Dreaming...lean burn manual taller transmission Civic sedan...or get an Insight

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Ecky

Was planning to respond to this after Thanksgiving weekend, but it looks like you picked one up.

We let the car idle longer and took it for a longer test drive, and the ticking "sewing machine noise" grew much quieter. We're going to have the valves adjusted just to be sure, but for $1500 it was a steal. Autostop worked at speeds under 10 MPH after the car warmed up.

Thanks for all your help though! I really would have been lost without all your guidance in answering all my questions and such about the Insight.

Already loving the car.

[Ecky]

Glad to help, feel free to ask about any maintenance advice or about quirks of the car. To be clear, this was the one with rebuilt engine and transmission?

[mpg_numbers_guy]

No, the one with the rebuilt engine and transmission was a silver one that was priced much higher. This one also has ~250K miles, and has also been regularly maintained, per the Carfax and our thorough inspection of the car.

The Carfax did not indicate an engine or transmission rebuild, yet the engine has shown no evidence anywhere of oil leakage after having driven it close to 100 miles including test drives and me practicing. The transmission doesn't have the grind either, so either this car somehow escaped those things or they were replaced but not documented. None of the common issues with Insights were found on it, like the wet seatbelt issue. Motor mounts were one of the things recently replaced. Exterior needs a little bit of work with the paint (especially the front bumper) and I need to take off the fender skirts and get replacement mounting clips since they're just bolted on the car for some reason. Literally the only rust on the car is on one of the windshield wiper brackets and some slight discoloration on a small part of the frame underneath the car.

[Ecky]

Sounds like a real gem at $1500 then.

[Xist]

Originally Posted by Ecky

Lean burn would be nearly pointless on a Prius, for instance, because it has effectively infinite gearing. You just slow the engine down more, or toggle it on and off.

Honda made buyers choose between a CVT and lean burn and lean burn always won.

[Ecky]

Originally Posted by Xist

Honda made buyers choose between a CVT and lean burn and lean burn always won.

Perhaps, but Honda's CVTs don't have infinite gearing. The Insight's CVT is only a hair taller than its 4th gear in the manual. A Prius transmission to my knowledge also robs less power. It's really a pretty slick gearbox.

[mpg_numbers_guy]

Originally Posted by Xist

Honda made buyers choose between a CVT and lean burn and lean burn always won.

Sad to say, if those cars were re-marketed today the outcome would probably be different, with CVTs becoming more reliable and manual drivers dying off, per se.