Honda Amaze Facelift Long Term Review – First Report

Some other bits missing on the Honda Amaze are push button start, request sensor on the front doors and reverse parking sensors. I stay in Mumbai and don’t feel the need to describe the tight parking spaces and it becomes a bit cumbersome without sensors, let alone a camera! The ORVMs are electrically adjustable but they don’t shut when you lock the car, instead, you need to shut them separately using a button. What I really love about the Amaze is the AC which cools the cabin in a jiffy and even on the hottest days here, the air conditioning does a good job with the blower speed set to 4 or 5 after the vehicle has been standing in the sun for long. I am driving the car 95% of the times and haven’t really got a chance to travel while sitting at the rear but the feedback that I’ve received from passengers has been pretty positive thanks to the generous space and soft cushioning, coupled with the fairly large windows.

Our test car comes with the 1.5-litre i-DTEC diesel engine (100 PS and 200 Nm) which is mated to a 5-speed gearbox, unlike the Jazz and BR-V which get a 6-speed unit. The motor is really noisy all the time and it gets annoying unless you turn up the music volume to mask the clatter. The engine has excellent driveability and the low-end is decent while the mid-range feels extremely punchy. Post 1800 RPM, the Amaze accelerates very quickly till 3700 RPM or so. The top speed is limited to 140 km/hr and the powerplant never feels strained or out of breath. In fact, it seems to have punch to attain much higher speeds too. Even at higher RPMs, the engine noise filters inside the cabin and you keep hearing a constant humming sound. Fuel efficiency is splendid and I’ve been getting 15-16 km/l under very hard driving while on a long highway cruise, I managed almost 22 km/l. However, my previous Jazz diesel long termer had better efficiency thanks to the 6-speed gearbox.

Honda cars are fun to drive but I wish my long term car had better brakes

The Amaze has a brilliant chassis and that’s what makes the car so much fun to drive. The steering is light at city speeds and weighs up decently on the highways. It offers excellent feel and feedback. That coupled to the sorted suspension set-up makes the Amaze very chuckable around corners. The suspension gobbles up potholes and provides a smooth ride, with the vehicle staying planted most of the times. However, the clutch on our test car seems to have worn out and I’ve been noticing since day 1 that the pedal feels a bit harder to operate compared to other Honda cars in general. The brakes are below average and while they feel sharp at low speeds, high-speed braking is scary and the compact sedan doesn’t stop how you expect it to, in hard braking situations. There is simply no confidence from the brakes in emergency situations. However, I would attribute this issue only with our test car since it has earlier been driven and tested by quite a lot of people. Even the tyres are just about average but these have been plonked in the Amaze in the interest of fuel efficiency.

The Honda Amaze might not be the perfect compact sedan yet but I really love it for its driving manners, performance from the diesel engine and the excellent fuel efficiency which I’m getting. The comfortable seats are a good place to be in when you go for long drives and the compact dimensions of the car make it feel very chuckable in traffic. The Amaze is reasonably priced and has many things going for it. There are definitely some flaws but most of them won’t be deal-breakers for anyone I think. Mated to Honda’s well-spread service network, the Amaze does make a strong case for itself.

Further Reading –

Honda Amaze Facelift Review
Honda Amaze Review
Honda Amaze Long Term Review – Final Report
Maruti DZire vs Honda Amaze vs Tata Zest vs Hyundai Xcent
Honda Amaze vs Ford Aspire vs Hyundai Xcent vs Tata Zest