jwong77

I think the last two generations of the Focus have blown away the Civic, its just unfortunate that Ford decided to sell us the first generation of Focus while the rest of the world got the newer updated models.

-J-P-L-

The EPA has officially awarded the Focus SE SFE at 40 MPG highway.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

love the 5 door hatch!
don't know why anyone would buy a pious over this.

tzu911

Lol... If only the Prius had orange-lit instruments instead of the green, beefed up the quality and feel of the interior, added more shoulder room, lenghtened the entrance height.... (read: Prius-envy) But I digress.., it's good to see there are other alternatives in this gas-slurping crap storm.

SLegacy99

Toyota is really lagging behind here....Honda too.

-J-P-L-

It's amazing how 2011 > has completely turned the tables on fuel efficiency.

The companies that used to put out the worse fuel numbers are now the best.
Ford, GM, & Hyundai have taken over and left the fuel efficiency kings, Toyota and Honda, behind (the Prius being the exception). The Corolla is starting to look really bad - amazing that it's still #1/#2. The next generation better pull out all the stops. I'm impatiently waiting to see the new Yaris sedan introduced and to see what the fuel efficiency turns out to be for the sedan/hatch. If they don't get more than 40 mpg highway (up from 35/36 now), then Toyota has got some hills to climb. They'll be hard pressed to ring up sales.

And can you believe the Honda Fit only gets 33 MPG highway!? While the much larger Cruze, Elantra, & Focus get 40? And they beat the Fit in the city too.

spwolf

thats because both Yaris and Corolla are vehicles from 2005/2006...

And dont expect to see some huge difference in real life mileage anyway, those cars are just better suited for new EPA tests that came out in 2009.

Autobild did big group test of Euro hatchbacks and compared these new small turbos to state of the art Toyota Valvematic and KIA engines, and found out (and downplayed) that during their tests, Toyota and KIA spent less fuel than small turbos that were rated better.

mmarshall

We're getting a little off-topic here, but the 2Gen Prius did have solid, well-done interior, sheet-metal, and trim quality....and then they got rid of it on the new 3Gen model with cost-cutting and weight-reduction. The Prius drivetrain, however, is (still) a model of refinement and efficiency, especially compared to the second-rate Honda IMA systems.


And a Prius with sport-oriented, orange-lit instruments? That would be like Hulk Hogan driving a VW New Beetle.

IS-SV

IMO, the latest Prius is a better car in areas that matter, therefore the car sells in droves. I drove the new Prius extensively (hundred of miles) and found the car to be solid versus anything in it's price range and class. Not that this is a Prius thread, but the car is a success by any industry standard, not to mention subjective (ot) blathering.

mmarshall

Sorry, we're just going to disagree on the 3Gen Prius ...at least as far as the interior and sheet metal is concerned. It does have a superb hybrid drivetrain, though.....and people are obviously buying it for its mileage.

But, back to the thread topic, if the Focus (same for the Fiesta and Hyundai Elantra) can get 40 MPG with a substantially lower price, less-complexity under the hood, and without the Prius battery-pack, I tend to think they may be better buys overall, even giving up some 10 MPG on the highway to the Prius. That 51 highway MPG for the Prius comes at a substantial price premium over other, more conventional small cars.....even more so, of course, for the Chevrolet Volt. And buying a used Prius may not (?) necessarily be the answer, both because of the Prius' very low depreciation and its difficulty to find as a used-car.

IS-SV

Yes we disagree on the subjective trivia (unscientific and unmeasured talk of interior and sheet metal thickness) about Prius, not that it matters since it's not thread topic. And people are obviously buying it by the thousands every single month for a variety of reasons of which mileage is just one major reason.

ABC

Agreed. Now that there is some competition close to prius mpg numbers, if i were in the market for this type of car, i would definitely be looking at these competitors.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

green and lean, and novelty, that's mostly it. it's pleasant enough to drive, if bland and fairly gutless.

other than that, it doesn't have a lot of room (really high rear deck makes back hatch space very limited), has a bizarre interior with awful center MAIN guages and center console 'bridge' with some controls underneath (weird). the lack of option flexibility sucks, but even with all those things, people buy 'em because of the above (green, lean, novelty). oh and because people can't do math.

IS-SV

Excellent description, especially the part about bland and gutless

mmarshall

Depends on what you and Paul mean by "Gutless". Obviously, with a 50-MPG vehicle, you aren't going to get a Dodge Viper powertrain. Nowever, in spite of my low opinion of the 3Gen Prius interior and sheet metal (something I'm not going to change my mind on), I do have to give it credit for at least gome "guts" in the chassis......that's a point I should have made earlier, and didn't. The 2Gen model rode nicely and absorbed bumps well, but had a high center of gravity, high-profile/low-rolling resistance tires, and a flabby Roly-Poly suspension. The new 3Gen model has a slightly lower stance, lower/wider tires (still with relatively low rolling-resstance), and a somewhat firmer suspension. It's like the new Buick LaCrosse vs. the old..... there is a small loss of ride comfort over the 2Gen (as to be expected), but, to compensate, a major improvement in steering/handling and noticeably flatter cornering.

(BTW, Paul, I agree with you on the console "bridge", with that big hole underneath, and the heated-seat switches all the way down on the floor.....that arrangement s**ks. I mentioned that in my Prius review.)