Search

Categories

Opera

Archives

Recent Entries

Honda Element: The first 3,500 Miles

We’ve put about 3,500 miles on our new Honda Element, and I thought I’d post my impressions of it so far.

Exterior

We chose the black one (as pictured above) because we thought it blended in with the gray body panels the best. The silver and orange/red ones look kind of “patchy” like they were pieced together from a junkyard, in my opinion. The black paint has a little bit of “glitter” in it, making it look very shiny.

What they say about black cars is true though, it’s very hard to keep clean, and even when you do wash it you have to dry it off immediately or you get water spots all over which looks just as bad as the dirt.

The gray body panels seem very durable and dent resistant, luckily nothing has hit it yet for us to know for sure. It could definitely withstand a stray shopping cart buggy or loose basketball though. It’s also nice to have the body panels in the places that your car paint normally gets dinged and damaged by road debris, insuring the appearance of the car will last longer.

Ours has a rear window washer/wiper which works great. The front windshield washers are also fantastic, compared to our old cars that just moved the water around, rather than wiping it off completely.

The headlights are extremely bright, even on low-beams. The high-beams shine like no other high-beam I have seen before. It’s like driving in the day time almost. :)

One of the best features of the car is the doors… The rear doors open backwards, which eliminates the center column. This gives you a ton of room to load things into the back from the side, in addition to the rear area. It is slightly inconvenient however to have to open the front door before opening the back door, and closing the back before closing the front. But the benefits far outweigh the bad part in this area.

Interior

The interior of the Element is the best part, and one of the reasons we bought it.

As many people have heard, the floor is a rubber material, which makes it extremely easy to clean up. You wouldn’t want to spray a hose in there though, as it isn’t water proof around the edges. But cleanup is still easy with a wet paper towel or other scrubbing device. Mud doesn’t get caked into the carpet, and hair doesn’t get entwined in the fibers. If you spill a drink, just clean it up with a paper towel or other liquid absorbing device (we like paper towels, can you tell?).

The seats are water resistant (not water proof!) but are still made of cloth so they are comfortable. The driver’s seat in our model is height adjustable, and both front seats can of course slide forwards and backwards to adjust the legroom. The rear seats are completely removable, or you can hang them up on the interior sides of the vehicle to make use of the entire floor area without having to remove the seats entirely.

The process for removing the seats is as easy as pulling a strap under each seat, taking off a protective plastic guard, and then pushing a lever while you lift the seat out. To hang the seat up on the side you pull the strap, fold the seat-back all the way back until it is flat, and then lift the seat up next to the window and secure it with a strap.

If you leave the seats in, you can fold all four seats down until they are all flat, leaving you with a large padded area that you could sleep on. There is plenty of room for a full sized adult to sleep comfortably on the seats in this car.

We keep our seats removed in the back unless we need them, and we bought a dog bed specially made for the back of an SUV to put in there. We also purchased a nylon netting to put between the back and front seats, which keeps the dogs in the back and off of the front seats entirely. The dogs seem to like it, and we definitely appreciate the dog free environment of the front.

In our old Acura Integra, the dogs were always moving back and forth and trying to come up to the front because they were uncomfortable. Now they lay down on their bed in the back and go to sleep. We forget they are back there most of the time.

The steering wheel is height adjustable in our model, but I rarely use the feature. I just set it how I need it and leave it. One problem is that I can never get a completely clear view of the front console panel, no matter the height of the steering wheel. I’m 6’ 2” and the top of the steering wheel covers the top of the console panel from view. My wife (5’ 2”) can see it fine though.

The gauges on the console are the standard gauges found in every car… speed, gas, tachometer, oil pressure, etc. Nothing else really interesting or out of norm in this area.

The center console has the CD player/Radio, air conditioning controls, etc. The gear shift is also on this console, which makes me glad we got the automatic. It seems like it would be extremely uncomfortable to have to keep your hand up on that console every time you need to shift. Imagine adjusting the air temperature every time you need to shift gears for an idea of how inconvenient it would be.

The controls on the air conditioning and radio are large and easy to use, even with thick gloves on. Even though the car is large, it heats up or cools down very quickly. The A/C and heater both work great and quickly. There are two vents in the center and one on each side of the car, which are closeable.

There is storage all over the place in this car. A little shelf on the passenger side above the glove box; the glove box; a compartment on the ceiling for glasses, emergency cash, garage door openers; large pockets on each door; some small shelves next to the steering wheel; and two large compartments in the back of the car. There are also cup holders all over the place. Four or five in the floor between the front seats, and one on each rear seat.

The lighting inside is also good, with a dome light in the front and back, and two reading lights in the front as well. When you open the back hatch the rear light comes on automatically, making it easy to load in groceries or what have you. And when you open the front doors the front dome light comes on and stays on long enough for you to get the key in or out and gather your things. If you use the keyless entry to unlock the door, the lights come on so you can see inside before entering, find the keyhole, etc.

Headroom is not a problem in this vehicle either. My wife can practically stand up full height in the back, and even my 6’ 10” friend has plenty of room up top, in case he wanted to wear a very tall hat.

Audio

The audio of this car is my favorite part…

Our model has a 6.1 surround sound audio system, and sounds pretty darn good for a “factory setup”. There are speakers in all four doors, and two tweeters on either side of the windshield in the little column things. Then there is a subwoofer in the center console under the gearshift, which provides quite a bit of bass.

There is a CD player built-in, as well as radio of course.

When you first start the car the audio slowly fades up to the level you had it at before you turned the car off, which is really nice if you forget to turn it down before you leave the car. This way you have a few seconds to readjust it, rather than starting the car and being scared to death by the blaring music.

There is also an auxiliary audio port on the little shelf above the glove box, where you can plug in any audio device to the 1/8” audio jack. This would include, an iPod (yay!), portable CD player, other mp3 player, tape recorder, laptop computer, portable tv, whatever. Next to it there is a cigarette lighter power port (but no actual cigarette lighter). There is another power port in the back of the car in case you want to setup an electric grill or something while camping I guess. Playing an iPod through the audio system is as easy as plugging it in and pressing the AUX button the the CD player. All cars should have this feature. Seriously.

Ride/Handling

I haven’t owned an SUV before other than a Jeep Cherokee, but in my opinion the Element has a great ride and never feels like it’s going to flip over. It seems to have a very low center of gravity and handles very well.

The anti-lock brakes are great as well, I have tried several times to slam on the brakes in the rain, and I never skid at all, let alone lose control of the car.

It only has a 4 cylinder engine in it, but it can be pretty speedy when you need it to be. I estimate I got 0-60 in about 3.8 seconds. Ha, just kidding. But it is pretty fast for a little SUV.

The ride is also very smooth, compared to a sports car anyway. Bumps that we would normally slow way down for in the Integra are easily sped over in the Element. This is to be expected however when switching from a sports car to an SUV I imagine.

Overall

Overall this is a great little car/truck/van that is extremely versatile and handy to have. If you have kids/dogs/sheep, haul a bunch of stuff, mountain bike, snowboard, camp, ski, this little car/truck/van can do it all. It’s rugged enough to handle all of those activities, but still has enough nice features to be extremely comfortable even if you just drive to pick up groceries with it. We’re looking forward to our 350,000th mile just as much as the 3,500th.

That’s a great review of the Element Derek. My wife and I have been looking into something like it when we can afford to get another car and it’s nice to hear the consumer perspective of it.

One of the best features that you mentioned is the volume of the radio when you turn the car on. I know it’s a little thing but it must be nice.

And man…I need a plug for my iPod in my Matrix. Soon enough I guess.

nice review indeed! and the tophat is fucking hilarious! :)

I have a palm zire 72 with a mp3 player and have plugged the cable in through the aux cable, but it is not very clear or it is not very loud. Any suggestions????

If your zire sounds good and loud through a receiver at home using the same cable, then it should sound similar through the Element’s radio. If there is a large difference, speak to your dealer.

I agree with your review. My only ideal add-on would be a holder for my ipod mini, which I purchased right after my Element.
I think that a 6’10” person would NOT be comfortable in the Element. I am 6’4 and am just barely comfortable in the drivers seat. For some reason I can’t fit into the passenger’s seat for too long. Knees hit the dash. TONS of head room though.

Very pleased with our 2004 Element purchased in June—except for the loud BRAAAAAATTT! when the Max A/C is turned on when starting the car for the first time on a hot afternoon. So loud and terribly inconsistent in a vehicle that is so smooth in every other aspect. Of course, the A/C will not do that when you take it to the dealership . . . . .
Anybody else with this problem?

I have a 2003 black EX AWD manual that I bought almost a year ago. I enjoyed your review and my opinion is that this is one of the best deals on the market. The 4cyl engine has enough power and decent mileage. The interior is great and I really like the sound system too. I use an IPod with my Element and I just saw that Alpine released their IPod interface. It basically lets you control the IPod from the Alpine receiver like you would control a CD Changer. The cool thing is that you can actually browse playlists, artists, and albums from the Alpine deck and the plug that connects to the IPod also charges it! I am seriously thinking about getting it.
The only thing that I don’t like about the Element is that the rear suicide doors don’t open wide enough. I can’t tell you how many times I get the person in the back seat trapped between the doors and the car next to us. If they just opened further the person could sneak around the back and then shut them, kind of like the new Nissan Titan pickups. I assume that this might be addressed in the revision in a couple of years.
I am excited about the upcoming Honda SUT that will be built on the Pilot platform. Although I don’t know if it will give me everything I have in the Element.
15,000 miles and counting!