At last, it's here!

[cjolley]

1, I have the same experience with the cruise control. It's not the small engine. That is perfectly capable of pulling the car up quite a steep hill at speed.
It's the cruise control programming, either to save gas or just sloppy execution.
I just step on the gas a bit when it bothers me.

2, Gradient is what you would expect. After all, going up hill is work. It's in the recapture going down that gets you to the good average.

PS Go down a really long hill and note how your engine braking drops off dramatically when the battery gets completely full and the generator turns off.

[Brian Ellis]

Yep, plus the fact that the car is quite heavy for its size, some 1350 kg unladen. In fact, I was surprised to discover it's 100 kg heavier than my old C-RV half-roader 4x4. And, before anyone talks about the weight of the batteries, they are only 28 kg. I doubt whether the 1350 cc engine + electric motor is any heavier than the 2000 cc engine of the old 'un, either. The difference must be in the structural ironwork.

[VJ]

The difference must be in the structural ironwork.

Cars are getting heavier (even small cars). In a way, this negates a lot of the effort put into the development of cleaner engines.


Jörg

[cjolley]

Cars are getting heavier (even small cars). In a way, this negates a lot of the effort put into the development of cleaner engines.


Jörg

No sad face needed.
Cars, big and small, are getting safer and cleaner every year.

PS Brian, it's also size. The 2007 Civic is larger than the Accord once was.

[Brian Ellis]

Yup, the weight is in safety! I see the crash test ratings are better than Volvo and BMW for frontal crashes and equal to them for side crashes.

My driving lesson for today: do NOT be timid pressing the loud pedal. It takes a LOT more fuel getting up to cruising speed slowly, because it's the engine that is doing the work. Heavy-footed and it's the electric motor that does it all in half the time! Next experiment: approach hills with more elan, rather than trying to keep up constant speed. Maybe cruise control is OK for flat terrain but less for hilly countries like here. Guess my learning curve will take a few weeks!

The Civic is smaller than the CRV in all dimensions, and heavier, even without 4-WD transmission

[cjolley]

Yup, the weight is in safety! I see the crash test ratings are better than Volvo and BMW for frontal crashes and equal to them for side crashes.
...

Oh God, here comes GURM

[Fat Tone]

My only experience of cruise-control was driving a motor home across the Canadian Rockies. On the flatter roads in Alberta it was fine, but once you hit the gradients it just tried too hard to maintain speed and you could watch the needle falling. Better to do it manually and not try to achieve more speed up the hills than it can easily cope with.

[cjolley]

My old Lexus GS300 stays pinned at whatever speed you set no matter what the grade.
So it can be done.
Frequently cruise controls are not given enough authority over the throttle to cope with steep hills.
I think that's the case with the Civic.
It's probably by design for some reason.

[Fat Tone]

Sure it can be done, its just the motor home was under powered. It wouldn't have kept speed up a steep hill even with 100% control.

[cjolley]

It never occurred to me that anyone would expect a motor home to be able to do it.
Just pointing out that many (most?) cars could, but that the cruise control design won't let them.