Archive for 2009 Honda City

The Honda City seems to be defying the current financial downturn as it has helped propel Honda Malaysia Sdn Bhd achieve its highest monthly sales ever in history, bringing Honda market share up to 10% of the Total Industry Volume, in a market that has shrunk by 17.5% year on year. Honda scored 1,693 units of the Honda City in January 2009, which is nearly 50% of total Honda sales of 3,815 units. The Civic, Accord and CR-V scored sales of 734, 803 and 413 units respectively. Honda dealership traffic has also doubled ever since the City’s launch. Honda Malaysia has bumped up production for the City by 20% to shorten the waiting period and the Pegoh Plant in Malacca is running at full capacity on two 10-hour shifts and even the occasional runtime during holidays. Read our past coverage of the 2009 Honda City linked below.

Related Posts:
2009 Honda City First Drive Impressions Review
2009 Honda City 1.5E and 1.5S launched in Malaysia
2009 Honda City in-depth details and specifications

The Japanese B-segment market is indeed a hot one and is dominated by the H and T badges, despite honest efforts by other manufacturers such as Suzuki to make an impact with cars such as the SX4 sedan. The City and the Vios remain the champions of the under RM80k non-national sedan market and are the target of many people who long to break out of what they feel is the curse of Proton ownership, so naturally the launch of the new Honda City this year was very eagerly awaited. The new City is blessed with good looks and now that the launch and fanfare are over, it’s time to take a good look at the car and see if it is indeed as good as it looks.

Read my full driving impressions after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Honda City: first drive impressions review

Honda Malaysia Sdn Bhd finally brought us the 2009 Honda City. For those that already know pretty much everything about the car thanks to this blog’s detailed coverage in the past, let’s quickly get down to what’s important, the price!

The 2009 Honda City comes in 2 variants, the Honda City 1.5S and the Honda City 1.5E. The 1.5S is the lower end variant, priced at RM84,980 OTR with insurance while the top of the line is the Honda City 1.5E priced at RM89,980 and includes full specs such as larger wheels and paddle shifters.

The City comes with a 3 year warranty and 6 months free servicing. For the full scoop on the Honda City for the Malaysian market, continue reading this story after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Honda City 1.5 E and S launched in Malaysia!

A few readers have spotted the new 2009 Honda City being transported on trailers on the highways in Malaysia. They don’t have much disguise on them, just some white cloth or some other material covering up the front and rear of the car, and even that is a little translucent so we get to see the tail lamps peeking through.

From the shots, we are able to gauge some minor details on how the new Honda City will be offered here in Malaysia. For one, we are getting the Asian design for the City which features a sleeker-looking side profile. The European version has some strips on the side of the car which makes the car taller than it really is, and that kind of messes up its sporty profile. There will be at least two variants for sure as there are two sets of alloy wheel designs featured on the cars being carries. One is a more traditional 5 spoke design while the other is the Y-spoke alloys belonging to the more expensive model.

The colour variants we are able to observe here are only two colours – the blue City and the black City. There will of course be a silver City looking at how popular that colour is in Malaysia, but no sign of the delicious red one at the moment. A white coloured Honda City would look good too (white is very popular now), as demonstrated by the white coloured unit spotted in China way before the City was unveiled.

The new Honda City will be launched before the end of this week. Look after the jump for more shots of the new Honda City. Photos thanks to Kevin Lee and Stephen Loh.

Related Posts:
2009 Honda City: in-depth details and specifications (must-read!)

Click here to read the rest of New Honda City transported on trailers in Malaysia

The Honda City has been unveiled in China by Guangzhou Honda at the 2008 Guangzhou Motor Show, but it will only make a showroom debut with official prices on the 12th of December 2008.

What’s most interesting is in the Chinese market, the City will come with two engine options. One is the new 1.5 liter i-VTEC that we’re also going to get, but the other engine option is the R-series 1.8 liter SOHC i-VTEC from the Civic 1.8.

A lightweight Honda City equipped with a 140 horsepower 1.8 liter engine could be loads of fun. China always gets special deals such as this, for example the current generation Toyota Vios sold in China is equipped with a 1.6 liter Dual VVT-i engine while the rest of the world have to make do with the 1.5 liter 1NZ-FE family engine.

I’m not sure if this is what Guangzhou Honda meant by developing a Civic competitor (the Civic is sold by another Honda-linked company in China).

A previous report said a 1.8 liter engine was going to be plonked into the City to create a C-segment competitor, but an engineer quoted in the report also mentioned that the new 1.8 liter City-based car would have Civic proportions and a new name and shape.

Related Posts:
2009 Honda City: in-depth details and specifications (must-read!)

Honda Malaysia has officially announced that the new 2009 Honda City will be launched in mid-December 2008! A date has been set for the 18th of December 2008. They are also having pre-launch competition where you’ll be able to win passes to the launch and the latest generation iPod Nano.

For everything you need to know about the new Honda City (except for driving impressions of course… that’s to come later), please check out my related posts below.

Related Posts:
2009 Honda City: in-depth details and specifications (must-read!)
2009 Honda City set to hit the European market
2009 Honda City officially unveiled in Thailand
Modified Australian Honda City “Concept”

The Honda City is now in its third generation, and has been launched in countries such as Singapore, Thailand and India. In line with the global economic outlook as well as global fuel prices, manufacturers have been downsizing their cars and the new City makes a perfect compact sedan in the Honda line-up slotted in under the Civic for world markets. It is considered to be a world car now, as it has also been recently revealed that the City will also be sold in Europe. Look after the jump for an in-depth look at the new City.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Honda City: in-depth details and specifications!

Click for hi-res photo

A new set of photos of the new 2009 Honda City have been released, this time a left hand drive version as a preview to the car’s official European unveiling at the Istanbul Motor Show this October 2008.

The European market Honda City will be fitted with a 100 PS 1.4 liter i-VTEC engine mated to a 5-speed transmission, and apparently the new City – like its European Jazz and Civic hatch siblings – will feature a 6-speed i-SHIFT automated manual transmission with steering-mounted paddle shifts will serve those who do not want to bother with a manual clutch on a daily basis.

The 5-speed manual transmission has been improved over the previous version, now featuring a carbon synchromesh for smoother gear changes as well a new set of gear ratios optimised for the new engine.

Other than the left hand drive interior, something new shown with this new set of photos is the fact that the car features an automatic climate control system with digital display instead of the three-knob manual air conditioning controls that were shown in the previous set of photos. The exterior also looks a little different, with some extra side strips somehow giving the car a more stout look. Frankly I prefer the Asian version’s exterior.

Look after the jump for the new set of photos.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Honda City set to hit the European market

Displayed together at the official unveiling of the new Honda City in Thailand was a version of the City with a Modulo bodykit. The Modulo kit features a new front bumper and grille together with side skirts and new alloy wheels. While it loses its Optimus Prime look, the Modulo front grille still has a very techno design theme to it and features alot more chrome. Look after the jump for one more photo of the new Honda City Modulo.

Related Posts:
2009 Honda City officially unveiled in Thailand

Click here to read the rest of Honda City Modulo with bodykit and grille

Honda Automobile (Thailand) Co., Ltd. has started selling the all-new Honda City in Thailand today. It will be sold in Thailand for between 524,000 to 694,000 Thai baht. We don’t have much details on the wheelbase and some other details yet.

The new Honda City is powered by solely by a 1.5 liter i-VTEC engine mated to either a 5-speed automatic or a 5-speed manual It is 4,395mm long, 1,695mm wide and 1,470mm tall, so it is slightly longer (+5mm), slightly wider (+5mm) but not as tall (-25mm) as the previous model. Making it wider and not as high reduces the whole hatchback with a boot tagged on look that the City it replaces had.

It’s quite an attractive car and the lines flow alot smoother than the model it replaces. I hope that for those who don’t fancy the grille at the front all that much (as expressed in some previous posts), there will be a replacement Modulo grille that they can opt for. This was an option that Accord owners who preferred not having an “empty” grille – they could opt for a Modulo grille that had a little bar running through it.

UPDATE: More photos including high resolution photos of the new Honda City have been added after the jump. The new City is sold in Thailand in three variants: S, V and SV. The S and V variants come with a beige interior while the top of the line SV model comes with a dark interior and all 3 variants also come with different alloy wheel designs.

Six colours are available – Habanero Red Pearl, Deep Lapis Blue Metallic, Alabaster Metallic, Polished Metal Metallic and Bold Beige Metallic and Crystal Black Pearl. Sadly white is not available but maybe it will be in Malaysia if Honda Malaysia deems it as a potentially popular colour, which I think it would.

More details to be updated soon, for the moment please have a look at a collection of photos of the new City after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Honda City officially unveiled in Thailand!