By Micheal Andre Adams
Having recently spent time behind the wheel of the new Accord, it’s only fair to say they REALLY knocked it out this box this time!
At the base price of $21,680, or the loaded to the max Honda Accord Touring V6 for $33,430, Honda took some ques from the Koreans, who have been knocking of their cars forever. By that I mean to say that the design of the new Accord has a degree of appeal that’s suitable for the connoisseur of champagne, while priced for the imported or craft beer to fine wine drinker.
Take for example the LED headlights and LED daytime running lights that come standard at the Touring trim level: They bring a degree of cachet that will definitely cause an onlooker to turn a head and say “that’s a nice whip!” The body in general eludes to being far more expensive car than it’s fully loaded at $33,430 price tag. To that they’ve even added some bling to the front grill!
From behind the driver’s seat I discovered an entire laundry list of favorites on the Accord Touring…
- With the power seat adjusted and locked-in to one of two memory options, followed by my rear and side view mirrors and manual tilt/telescopic wheel adjustments, I paired my new Blackberry Bold with the Bluetooth and sought to set my favorite XM satellite radio stations. While in the past Honda and Acura has got some flack for the center stack being too cumbersome, those days are over in the new Accord. With the monitor for navigation up top, a second monitor they call i-MID, is positioned midway down to provide touchscreen sound system controls. With your phone Bluetooth’d, that means wireless access to your iTunes and Pandora. You can even load images to i-MID to create personalized wallpaper.
- While I found the 278 horsepower V6 engine with a six speed automatic tranny to be quite sufficient in “D,” switching the gears to “S” eliminated the overdrive for some extra torque when I needed to roll with the quickness. Still, Accord scored a 21 city /34 highway government fuel economy rating.
- Perhaps my absolute favorite of all in the new Accord is the side view camera. Each time I turned on the right turn signal, the view from the camera affixed beneath the mirror on the same side would display (in the main monitor) a view of the oncoming traffic in the right lane. That was awesome!!! And while I test A LOT of new cars, I have yet to experience this on a $33K car!
- Text messages? They too can be viewed on the main monitor or read aloud, with a generic selection of replies as well.
- It’s totally keyless! Touch the door handle and they unlock when the key fab in close proximity. Push the button to stop the car, get out and hit the button on the door handle to lock all four doors–that simple!
Oh, and did I mention forward collision warnings that appeal via sight and sound when the danger of an oncoming collision becomes possible, or the lane departure warning that goes off (sight and sound) when the driver drifts out of the his/her lane?
Decades ago, a Honda Accord was my very first new car purchase. I would probably still have that teal green Accord, with tan velour seats had it not been totaled in an accident. As for the new Accord–three generations later, they’ve taken it to a whole new level!
For more specs on the new Honda Accord, visit Honda.
What do you think?
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