coldrsx

Majority of the new Honda/Acura product is geared to slightly overweight, khaki wearing, suburban house loving, 60-80k earning, PVR must having, miller light drinking, better get a GPS option cause i cant think for myself anymore-ing, thinks a fun night out is going to a restaurant bar-ing, better 3M the front and mirror doing, boring ass mother ****ers.

Soichiro has not only thrown up in his grave, but is mad as hell at the abomination of a product line and 'style direction' they currently have.

wraith5

The problem I see is Honda is becoming way too conservative. The currently line-up is safe - meaning it caters to the majority (average). There isn't a lot to criticize but there is nothing to get excited about either. The current economic condition just scared Honda more; they practically scraped everything that may be considered wasteful or daring.

The Crosstour kind of signifies the limits of Honda's willingness to be bold - safe (based off the Accord), what average wants (utility and comfort) and a hint of boldness (untraditional styling).

The same can be applied to the CRZ. Safe (small car), what average wants (hybrid technology), hint of boldness (first "sporty" hybrid).

What would get my blood pumping are less conservative cars. Give the Civic Si more juice, update the Element, make the Element SC more appealing, bring back the S2000, release a Fit Si, give the CRZ a petrol engine version, new power plants (direct injection, FI) and etc.

OverBooster

It doesn't really matter how great Car & Driver places the Sonata if nobody buys it

mingster

well, it looks like plenty of people are buying it in my neck of the woods, but then again the hoosier state stats are really never a leading indicator of anything except redneck-ism...

Chris S

It just came out, and I predict it will be a big sales hit for Hyundai, if not achieve Accord/Camry-like sales volumes.

JonBoy

If you're picking mid-level models, Hyundais tend to have a lot of features (standard) that give them an edge in a tight comparison. As a car, C&D actually didn't like the ride of the Sonata, even though it had an able chassis. It's just that it looked quite a bit better (bland silver Honda vs bright red Sonata is a bit of a mismatch as well), was a little sportier (if not as composed or easy to drive), and was moderately priced, though still more expensive than the other two. I'll wait to see how the Sonata Limited fares against the Accord EX-L when they both have similar options to cancel that part of the equation.

That said, the Sonata with turbo motor sounds like a crazy car (in a good way) for this segment. I'm just waiting for it to prove its reliability and fuel efficiency, given that the Accord beat the Nissan Altima and the normally-aspirated Sonata for fuel efficiency despite being ranked lower than both by the EPA.

mad pup

I see them every day around here in Socal.

Spec_Ops2087

uhh...

~50mpg in an insight vs ~36 in a civic....Where is your arguement coming from exactly?



We all know the EPA numbers are BS

cbehney

I'm not sure that's true. If your [Hyundai's] absolute numbers aren't greater than the competition, you may grown relative to the competition for a while but you'll never surpass them in sales. And once your denominator rises, if your absloute number per period is still smaller, you'll end losing share.

I'm for sure not an expert, so this is just my opinion based on math.

hirev

I own an acura and a honda, there is nothing in this current lineup of either company i would consider owning. I have owned several of each nameplate over the years, but again there is nothing left worth looking at...unless i want a great van, or a good pickup 4/4/, which i want nothing to do with .

what has happened, they used to be on a bmw type high, they gave that up to be more practical and have sentenced themselves to failure...it will take several models of new stuff to dig outta this whole...

cars can be head and heart, now honda is only head.