red! Powered by the Honda i-vtec engine with the displacement of 1.5liter and Integrated Motor Assist (IMA). The gearbox is available in manual and also the automatic.The one I was driving is Auto. (I reckon Manual is better for guys)

The automatic transmission type is CVT. CVT gearbox stands for continuous variable transmission. The difference of this with the conventional auto gearbox is that the car runs without a fixed gear ratio which in simple term, it does not shift gear from 1-5. It just continuously pull the car delivering different power output based on what you need. The advantage of this is of course better fuel consumption and also comfort.

Can you imagine you can ride up to 800km for a full tank petrol for such a small 40litres fuel tank where the whole tank of petrol is RM84@Rm2.10per litre. However, we can never pump that amount due to safety purpose which means that your petrol expenses will never be more than that for at least every 600-800km. Imagine the petrol expense from JB-KL-JB is less than Rm80. That’s very nice saving! We also save the environment too.

Speaking of the main attraction of how powerful is the car to be marked as a sport hybrid. The car delivers a below 10 second time for the 0-100km/h sprint. Assisted by the electric motor, the car 1.5liter engine with the assisting electric motor is able to produce a 130horsepower and a 172nm of torque which is almost equivalent to the power of a 1.8liter engine. Also look at how nice and neat is the car looking.

We take a look at the interior of the car from the driver view. The car have a nice finishing touch which is simple but good looking. Notice how easy and eye pleasant it is to read the meter. All the buttons that are needed can be reached easily too. Personally I like the whole design of this car.

The car is have three button at the right side of the dashboard near the door where there are 3 modes to select from which is the Eco mode, Normal mode, and Sport mode. During this 3 mode, the car dashboard meter will light up in different color to indicate the driving style of the person driving.

In Eco mode, the car will light up in green. The Eco mode is the best mode and recommended mode as it gives the car the best gas mileage.

In Normal mode, the meter will be in blue color. The Normal mode is giving the normal type of response with the normal power of the 1.5liter engine.

In Sport mode, the meter will be in red color. The sport mode is used for spirited driving where power are needed. When activated, the car power is increased with the full assist by the electric motor.

I find that although the car will light up in green during Eco mode, it is still depends on the level of acceleration. When you press the accelerator harder during Eco mode, the meter will turn blue too. However, during sport mode, regardless of whether the car is moving it will be in red as the car is standby for the power that you need.

The car seat is very comfortable to sit in. Compared to normal type of car seats, the car seat is hugging the person something like the bucket seat of a race car.

The car also is also equipped with many safety feature such as all 4 disc brake with ABS and EBD. It also have brake assist and also VSA with traction control. The car had another special system called the Tire pressure monitoring system(TPMS). It is used to monitor the car tire pressure. The car also have front and side airbag which it's good because I feel much safer and protected.

This model that I am driving is equipped with HID headlamp where it is much brighter than standard light bulb where during the night, driving is much more easier as the vision becomes better.

The beauty freak in me just have to show you this! I discovered a LED Mirror in the car!! I know a lot of cars nowadays come with LED Mirror. This is like a god-gift for girls. So we could do a quick check on our smudges mascara at night. (while our partner is driving)

I urged everyone of you to convert to Hybrid cars, so your car doesn't emits smoke that make me smell like a BBQ. Can you imagine how much I hate those smokes? Less fuel emissions mean less air pollutant. And now people can smell your perfume that you sprayed in the morning. Love yourself and love our mother nature with Hybrid cars =)