The new hybrid Honda Prelude is officially coming next year, and it has people intrigued. Honda will once again have a sporty liftback coupe on sale in America, and it’ll feature both the practicality of rear seats and the efficiency of a hybrid powertrain. The initial North American press release didn’t feature a ton of details on the powertrain, but thanks to Japanese press releases and prototype media drives, we now know a little bit more about Honda’s new coupe.
When it comes to what makes it go, specs are scarce, but you’ll find a new two-liter naturally aspirated Atkinson-cycle four-cylinder engine, a more efficient front drive unit, lower production costs, and paddle shifters that aren’t just for dialing in regenerative braking. You know what isn’t present here? A CVT transmission. No automatic, either. So what’s Honda doing here?
Like other modern Honda hybrids, the Prelude doesn’t actually have a transmission. Instead, when engine power is needed to drive the wheels, the engine is clutched directly to the wheels through a fixed ratio – no CVT, nothing continuously varying here. As such, you end up with three basic modes of powertrain operation: Electric power alone from banked energy in the battery pack; engine power driving a generator and flowing that power to the drive motor; and engine power driving the wheels directly. It’s a wonderfully simple system, but it begs the question: How do you get “gears” in a car without a transmission as such?
Well, in a battery-electric vehicle, it’s all software. A series of motor response curves are tuned, each pull of a paddle briefly interrupts drive torque, and fake engine sounds fill in the soundtrack. There’s a bit of that going on in the Prelude as well. The simulated eight-speed transmission in the new Prelude is entirely virtual, and there is some fake engine noise to pad the driver’s ears, but there’s also real engine noise beneath it. This is where things really get interesting.
See, this “S+ Shift” mode, as Honda calls it, actually varies the RPM of the gasoline engine under the hood to both provide more immediate response when exiting corners and offer a greater sense of immersion. As Honda puts it, the logic of holding revs off-throttle rather than, say, shutting off the gasoline engine, “greatly improves the initial response time of the motor when the driver depresses the accelerator pedal.” Indeed, Japanese automotive media outlet CarGraphic has captured video behind the wheel of a Prelude prototype, and the results sound shockingly good. It sounds like a pointed four-cylinder engine in Honda tradition, because to an extent, that’s what’s happening.
It’s also worth noting that the simulated shifts sound pretty damn prompt, quicker than the mushy trombone slide of a CVT switching between stepped ratios. Weirdly, rolling into S+ Shift mode almost sounds like a torque converter coming up to stall speed, an odd sensation when you consider this hybrid system has no torque converter, but one that makes sense when you realize the gasoline engine is likely coming up to speed against the forces of a generator. Simulated downshifts also seem as quick as some of the best automatics on the market today, meaning this drive mode has the promise to be more joyful than frustrating.
Of course, there’s more to the new Prelude than fake shifts. From this Ride Now video, we can glean that the Prelude uses dual-axis struts from the Civic Type R, adaptive dampers, and enormous fixed front brake calipers. The track’s been widened and the wheelbase has been shortened, both good things when it comes to promising a certain fun factor. Interestingly enough, Ride Now claims the standard drive mode is dubbed “GT” for grand touring, potentially an indicator of the Prelude’s natural disposition. However, in sportier drive modes, the ride does seem to firm up nicely judging by body movements.
Needless to say, we can’t wait for an opportunity to get behind the wheel of the new Prelude next year and experience these simulated shifts ourselves. Sure, they might be mimicry rather than authenticity, but in an age when almost every combustion-powered performance car features fake engine noise, manual transmissions are saddled with clutch delay valves, and electronic throttle curves usually aren’t linear, who’s to say what’s real and fake anymore? A good time is a good time, and we’re curious to see if the Prelude provides.
Story photo credits: Honda
Top graphic image credits: Honda; Cars And Bids
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Fake shifts/sounds are bullshit
ND/Crackpipe
I have an Accord hybrid, and it’s got fake shifts and fake (additional) engine noise. It’s relatively convincing, and is certainly much more pleasant to drive enthusiastically than a droning Toyota hybrid.
With every new car coming out, I find myself developing a deeper intolerance for fakeness in modern vehicles and life in general. THE ENTIRE REASON any of these sensations felt cool and fun in the first place was the knowledge that it was real, that you were genuinely moving gears around and controlling directly how the engine sends power to the wheels. That the engine sounding the way it did was because of what it was doing and how it works.
I’m fricking sick and tired of this insane notion that “a good time is a good time” even if it’s a complete and utter lie. Maybe video games and theme park simulator rides are one thing, trying to create an otherworldly story-based experience you can’t ordinarily have makes SOME sense, but trying to simulate actual real experiences that very recently were the norm and pretending that the best things in life we can allow ourselves to enjoy are lies is just… dystopian levels of depressing.
This is why I don’t understand how people can enjoy AI art (a lie imitating human expression), how people aren’t perpetually disturbed by the Hyundai Ionic N actively handicapping its own performance potential to pretend to be the ICE hot hatch it isn’t, how some people are fine with the new Dodge Charger Daytona pretending to have a V8 and even wishing it had fake shifting or motion simulators to complete the deception, virtual reality in general, etc…
GIVE ME AUTHENTICITY DARN YOU. I don’t care if it’s electric, better to have an unashamedly electric car that tries to make electricity fun on its own merits than a car with an identity crisis that wishes it was something else. It can be done! Electric motors can make noise, and some types even vibrate naturally, use them with straight cut gears and tune the chassis so you hear it.
But as for this Honda specifically? Absolutely shameful, no reason it couldn’t have had a real manual or automatic with an electric motor assisting it. Would it be as efficient as a Prius with multiple actual gears? No, but it’s a fricking sports coupe, it shouldn’t have to. And what makes this fake-shifting bullcrap especially offensive is that the ENGINE STILL REVS UP AND DOWN, WITH NO LEGITIMATE REASON TO! At that point, WHY the frick wasn’t it actually a manual hybrid???? It would’ve had exactly the same fuel economy, and you could even uncouple the engine from the transmission to run it as a generator while driving the manual via the electric assist motor for a properly efficient EV driving mode if you wanted all the MPGs without necessarily needing to shift.
Honda even built hybrids with real manuals in the past, they of all companies should’ve been able to do it the real proper way, but instead chose deception.
If this is the way of the modern world, then that’s it, I never want a new car. I used to think it might be fun to buy a new car, but I’m just sick and tired of endless talk about how this is the future and we just need to accept it. I will do no such thing thank you very much, you can pry my 30 and 60 year-old cars out of my cold dead hands, I don’t care what it takes to keep them running indefinitely, I’ll push them to a million miles if I have to. And if you want to try and ruin my day by saying gasoline will be banned someday, I’ll still take both my old cars EV converted over any modern trash. At this point I don’t see how anyone who isn’t into retro/classic cars can still call themselves a car enthusiast, crap like this new Prelude really makes me feel like there’s not much left worth caring about. Thanks, I hate it.
You have taken my exact thoughts and put them into words! I will EV convert my engaging old gas cars before buying something that fakes the experience.
This is why I was so excited for the Jeep Magneto concepts, shown three years in a row. Particularly the first concept was genuinely just a Wrangler drivetrain with an electric motor where the engine would attach to the manual transmission. I want to have the real experience of shifting power through the drive train, not ride a simulator.
I have nothing against electric cars, I’m extremely excited for the Aptera to hit production or for Mazda to sort out what an all electric Miata will be. However, today I am much more excited for the experience of my old daily drivers, a 99 BMW M3 and a 90 Jeep Comanche. Both manuals, and both raw unmodified experiences of how they mechanically operate.
Am I the only one that thinks that this is the serial hybrid that might be fun to drive? Plus the added bonus of a direct drive from the engine when it makes sense?
Fake shifting aside, this is the first hybrid that makes sense and might appeal to me. (All pending actually driving the thing. I’ll reserve real judgement until then.)
Well I guess the three people who want a coupe will have another option now
Me, that’s me with my hand raised…
I could go for a coupe. I could even go for a hybrid coupe. But this… I don’t know…