[Rick Reece]

I would like to see who in the group has the most mileage on their battery. We hear from members every once in a while that have had to have the main battery replaced, some while still under warranty. I believe in nearly all the cases Honda has paid for at least part of the replacement. Anyway the purpose of the thread is to try and find the upper limit that users have experienced. I believe someone has already topped 160K miles. To start off my battery has 125K miles and 4.5 years old and no IMA lights yet. Have fun, RIck

 

[Calpod]

Mine has 126K and no IMA lights or any other codes yet. 8)

 

[Mike Dabrowski 2000]

Mine is at 80K, and is getting a licking and still keeps on kicking.
Must be energizers.
:lol:

 

[james]

Sheesh, you guys make me feel like that little old lady who only drove to church on Sundays. I've only got about 70K on my 2000. With all the mountain driving I do, though, I probably have more charge/discharge cycles than most - figure between 2-4 per week, on average, over the two years I've owned it. No problems so far.

 

[Dougie]

Would be interesting to know whether long battery life is correlated with hypermileage driving (not getting into the battery much) versus "regular" driving (using the battery). Does the battery last longer if you don't use it or if you exercise it a bit?

 

[Insightful Trekker]

AFAIK _all_ "rechargeable" batteries have cycling limits. Some have a greater number of life cycles. Simply stated the more you charge - discharge them the shorter their life. Shelf life has its limits too so simply not using them will not increase their life past a certian point either. But you sure can rapidly cycle them to their life's limit faster :!:

HTH!

 

[jburdett]

I feel like the youngster on the block then.... My 2000 insight has just over 45 K and is getting on average 60+ MPG. I drive it normal, i.e; like you would any other 5 speed winding out the gears a little more than what the indicator says to shift. I regularly use the IMA and so far I'm not having any problems. The best milage that I've gotten is 72.9 and the worst was when I first got it in December last year and that was 54.2 MPG. It has steadily gotten better. I'm getting ready to go to Arkansas on the 27th of this month. I'll let you know how it does.

Jerry

 

[malachev]

Battery Life

I killed mine after about 70k. Although it began to noticeable decline in performance after 50K. The battery and IMA were replaced under warranty, thankfully. My commute involves 2-4 days a week of severe mountain driving at 60 mile round trip. I downshift before completely draining the battery, but still it involves 2 half discharges per trip.

I'm hoping to get more life out of the reconditioned one, but we'll see. Hope to make it to 125K without problems!

2000 silver manual with A/C
77k
56.4 lmpg
Clint

 

[No. 166]

125,000kms driven, nearly 5 Years old and still going strong !
No IMA light, ever.
Just the "engine check"-light which meant replacing the lambda-sond.

 

[meow77]

what is the lambda sond? never heard of that

 

[Insightful Trekker]

Sprechen Deustch :?:

O2 Sensor

 

[No. 166]

O2-sensor, obviously. :roll:

Well, speaking, writing English AND German over here you do tend to mix up things sometimes.
I remember once when I was speaking to my mate, who doesn't understand any English, as he looked at me very puzzled. It was THEN when I noticed I was talking to him in English

My dad is ex-army btw and I've been brought up with both languages. :wink:

 

[bfivelover]

Mine is a 2002 with 100,500 miles. Have had the IMA light come on and the IMA lose power once due to my covering up the vents and the batteries overheating while on a long trip. Had the car jam packed. Other than that, no problems.

 

[LoNOx 1]

2000 5spd @ 102,000 miles and I'm afraid the battery is near death!
I've been experiencing recals since September with irregular frequency.
Last week they have been averaging 1 every 150 miles for a total of 4 in one week. I'm going to check a few things next week.
I will probably call American Honda as well.

 

[ilusnforc]

My battery pack was replaced September 16, 2004 with 63,900 miles.
Thankfully it was under warranty, grand total of $2,034 at Honda's cost. It's not like the battery just gave out... It was just irritating how the battery would reach a full charge and every time it would just do a recall and deplete itself instantly, and just happened more and more frequently. My honda dealer Tech took it for a ride and thank god even after manually resetting the battery by pulling and replacing the fuses and letting it idle above 3000 rpm until fully charged and he could not get full assist. Just about the last 3 bars of assist were not lighting up. So he called in to Honda TechLine and they suggested replacing the battery pack because it is defective. Has been running incredible ever since.
~Silver 2000 Honda Insight 5-speed~

 

[ericbecky]

ilusnforc,
What year Insight and is it a CVT or 5 speed?

 

[ilusnforc]

Sorry I forgot to include that info...

2000 Insight 5-speed

 

[ilusnforc]

I've been experiencing recals since September with irregular frequency. Last week they have been averaging 1 every 150 miles for a total of 4 in one week. I'm going to check a few things next week. I will probably call American Honda as well.

I would say you are due for a new battery pack, unless you don't mind the milage-destroying recalls. Thats exactly what was happening to my Insight... I had one dealership tell me that it's normal and they even sent me a letter explaining. It talked about how if you drive up a long hill using lots of assist then park the car and turn it off, then the next time you get in the car it will look like a "recall" and the battery will deplete because of the delayed calculation. That does make sense to me but had absolutely nothing to do with my situation. I would drive very carefully about 20 miles on the highway and another 5 miles on smaller streets at constant speeds coming home from college at night and park my Insight in the driveway with a completely full charge. The next morning I would go outside, drive about 5 miles or so and then it would suddenly discharge and drop to zero and go into forced charging mode. It got to the point of doing this as many as two or three times a day and eventually even when it was not fully charged. I started going to another dealership and found a really helpful and friendly mechanic, one day I just drove up, poked my head into the shop and called him over, told him I think there's a problem with my battery pack and he spent about 2 hours on it right then and there until he got word from Honda TechLine to put in an order for a replacement, I was not even charged for it... It takes about 2 weeks to be ready for replacement because there is only one tool (basically a big handle that bolts to the battery pack to be able to carry and lift it into position) and it just circulates around with the suitcase looking thing for the battery packs. I'll put up a link for pics of my replacement, I even got to help him install it, it was too heavy for him to do it alone... quite interesting but fun!
http://hometown.aol.com/ilusnforc/insight.html

 

[GasWatt]

Battery longevity

I have 190,000 on my 2001 insight. I've had it 4 1/2 years and no IMA lights and not an unusual amount of resets. Approx 2 per week.

 

[Insightful Trekker]

WOW :!: :shock:

I think that makes you the "new" record holder here at I.C. :!:

Can we get some more specifics :?: Please :?:

General geographic location (weather, temperature and terrain effects)
General driving pattern :?: e.g. long distance commuter etc.
Original owner :?: you post seems to indicate such.
LMPG (Lifetime MPG as indicated on the dash or calculated)

Any other driving patterns / conditions that you believe may have contributed to the IMA packs longivity.

Anxiously awaiting your reply (in this thread )