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View Full Version : Long live the Honda Odyssey!



Mr Buckshot
April 9th, 2008, 09:40 PM
Just for kicks, my dad and I drove to the Honda showroom today to test drive the new generation of the awesome Honda Odyssey minivan. No, we won't be buying one because we have no more use for large cars, but it still brought back memories.

Back in 2001, within a few weeks of arrival in America, my dad purchased the previous-generation (current-gen at the time) Honda Odyssey. It wasn't that great of a car, especially when it came to the gas pump. But it'll always have a special place in my heart for these reasons:

1. It was the first left-hand-drive car we actually owned. Ok, I used to live in Shanghai for part of my childhood (mostly spent in Singapore), but cars in mainland China were so expensive that our vehicle was a right-hand-drive model imported from Hong Kong. My dad had owned a left-hand-drive car before when he studied at Stanford, but this was the first time the whole family got to own and use a left-hand-drive vehicle.

2. First time we had an in-dash GPS navigation system of any kind. Being unfamiliar with the roads of California, my dad checked off this option on the list almost immediately. The DVD-based system was shit by today's standards, but it worked well back then with its touch screen and effective route guidance. Our current vehicle now uses a hard drive for the GPS, and my dad has even acquired a cell phone with built-in GPS.

3. Today, the Honda Odyssey is still the largest car I've ever had in my own house. The reason why we bought a minivan in 2001 was because we never actually bought a house (rent, rent, rent...) so we moved around quite a lot. I tell you, with the third-row bench seat folded down and the second-row seats detached, the car turned into a moving truck with more than enough cargo room (we managed to stuff in 3 dismantled bed frames, one dismantled dining table, and 4 chairs and a folding mattress)..

4. It was the last car we owned that had cloth seats. My dad's real reason for preferring leather seating was not because of comfort or class (cloth is actually more comfortable in many cases), but because cloth seats caught dust very easy. If any of you have cloth seats in your cars, try slapping the seat every once in a while and watch the dust fly.

In 2004, before moving to Canada, my dad replaced the van with an Infiniti FX35 crossover SUV, which was imported into Canada (after a headache-inducing 8 days of Canadian tests and paperwork), and then sold almost 3 years later.

So while test-driving the new model, I noticed a number of improvements. The fuel economy was improved (well, the Honda salesman said it, that is) over the version I used to own. The GPS is far more advanced with voice recognition and is linked to a rearview camera for safer reverse parking. My mom didn't dare to drive this car back in the States because of the poor rearward visibility. I wonder if she'll change her mind now...not to mention that the front/rear bumpers have sonar sensors to detect any objects (or kids) in the blind spots. A rear-seat DVD entertainment system is now an available option (it wasn't in my version). And the rearview mirror is much larger (it was way too small on my version).

So, long live the Honda Odyssey, the first car I ever had in America and also the largest car I ever owned.

The model I had:
http://www.edmunds.com/media/editorial/carmudgeon/01.honda.odyssey.500.jpg

The current model my dad test-drove today:
http://www.automedia.com/NewCarBuyersGuide/photos/2006/Honda/Odyssey/Minivan_Van/2006_Honda_Odyssey_ext_1.jpg

I hope Honda comes up with a manual override for the electric sliding doors, though. They moved way too slowly - sometimes I wished they could just slam shut since the car's safety system prevented the car from moving unless the doors were completely closed.

I wonder if Teekup's favorite Chrysler minivan can stand up to this...

Chainsy
April 9th, 2008, 10:14 PM
CHUCK NORRIS
VS
HONDA
http://media.koreus.com/files/200408/accidentaudia3.jpg
norris wins.

Mr Buckshot
April 9th, 2008, 10:18 PM
That's an Audi A3, so it doesn't count.

DrunkenSamus
April 9th, 2008, 11:30 PM
I love how Chuck Norris can enter any type of conversation.

TeeKup
April 10th, 2008, 10:32 AM
For the last goddamn time I was commending chrysler for all their innovations in new Town & Country, and I actually drove an old one the other day. It had better acceleration and top speed than my 94 accord. Which was a bit surprising cause my honda's engine is turbo charged.

The only time I would actually use a minivan would be some cross country trip or some shit, my honda is just too small for that.

Mr Buckshot
April 10th, 2008, 11:29 PM
I saw the 2008 Chrysler Town & Country, and it certainly looks better than most American cars I've seen. But the only thing that impressed me was the Swivel-N-Go second-row seats - almost everything else was already available on the Honda counterpart. If not, they could be bought as cheaper after-market devices. Kudos to Chrysler for having the in-dash hard drive music server though - it's a feature previously only seen in prestige brands. Then again, I don't know if anyone actually fills up the hard drive with that many songs. In my current vehicle, we haven't bothered ripping any CDs for the time being.

The Honda wins out with its Japanese bulletproof reliability though. I've heard that the Americans are trying to match up in reliability, so the competing Town & Country has probably improved in reliability, but I don't know by how much.

P.S. LOL @ the piece-of-shit GPS in the previous-gen Chrysler Town & Country. During a vacation in Anaheim, CA with some relatives tagging along, we rented that particular model (fully-loaded, to our surprise), and my dad ended up using his phone's GPS since the factory-installed one was user-unfriendly and impossible to see clearly.

Long live the Honda Odyssey. Good luck to the Chrysler Town & Country - it has potential too.

SnaFuBAR
April 11th, 2008, 01:19 PM
more asian pride is all i read.

Llama Juice
April 11th, 2008, 01:26 PM
^^ indeed

I didn't know that minivans had fanboys...

sports cars I could understand but... minivans?

Anyhow... the thing has a HDD in it to hold music? When the hell did that start happening? How big is it? Is it user replaceable? :P

Mr Buckshot
April 11th, 2008, 09:11 PM
Well, it's less about azn pride than it is about the fact that this was the very first left-hand-drive vehicle I owned, and the very first car I owned in this particular continent (I used to live in the U.S.).

I don't think the HDD in the Chrysler or in my Lexus is user replaceable by default unless you have a way to copy the operating system onto a separate HDD or you rip out the whole computer system and install a custom one.

I believe the HDD in both the Chrysler and my Lexus is 30 GB large, but songs don't take up that much room, and who carries around 5000 songs anyway.

From what I've seen of the new Town & Country, it's a vast improvement over the one my dad rented in Anaheim in 2007. For the first time, I see an American car that's a force to be reckoned with in terms of tech/innovation. Most of the American cars I've sat in are rentals (even if we ask for a premium vehicle, we get handed a Cadillac), and they have not been satisfying rides at all, especially the Cadillac Deville that broke down 2 hours after being driven out of an Avis center in New York. And the Pontiac Grand Am rented in 1999 had a tight-as-hell and itchy seatbelt.

Out of curiosity, anyone ever sat in or own a Honda Odyssey? I wonder who bought the one I used to own...it was purchased brand new for $36k in 2001 and sold for $25k in 2004 - not a bad resale value at all.

Llama Juice
April 12th, 2008, 11:08 AM
I carry around 30 GB of music with me all the time.... (iPod)

I'm not really one to talk about having something innovative for a vehicle though...

I have a 93 Chevy S10.... it's got 496,000 miles on it and doesn't even have a radio... soooo yea.

Interesting though that they're putting HDDs into cars now... I wonder if you can pull songs off of a MP3 CD or DVD or flash drive... or iPod..... so many questions... lol research time.