this is a question with a very wide range and subjective answer. never had a city, but for my insight, after 3 months of heavy use and clocking 15000km plus, this is what i can share.

highway driving with smooth traffic (no jam), i will get close to 750km with one full tank. I already drove a few time puchong-penang-puchong same day trip with one tank, and when I pump back to full, it is plus minus RM63. That's about 22 plus km/l.

Town driving, with a lot of stop and go, traffic jam and long traffic light wait or ocasionally stop with engine running waiting to pick up things, i get between 550km to 650km for about the same full tank. That's about 18 to 20 plus km/l.

This is fully on econ mode on and never on S mode. so far personally i never felt i need to off econ or shift to S, only used that when going long downhill slope in attempt to slow the car down.

I believe driving style greatly affects how many km you can do in a full tank. a carefully driven city may come close to insight, or even overtake it if the insight was driven in agresive manner.

I am on ron95. i did tried ron97 few times just out of curiosity, no actual measurable dyno result but personally did not felt any significant difference in power and fuel saving to justify the extra money paid.

ron number does not directly signify power output of the fuel, in other words, ron97 is not 2 unit extra as compared to ron95. different engine are designed to run best on different ron fuel. if you use the wrong type, you get lower performance. on high performance engine (usually those on high rpm) specifically require high ron fuel to prevent kncoking (and thus degrading performance). Normal car can usually run both type of ron ok because the ecu will adjust accordingly based on feedback from the knock sensor. for detail on which fuel suite your engine best, refer to manual or manufacturer.

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Added on January 13, 2012, 11:25 amHahaha, you offer considered not bad, mine end of nov, all i got is an umbrella, my petrol was so badly low that the range reading on the mid is only 5km left, and salesman just say 'not to worry, hybrid car does not use that much fuel, besides, there is a petrol station 100 meters away'.

So, does this make you feel better? :P

This post has been edited by cbinn: Jan 13 2012, 11:25 AM

Just to share.

Both normal and regenerative braking on Insight are two separate physical component controlled and triggered by the same brake pedal (and of course with the aid of electronics).

In the first stage, when the car is still moving and you take your feet off the accelerator completely, the car computer will trigger mild regenerative braking (you can see the IMA needle start to move downwards from the middle point). This is achieved by switching the IMA motor that are sandwiched between the internal combustion engine and the CVT to become generator, charging the IMA battery, thus creating load and drag, slowing down the car (just like when you drop your gear in manual transmission car to slow it down without braking when you going downhill). Conventional brake pads on the wheels are not engaged at all at this stage.

In second stage, when you want Insight to even slow down further, you will start to step lightly on the brake pedal. The car computer recognized that you intend to slow the car further, thus increase the level of regenerative braking. The amount of regenerative breaking is controlled by the MDM (Motor Drive Module) by varying the amount of charge allowed enter the IMA battery (the more charge means more loading to the IMA regen motor, thus more drag and slowing the Insight more). The needle on the IMA meter will continue to move downwards further till max regen. Conventional brake pads on the wheels are still not yet engaged at all at this stage.

In the final stage of braking, when you really need the Insight to slow down even further or to a stop, you will step on the brake pedal even harder. When the MDM had already triggered the maximum possible regen and you still step on the brake pedal further downwards, the system knows you need further braking power, more than what the regen can do to slow your Insight down, thus start engaging the conventional brake pads on each wheel.

The design concept of the braking system in Insight is to allows wasted energy of slowing down or going downhill to be collected and stored in the IMA battery by means of regenerative braking, and conventional brake pads braking only comes into action during more agressive braking and holding car in position when in full stop. So one of the fuel saving tips we can learn here is to avoid last minute a.k.a. hard braking i.e. anticipate stopping and brake mildly earlier. Apart for able to harvest the slowing down kinetic energy to charge the IMA battery for next acceleration assist, you also less likely to use and wear off your brake pads.

Since you mentioned it, does the sidestep you sold also require additional doublesided tape?

The shape of the sidestep did not fit perfectly the car body, especially the longer front door sidestep. The middle section keep springing up, probably because existing doublesided tape does not have sufficient surface area to hold it down. I will remove it later and try adding more tapes. Or I probably have to bend the piece slightly to make it into correct shape so it does not spring up.

Any other people who DIY have the same experience?

Finally, I manage to pinpoint the source of the wind noise by accident.

I was spending my Sunday installing sidestep steel plate onto my car. The front plate comes with LED, so I decided to link them up to the room light circuit. I opened the plastic trim along the sidestep to allow me to pull out the door trim rubber lining and thread the wiring of the LED on steel plate into the car.

While I was removing the passenger side sidestep plastic trim, a black plastic plug, about the size of 20 cents coin dropped out. I was guessing that could have been dislodged due to improper factory installation as no one had dismantled that part of my car before (Japanese also human, they may make mistake too). Putting my hand in between the plastic trims and the car body, I could not find any hole that this plug could fit, so finally and reluctantly, i took out most of the plastic trim on the passenger side. I found the hole at the sidewall somewhere beside the glovebox, somewhere below the passenger door wiring. I could be pretty sure that's the hole as there are no other nearby, and the size is perfect fit for the plug i found. So i just plug the hole up.

After fixing the wiring for the sidestep LED putting back all the plastic trims very carefully not to break anything or left anything loose that might rattle, time to go for testdrive. Of course, the LED is easier to test, just open door and the LED comes on. I was more eager to test whether the plug I found did solve the whistling noise that had been bothering me each time I reach highway speed. After driving up and down NKVE for about 45 minutes, I finally convinced the whistling noise has been eliminated.

Close case, finally. Ended up I spend one whole day on my car due to the extra time caused by discovery of this 20 cent size plastic plug, but I am very happy and statisfied, apart from smiling myself looking at the blue glow of my newly installed side step, I got a bonus today for be sure not hearing any more whistling sound each time I hit highway speed, and prove to myself I am not paranoid about the noise as what the service center might have thought.

I just think service center should have took customer complain more seriously, rather than just come out with some lame excuse or even worst to lie to customer in order to coax customer to accept minor defects so they can safe on troubleshooting work.

This post has been edited by cbinn: Jan 15 2012, 10:50 PM

[quote=just_ice,Jan 16 2012, 07:39 AM]

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Added on January 15, 2012, 11:12 pm
meaning it doesn't fit properly?

[/quote]

it fit perfectly, but you just have to use another double sided tape... there should not be any bending the tip of the side step also..

[/quote]
Ya, ended up peeling the sidestep off, added another 2 layers of doublesided tape to make it thicker, and now it fitted firmly. Earlier, the original tape could not hold the middle part of the long sidestep from keep springing up and rattles.

I guess this info will be useful for those who want to diy the installation. for those installed by shop, I am sure the shop will warranty their workmanship.

[quote=lunchtime,Jan 16 2012, 09:44 AM]
Ya, ended up peeling the sidestep off, added another 2 layers of doublesided tape to make it thicker, and now it fitted firmly. Earlier, the original tape could not hold the middle part of the long sidestep from keep springing up and rattles.

I guess this info will be useful for those who want to diy the installation. for those installed by shop, I am sure the shop will warranty their workmanship.

[/quote]
how did you install the LED? where did you tap the wires?

[/quote]

babysmile had posted a very detail guide on where to connect the wire of the sidestep LED to in order for them to come on together with the room light. Just read through this forum (it is on page 100+ of the V4 thread if I had not mistaken)

You will need to pry off the inner plastic trip of the sidestep before you can pull out the weatherproof rubber trim. I run the thin wire under the rubber trim, prior to that, I add insulation using few layers of duct tapes as I felt the metal car body where the rubber trim is mounted is quite sharp and could damage the LED wires when the trim is being reinstalled.

As for how to remove the plastic panel to route the wire from the LED all the way to the connector mentioned by babysmile, it is quite straightforward, just wrap a piece of cloth on your flat tip screw driver before any attempt to dig in to avoid scratch, and requires a lot of patience and care to avoid breaking the plastic clips or having the clips and hooks not in proper place during reinstallation that may cause rattling.

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Added on January 16, 2012, 1:20 pm[quote=xtrabite,Jan 16 2012, 12:15 PM]


could you show us the picture where that hole is located.. kind of blur here...

[/quote]

Sit on the passenger side of the car, to the left of your left feet (under the glovebox), there is a plastic trim that runs all the way down to the floor carpet. If you remove this trim, you will see the metal part of the car body (the other side is where the passenger door hinges are attached to car body). The hole is there, suppose to be covered by the plastic round plug the size of 20 cents coin (mine was dislodged and the plug drop all the way down to the sidestep plastic trim). Higher up above this hole, you will see a bunch of wire running into the wall, this bunch of wire is going towards the passenger door for the power windows, door lock and power mirror.

I wish I got a photo yesterday, by time I done and wanna take photo, sky already dark and you know how bad phone camera works in low light.

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Added on January 16, 2012, 1:21 pm[quote=Sh@rty 5,Jan 16 2012, 11:53 AM]
it fit perfectly, but you just have to use another double sided tape... there should not be any bending the tip of the side step also..

[/quote]



yup we tried sticking before, no prob

we did not change the double side tape but we did apply 3m chemical on the car before sticking

but again, if u guys have the better tape, why not change it
on another note, on our way down to setapak, so those around that area can call us 012 710 7917 if wanna cod today. or sunway and pj area

[/quote]

Hahaha, bro, DIY-er are not supplied with '3M chemical'.

This post has been edited by cbinn: Jan 16 2012, 01:21 PM

Bigger rims and lower prifile tyre naturally give more road surface contact and thus higher turning resistance. Because Insight is using an electric assisted power streering instead of the hydralic version driven by the internal combustion engine, it was not probably designed to drive the extra resistance of a different profile tyres and rims.

There is nothing much you can do as I do not think you can adjust or increase the assist power of the electric power steering. You can opt to slightly over-inflate the tyre and see how much that could help, but it will cause harder uncomfortable ride and probably more wear to the center thread of the tyre.

I wonder the extra resistance will cause more stress and wear to the standard electric assist power steering on the insight, as it was not originally designed for the extra turning resistance.

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Added on January 16, 2012, 11:24 pmDid it help to reduce? After I fixed mine with Mugen visor, I felt wind noise is slight stronger. Anyway, I have no measurable standard for this, just feeling.

I had my visors removed eventually because I find it hard to clean my glass windows with the visor on, and I travelled frequently on trunk roads that are dusty (and muddy when rainfall). Besides, my double-sided tape (which was supposed to be original 3M that cost more than RM20 a roll) looks like about to fail too. I guess for a good stick, you will need an application of primer solution on the surface before sticking the doublesided tape.

For me, visor give the advantge of able to leave a small gap open on the windows when parked under hot sun so that the car does not turn into presurized hot oven when I get back in. I do not see any additional advantage actually as we probably always drive with aircond on in our hot humid climate. The problem with visor is that it is making windows cleaning task harder. Besides, it actually make viewable area of the windows (especially on the back windows) slightly smaller (the visor is actually very dark and cannot see through it). Finally, if your double sided tape application is problematic, your visor can turn into harmful projectile to vehicle behind or opposite you when travelling at high speed.

This post has been edited by cbinn: Jan 16 2012, 11:27 PM

Count me in too. Five year warranty for not needing to wax my car sounds too good to be true.

This post has been edited by cbinn: Jan 19 2012, 10:11 AM