Honda Civic

Honda isn’t the kind of car maker to measure success exclusively in terms of units sold and overall market share captured – but as far as UK sales of its Civic are concerned, that’s probably just as well. This engineering-led innovator has been making Civics for four decades. More than 20 million examples have been sold worldwide.

But despite having been built in the UK for more than a quarter of its life now, the Civic has never featured among Britain’s top 10 annual best-selling new cars. Into that context of unexploited potential, and borne out of Honda’s will to compete more closely with the established local powers across as many of Europe’s new car market segments as possible, comes the ninth-generation Civic five-door – the third to be assembled at Swindon.

DESIGN

Honda was always likely to struggle to reproduce the sense of amazement that it created with the design of the 2006 Civic, so it hasn’t tried. The company describes this new version as “a thoughtful evolution”, saying the exterior styling is more athletic and elegant than that of the last car and its profile lower, wider and more aerodynamic. As much as it can be, at any rate, while retaining the old car’s basic mechanical platform and fixed reference points, or ‘hard points’.

The shortage of design freedom that implies might explain some of the less visually successful parts of the Civic’s styling, such as its front wings, bodyside surfaces and rear bumper treatment. This, as most testers agreed, is not an attractive-looking car. From a functional perspective, however, design improvements have been made. The drag coefficient is a close-to-class-leading 0.27 and rearward visibility has been improved by a more intelligently designed tailgate with a standard wiper.

The new Civic’s petrol engines range from 1.4 to 1.8 litres in capacity and 98bhp to 140bhp in power output. A sub-100g/km 1.6-litre oil-burner will surely outsell the unusually large capacity all-aluminium 2.2 i-DTEC.

Fitted with lower-friction internals, ‘shallow bowl’ combustion chambers, a new intercooler and a more efficient lubrication system, the 2.2 diesel now meets Euro 5 emissions standards and produces 148bhp and 258lb ft of torque. Automatic engine stop-start contributes towards CO2 emissions of 110g/km on most trim levels (115g/km on bigger-wheeled EX GT flagship versions like our test car) and combined economy of up to 67.3mpg.

The smaller 1.6-litre turbodiesel's 118bhp of peak power and 221lb ft of torque, combined with CO2 emissions of 94g/km, make it an outstanding on-paper prospect among its peers.

As is the class norm, the engine sits transversely under the bonnet and drives the front wheels through a standard six-speed manual gearbox. As with the outgoing Civic, suspension is via MacPherson struts at the front and a torsion beam at the rear.

However, Honda claims big gains in rolling refinement and dynamism as a result of a long programme of retuning the chassis and steering. A stiffer twist beam has also been specified, as well as new fluid-filled compliance bushes at the rear.

INTERIOR

Honda has set out to make the cabin of the new Civic more luxurious and upmarket than its predecessor’s. It has achieved this up to a point. The interior of our test car looked and felt very pleasant, fitted out in soft, tactile plastics and leathers with all the integrity and finished with all the attention to detail that you expect of a true premium product. All it really lacks is the material variety and richness, and the more imaginative and contemporary styling, of the plushest luxury hatches of the moment.

The steering wheel is larger and flatter than before and the gearlever is sited lower. The dashboard architecture is very much driver-oriented, made up of two arcing swathes of plastic that wrap around the right-hand seat, encompassing the binnacle below and the speedometer and new intelligent multi-information display above. The logic of having an analogue revcounter underneath a digital speedo may seem flawed, but the car’s instruments are clear and work well.

However, we can’t say the same about the rest of the car’s secondary controls. Although the steering wheel-mounted shortcut buttons are easy to get on with, controlling the audio system and sat-nav is made needlessly difficult by fiddly switchgear. The labels are small and tricky to read, too.

Elsewhere, the cabin is designed more thoughtfully, but it’s far from the class’s most accommodating car. In the front, a high-mounted driver’s seat conspires with shallow A-pillars and a low roof line to make headroom tight; there’s over 100mm less of it than some hatchbacks offer. In the rear, there’s about 60mm less headroom than you’ll find in a Golf, making it an uncomfortable place to travel for anyone taller than 6ft.

The boot is quite generous, though. The absence of a spare wheel makes for a split-level boot that’s almost a metre tall. And the ‘magic’ rear seats not only fold down totally flat but also have squabs that flip upright to allow you to accommodate more ungainly things such as bikes.

PERFORMANCE

The Civic is all about quality rather than quantity in this department. In outright terms, its ability to crack 60mph from rest in a shade over nine seconds is unexceptional. Honda’s claim (to 62mph) is 8.8sec – and on a warmer day we might have been able to match it.

What is particularly commendable, however, is the way this car serves up its performance. Throttle response is excellent and the shift quality from the six-speed gearbox is equally fine. Long gear ratios blunt the Civic’s flexibility slightly, but the trade-off is an engine that’s spinning at just over 1800rpm at 70mph in top gear. It has a free-spinning nature and cruises well, although a few questions remain about its refinement. 

The smaller 1.6 diesel is pleasingly unaffected by the usual rattle and clatter of diesel engines at low and middling crank speeds, and pulls as hard as many 2.0-litre units at times. It doesn’t  like revving beyond 3500rpm too much, and isn’t as refined at high revs as it is lower down. But throttle response is good, and there’s no sense at all that what you’re driving might be in any way austerity-minded.

Both petrol engines are a little outclassed in terms of their figures and overall usability by the more refined turbo’d petrols available in rival cars.

The 1.6 and 2.2 diesel are engines that are very effectively isolated from the cabin, too. Honda makes a big deal of the noise and vibration reduction regime that the Civic has been through. This has resulted in extra insulation in the rear wheel arches, roof and engine bay, better door seals all round, and thicker front side windows.

You can certainly perceive the improvement. Although the noise levels we recorded look quite average, they mask a car that filters out the harshest frequencies of mechanical noise and road roar very well, and it suffers with little wind rustle.