Honda City [2014-2017] User Reviews

Exterior Superb, Stylish, Well designed. When you see it first itself it will impress you because of the sportive look with side liners.

Interior (Features, Space & Comfort) Comfort to sit on back, OK with front. Great cabin space, well enough boot space. Without trouble 6ft can sit in front or back row. More than its competitor giving.

Engine Performance, Fuel Economy and Gearbox No need to tell about engine. Amaze engine 18 to 20km

Ride Quality & Handling Very much comfartable to ride in city as well as highways. Nice to drive in low as well as high speeds (not crossed 100. But till 100 it was comfort)

Final Words Go for it. I did not find any major reason to reject or object this car.. Everything looks okay and has better quality than other cars in the market of similar range. Most importantly the service of Honda is much reliable. Its bit expensive but reliable. If you have accessible service centers then should not worry about service. I met many HONDA car owners  who came to book their second car from HONDA.

 

Areas of improvement Need to improve interiors

Good fuel economy good stypeHmmm

All fellow Readers:

Please be aware that Honda's iDtec engine is not a mature engine. It does provides an excellent mileage but at the cost of 'peace of mind', 'driving pleasure', 'reliability'.

There is a high probability of water entering the engine way, even in foot deep water. The so called 'entered water' stalls the engine, can causes variety of damages - ranging from complete clutch failure to overall seizure.

It's 31 Aug/16 and it rained reasonably in Delhi/NCR. My office is just 4kms away from home and during this stretch with around 1.5 feet of water (max, that too at 1-2 places) - the water entered my engine bay and damaged the complete clutch section. The approx cost estimate is 35k (my car is 17k driven). When I reached the honda service center (Crown Honda, sector 63 Noida) - the gaurds and service advisors shared that more than a dozen of such cars have reached the garage today, all damaged due to water-entered their engine chambers.

Since it was late - 7:30pm, they took my car in custody but didnt' put the entry in garage's official system. I am mentioning here coz, it was my last day of 2 year warranty (I still have 2 years extended warranty left) but the advisor and GM ( I also talked to him) shared that clutch etc. is not covered under warranty and these engines do have such issues - i.e. they confirmed it unofficially.

I exchanged phone numbers with few other fellow honda ownes (poor souls) and we are planning to collectively talk to Honda Management around this. I just cannot pay 35 K for driving my under warranty car in 1.5 deep water.. This is disgusting and unbearable.

So guys, till they come with an improved engine, please avoid buying Honda iDtec series, it such actually - on all aspects except great mileage. They call for sevicing in every 6 months as opposed to 1 year by other car manufacturers and they are very stingy in ackowledging warranty issues.

Few issues in bullet point manner:

Engine NVH level is way poor. Going above 2K rpm, it starts sounding like TATA407 engine and causes nausea and headache over long drives. I just can't bear it. 

Ride Quality & Handling The poor NVH thing ruins the overall driving pleasure. The chasis is so light that even slightest of windy condition makes the car shake. The damping is so poor that even lightest of gravel on the road passes on the vibration and noise in the cabin.

Final Words If you are JUST looking forward to a nice mileage, go for it. Else it doesn't have anything to be fond of. You can't drive it in cold areas (hills etc. as hot air from engine bay fogs out the windscreen via coltop gaps) and not even in rainy season as well, the water enters the engine easily and causes hydrolock or clutch failure cases (costs around 30k to 1L, depending on the nature of damage.)

Areas of improvement

Many:

Start listening to customers. Work on the incompletely/poorly designed iDtec engine. Make it water proof for god sake.

Advise your buyers to not drive the diesel cars in rainy season (guys, am serious).

Work on the NVH level, and make the car able to absorb road noise.

Dont' cut cost around essential areas, such as coltop clippings (it keeps on making variety of noises), Jack holding plate (in trunk), horn (it sinks often), clutch pedals making screatching noise etc.

Design, Interiors, fuel economyLow ride, poor product quality, poorest NVH level- drives like a TATA 407

I have purchased the new HONDA city from Olympia HONDA - Chennai in the Apr 2014. From my purchase I used to face water leakage inside my car during the rainy season. Whenever I take to the showroom they used to say some positive comments as it's fixed/may be glass would left open/when we flushed water there is no leakage, their ultimate intension is to release the car with my sign on the same day.

Now, days went off and they are not ready to accept the water leakage issue and they say it as my fault and atlast now my car under chase has been completely rusted because of water leakage and that too I found it through outside Mechanic. From this I came as they are not ready to reveal the impact of leakage too.

Pros:

- Mileage (diesel if you are ready to drive between 60 - 70 Km speed per hour on Highway).

- Comfort (Only for the passengers and not for the drivers due to Indian road conditions).

- Reliability (Drive the car on highway and if any another vehicle like bus / heavy vehicle crosses you above 100+ Kms u may know the reliability of this car).

- Looks (Great - aerodynamics concept).

- Leg Room (Excellent).

- Steering (Awesome).

Cons:

- Very light weighted car.

- Low Ground clearance (It kisses the road like anything, that too when its fully loaded it will be awesome).

- You will not get the clear view of raods.

- Blind spot is there, while turning you may face this blind spot like you can't notice the person who is about to cross you.

Suggestion to Car owners:

- Better to do service at some private stations instead in showrooms, you can save half of the amount.

- Always during service you can notice one thing, your car smells fresh and clean however, not your car internal organs, please check it like engine oil / coolant oil / break oil.

- Go for a test drive, check your breaks, power and clutch of the car.

- Don't do down payments unless you select your car, beacause once down payment is done you are under the control of the showroom person.

- Please choose your car and go for a drive atleast 5 kms on the city roads so that you may know the suspension and drive quality then, sit inside the car and tell the showroom person to flush water on your car. Check is there any leakage or not because, it's very tough to identify later, it may rust the complete car.

- Please never compromise or listen to showroom people as it's your hard earned money you take your decision.

The reason for such a long conversation is because, I already messed up with my car and money by investing on HONDA and the consumer court in INDIA is not effective. I don't wanna waste my rest of money in cases or chasing the Olympia HONDA instead better to go with Maruthi or Toyoto (Worth for 5 lakh KMS).

Suggestion to HONDA:

- Please do a proper Quality Check on all cars as you guys are not giving it for free.

- Listen to customer feedback and issues.

- Provide customer's a link where they can reach you directly incase, the dealers service are not satisfied.

- For your kind notice, dealers are begging the customer's to give rating as 10. It's a shame for HONDA to beg customer. Tell them to do service instead of begging us.

FYI, my car number is TN 09 XXXX.

Never ever under estimate INDIAN customer's please value everone.

Suggestion to Olympia HONDA - Chennai:

- Never skip an customer complaint.

- Try to sell cars and don't do brokerage.

- Don't do cheap business, It's all everyone's hard earned money.

- We all come with a dream and don't spoil it for your benefits.

Mileage, Looks, Leg RoomReliability, Not fit for Indian roads, Blind Spot