2016 Honda Pilot: What's It Like to Live With?
Pack up the kids. We've got a year with the new 2016 Honda Pilot.
Introduction
What Did We Get?
After some recent stumbles, Honda is starting to hit its stride once again. The new 2016 Honda Pilot is a good example why. Unlike the previous Pilot that was slow, bulky-looking and had a cabin that looked cheap, the redesigned model has plenty of power, a crisp and modern exterior design and a spacious cabin that is well trimmed throughout.
It felt like a huge step up the first time we drove it, and subsequent test-drives only reinforced the idea that this sizable crossover was now a top-tier, three-row family vehicle. We wanted to see if that perception would hold up over the long haul, so we decided to add the new Pilot to our long-term fleet.
What Options Does It Have?
Like all Honda models, the Pilot doesn't offer stand-alone options like most other vehicles in its class. Instead, Honda offers the Pilot in various trim levels that come standard with certain features.
In the case of the Pilot, there are five basic trim levels: LX, EX, EX-L, Touring and Elite. All offer a choice of front-wheel drive or all-wheel drive except the all-wheel-drive-only Elite. Every Pilot is powered by a 3.5-liter V6. The LX, EX and EX-L models use a six-speed automatic transmission, while the Touring and Elite models come standard with a nine-speed automatic.
The base LX starts at $30,895. It has all the basics and there are no upgrades available. On the EX, which starts at $33,330, there's a standard level of features and then a trim level upgrade that adds Honda Sensing, a package of safety equipment that includes automatic emergency braking and lane departure warning, among other things.
From there you can upgrade to the leather-lined EX-L ($36,805) that offers three upgrades: the Honda Sensing system, a rear entertainment system or navigation. For even more features there's the Touring model ($41,920) or the fully loaded Elite version ($47,320), which is the only model that offers second-row captain's chairs. All other trims get a second-row bench that increases total seating capacity to eight.
Honda loaned us a Pilot Elite for a year so we could test every last feature available.
Why We Got It
This is one of the most competitive segments in the industry right now and for good reason. Three-row crossovers are the vehicles of choice when you need to carry more than a couple of kids on a regular basis and you can't stomach the thought of a minivan. That's a big chunk of the market, which is why nearly every mainstream carmaker has a three-row crossover either in its lineup or in the works.
Honda's latest entry is as important to its success as the upcoming Civic. It's been offering the Pilot since 2003, but it hasn't been as dominant in its class as some of Honda's other models. The Civic and Accord are synonymous with top-quality sedans, but the Pilot has yet to make its mark.
We have tested some of its main competitors like the Ford Explorer, Hyundai Santa Fe and Toyota Highlander, all of which impressed us with their capabilities and comfort. Now it's time to see if Honda has raised the bar. Over the next 12 months we'll subject the Pilot to thousands of miles of real-world testing to see if it accommodates families, vacations and daily commutes as well as or better than its rivals.
Follow along on the long-term road test page for daily updates on our 2016 Honda Pilot and the rest of our fleet.
Yes, this is the first thing I felt the need to comment on when it comes to our new 2016 Honda Pilot. I understand that designers have a hard time just leaving well enough alone, but these gauges aren't my favorite alternative to the standard two dial design.
At first glance it looks like the digital information display in the middle is the main source of information here. Everything else is pushed to the edges as if it's all secondary information.
Maybe that's true to an extent, but the space taken up by the info screen in the middle isn't used for anything more important. It's adjustable, with multiple screens for everything from tire pressures to trip meters, but none of the information is any more relevant than the gas gauge or engine temperature.
Call me old-fashioned, but I like it when even the most sophisticated new vehicles have basic analog gauges front and center. Leave the other stuff off to the sides.
This transmission shifter may look familiar. I wrote about a related setup in our long-term Acura TLX earlier this year. I liked it in that car and I think it works well in our new 2016 Honda Pilot, too.
It's not the exact same setup as the Acura. Our Pilot has fewer buttons and no electronic parking brake. What it does have are the things that make this setup easy to use without looking, namely a large, central button for selecting "drive" and a rocker switch that you pull back for reverse.
After driving the Pilot in various situations that included parallel parking and three-point turns, I still find the setup easy to use. Don't fear the buttons, they work just fine.
Admittedly, I'm not a huge fan of rain-sensing wipers in general. Aside from a few exceptions, I don't think the technology behind automatic wipers is perfected yet and it's distracting. Enter our newest long-termer, the 2016 Honda Pilot.
On a recent road trip in the Pilot, I drove through a weather system for several hours with every kind of rain there is. If the wiper system were perfect, it would've cleared the windshield of water at ideal intervals, never allowing for an excessive build-up of water while simultaneously staying off when there wasn't any rain present.
Instead, the Pilot's wipers were finicky. I found myself constantly adjusting the wiper stalk, increasing and decreasing the sensitivity nearly every mile. During the heavy rain, the wipers would increase in speed but not quite enough. During light drizzle (or when another car would throw some mist my way) they were a bit too sensitive, wiping too often.
The tech worked, sure, but the level of human-input was too high to call these wipers automatic. If I could, I'd leave this option off the list (it's included on our long-termer's Elite trim level) and just do the work myself.
What does "Earth Dreams" mean when it comes to engines? When it involves our 2016 Honda Pilot, it roughly translates into improved mileage. At least that's the idea on its most basic level.
"Earth Dreams" is a catch-all phrase that covers all of Honda's latest fuel efficiency technology. Whether it's a hybrid drivetrain or a particular feature of a gas engine, if it makes things work more efficiently, it falls under the Earth Dreams banner.
In our Pilot, the Earth Dreams badge mainly refers to the Variable Cylinder Management (VCM) feature of the 3.5-liter V6, which shuts down half of the cylinders under certain conditions.
The fact that the engine is hooked to a nine-speed automatic transmission probably qualifies too, but since the nine-speed isn't standard it might not count. There are many smaller technologies baked into the design of the engine that further contribute to the Earth Dreams philosophy, but it would take more than a few blog posts to explain them all.
So far we don't have enough miles on our Pilot to judge the effectiveness of the Earth Dreams technology. Honda says the Pilot is the most fuel-efficient vehicle in its class with its EPA rating of 22 mpg for our particular model. As soon as we get some serious miles on the clock, we'll see how close it comes to delivering on its promise.
From this angle, the rear seats in our 2016 Honda Pilot don't look particularly spacious. Measure them against the competition, however, and they match up quite well. Here are the numbers against some popular rivals:
In terms of legroom, the Pilot sits midpack. It offers exactly the same amount of legroom as the Toyota Highlander and an extra two inches compared to the Chevrolet Traverse. Want more? The Ford Explorer tops the Pilot by an inch in this area.
When it comes to headroom, it's pretty much a wash. All of the competitors mentioned here are within an inch of each other so you probably wouldn't notice a difference.
Shoulder room is an often-overlooked parameter when it comes to interior passenger space. Here the Pilot does well, topping both the Highlander and the Explorer by an inch and the Chevy by two inches. Then again, since we're dealing with captain's chairs it really doesn't come into play. With the bench seat in back, the extra shoulder room would certainly come into play.
The seat themselves are above average in terms of shape, adjustability and materials. Always nice to have a fold-down armrest, too. As midsize crossovers go, the second row in the Pilot is definitely near the top of its class.
There's something almost too nice about our 2016 Honda Pilot. It's probably a result of the high-line "Elite" trim and all that comes with it, but if I was buying one of these for my family I might step it down a notch. Here's why.
When I drove the Toyota Highlander we had for a year, it always seem built for function over all else. Sure it was the top-of-the-line Limited model, but everything looked like it was there to be functional first.
The big shelf that stretched across the dashboard was a perfect example. It was a little abrupt from a design standpoint, but when it came to daily driver duty, that shelf swallowed lots of stuff. And although the materials were nice, they didn't make the Highlander look like a luxury car.
Looking like a luxury car is rarely a bad thing, but in this car I would rather just live with the lack of wood and not feel bad about spilling some coffee now and again.
We've been banging around in our long-term 2016 Honda Pilot for a little more than a month now and we have our first mechanical issue. I wouldn't call it serious, but it's certainly annoying on a brand new vehicle that's been driven 3,000 miles.
This morning the Pilot's heated steering wheel was a no-show.
Now, I'm not sure if we took delivery of the vehicle with this malfunction and I'm just the first to notice, or if it worked before and now it does not. Either way, it's busted. Push the button on the lower left of the steering and nothing happens. No lights indicating that it's operating and no warmth within the Honda's leather-wrapped rim.
And now the decision all car owners face when something goes awry. Should we get it fixed now, or live with it for a while and have it addressed when the Pilot goes in for its first scheduled maintenance?
What would you do?
The car biz is a copycat biz, which is one of the reasons so many cars kinda look alike, drive alike and offer the same or similar features and technology. If something's a hit with the public, you can bet your Bluetooth it'll be on the competition soon.
I was reminded of this while filling the gas tank of our long-term 2016 Honda Pilot.
Ford pioneered the Easy Fuel Capless Fuel Filler back in 2008 (on the 2009 Explorer), and we've lived with a few Fords with it since, including our long-term 2009 Ford Flex, 2010 Ford Mustang GT, 2011 Ford Explorer and 2013 Focus ST. Our orange long-term 2015 Ford Mustang GT is the latest.
Basically there's no cap to unscrew or hang while fueling. Just insert the gas pump nozzle and start gassing up.
Seven years ago, I thought this was gratuitous engineering at its worst, an answer to a non-question. Now I love it. It's one of those things you don't know you want but once you have it, there's no going back.
And I must not be alone, because other car companies have started using the technology including Chrysler, Cadillac and now Honda on the new Pilot.
This array of buttons is a good reminder of just how many active safety systems are watching the road when you're behind the wheel of the 2016 Honda Pilot. It almost looks like overkill, but these days this is considered perfectly normal.
For those that aren't familiar, here's what these buttons control. Starting on the left, you have your typical backup warning system, then a lane departure warning system, electronic stability control and finally a collision mitigation system.
Most modern cars and SUVs have parking sensors. They're useful, unobtrusive and rarely do you need to shut the system off. Lane departure warning systems are relatively new. They can be useful, but I rarely find them necessary. Glad to see you can turn this one off.
Stability control is now mandatory for all vehicles. Only reason to turn it off in a vehicle like this might be if you're stuck and you think it might prevent you from putting enough power down to get out. Finally, the crash avoidance system is one of the newest features and one that can be annoying if not programmed properly. We've noticed several Hondas that seemed far too eager to warn of an impending collision in otherwise benign situations. Thankfully, this system's sensitivity can be adjusted, although you have to go through some menus to find it.
It's quite a bit of technology and I'm glad it's all there to help out. Then again, it's nice to see these buttons give you some measure of control as well. I'm not looking forward to the day when stuff like this is watching whether you like it or not.
It's time for the Edmunds family's annual holiday trip to Oregon to spend Christmas with my parents. This year I locked in on one particular long-term vehicle as soon as it was admitted to the fleet: the 2016 Honda Pilot.
Why? It has a goodly amount of hauling capacity for the luggage and presents the four of us will haul up there and its third-row seat will make it possible for my parents to climb aboard once we settle in and make the inevitable trip into town. Both of these were shortcomings of the 2012 Honda CR-V we took up there a couple of years ago, which needed a rooftop cargo box to accommodate our stuff and had no third-row passenger capability. Here's hoping the Pilot is more or less a supersized CR-V.
What's more, our particular Piot has the optional all-wheel drive system. This year's El Nino weather cycle has so far proven very active up along the southern Oregon coast. Heavy rain has fallen for weeks at Mom and Dad's place and snow is in the forecast. There have been numerous mudslides. There's no telling what sort of detours we may be forced to take.
On a recent weekend, my wife's friend was visiting our house. She noticed the long-term 2016 Honda Pilot parked in the driveway and asked a few questions that concluded with, "How much does it cost?"
Ummm...
I actually didn't know our test vehicle's exact price at the time, but told her that it was likely around $45,000 (actual price: $47,320.) I was expecting her to say something along the lines of "Geez, that's pretty expensive," but instead she replied, "Oh, well that's reasonable."
I was a bit surprised at first, but then I remembered what she drives: a 2014 Mercedes-Benz ML350.
It's interesting to me how perception influences one's view on whether something is thought of as expensive. A few weeks ago, my colleague Ed Hellwig wrote an update noting how our decked-out Pilot might be a little too nice for his tastes. Yet as I learned later, my wife's friend's interest in the Pilot actually stemmed from her desire for a less expensive car than her ML-Class. In her case, even a top-of-the-line Pilot Elite would be noticeably less expensive.
You can get a more objective viewpoint by comparing vehicles within a particular class. And yet the reality is that the mid-$40,000s is pretty much what you can expect to pay for a loaded-up three-row crossover these days.
We (the Edmunds crew) like testing well-equipped vehicles (such as our Pilot Elite) as it gives us the opportunity to report on all of the available features. But I'm curious — if you were buying a large three-row crossover SUV like a Pilot, what do you think your budget would be?
Would you be fine getting a top model or is there a sweet-spot?
When you opt for either the Touring or the Elite trim level of the 2016 Honda Pilot, you get a nine-speed automatic in place of the standard six-speed transmission. Sounds like a nice upgrade.
We're not so sure.
With so many gears to choose from, the transmission has a tougher job of picking the right one. It's also designed to deliver improved mileage, so it's fighting the urge to get the engine in its sweet spot with the mandate to keep engine speeds low.
The result is a gearbox that quickly heads for ninth gear as soon as possible when you press the gas lightly. Press harder, however, and suddenly the transmission starts to decide whether it should drop to seventh, or sixth, or fifth and so on.
Needless to say, it takes longer than it should. Occasionally it also holds lower gears longer than it should, making you wonder if you unknowingly engaged "sport" mode (which, by the way, doesn't feel any better).
As Dan proved on his trip to Vegas, the nine-speed transmission is able to deliver solid mileage when given the chance, but in day-to-day driving, I would rather have the six-speed automatic and live with the mileage hit.
Presenting another post from the "Give Me a Volume Dial" folder (1, 2).
An interesting thing happened when I tried turning the volume down in our 2016 Honda Pilot one evening while parking: It kept getting louder.
Getting into my parking spot isn't the easiest thing. It's tight and oddly positioned, often necessitating a multi-point turn and faith in mirrors and proximity sensors. The garage is underground too, so I always lose satellite radio reception.
While parking, I put the Pilot in reverse and started swiping the touch-sensitive volume bar to turn down the volume. Somehow, the combination of the backup camera activating, the loss of satellite radio, and my volume input caused the audio level to increase.
And it didn't stop, even when I took my finger off. I hit the power button and cursed the thing under my breath.
Maybe I have some weird juju that makes audio systems freak out (this isn't the first time), but a volume dial would never have this problem. The volume would go down because that's the direction you're turning it. There's no confusion.
I still don't know what caused this problem, and I haven't been able to reproduce it. Still, it only makes we want real volume control more. Not only does the absence of the dial make the experience more difficult, the thing Honda's replaced it with doesn't even work right.
The driver information display on our 2016 Honda Pilot is now kindly notifying us that maintenance is due soon. Grab your beer and pretzels, it's Honda/Acura service bingo time with an "A1" indicator.
The A1 note means we're due for an oil change (no filter change) and a tire rotation. But since we're going to the dealer, we also plan to have them check on the inoperable heated steering wheel. Stay tuned.
No, I'm not talking about a new folk rock band coming to a summer music festival near you. The creaky lumbar in question here would be the one found in our 2016 Honda Pilot.
There are many fans of adjustable lumbar support on our staff. I'm not one of them. Sometimes it makes a seat feel more comfortable, other times just feels awkward. In most cars, I just leave it alone.
Another editor, who clearly loves a good shove in the lower back, had it extended to its most intrusive and the result was an awful creak every time I pushed against it. And I don't mean a tiny squeak from deep in the bowels of the seat back. I mean a ridiculously obvious creak that makes it sound like you're sitting in a rusty rocking chair.
Hopefully this takes nothing more than a shot of WD-40 to cure. We'll see. In the meantime, I dialed out all the extra lumbar support and the noise is gone.
Fuel Economy Update for January — Road Trips Boost the Average
Dan wasn't kidding when he wrote that the 2016 Honda Pilot would see plenty of road trip miles in January. The Pilot started the month with Dan coming home from Oregon. He laid low for a couple of days, then traveled to and from Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show.
Brent took the Pilot a few days later for a day trip of his own with his mother and two kiddos in tow. The long-distance trips helped the Pilot eke ever closer to its combined mpg rating.
Dan set out on his Vegas journey with the intention of setting records for the Pilot. He flew solo and religiously stuck to posted speed limits. He ran into traffic heading north on Interstate 15, so he ventured off the beaten path through deserted two-lane roads. Taking the long way round helped Dan set a best-range record, covering 400.6 miles on one tank of fuel. His return trip set a best-fill record at 25.8 mpg.
The Pilot covered 3,302 miles in January and fuel economy for the month stands at 22.6 mpg. Overall fuel economy increased from 18.9 mpg to 20.4 mpg, not far from the EPA combined rating of 22 mpg. Fuel consumption decreased from 5.3 to 4.9 gallons/100 miles.
Worst Fill MPG: 13.1 mpg
Best Fill MPG: 25.8 mpg
Average Lifetime MPG: 20.4 mpg (4.9 gallons/100 miles)
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City/26 Highway)
Best Range: 400.6 miles
Current Odometer: 8,050 miles
Two days before I was set to leave for Las Vegas in the 2016 Honda Pilot, Schmidt informed me he received a letter from Honda saying there was a technical service bulletin issued for the Pilot regarding the infotainment system. Schmidt said that if I had time to take it in, I could have the Pilot a day early and work from home. To save myself from a three-hour round-trip office commute, I took the offer.
Everything at Community Honda is done on a first-come, first-served basis. I showed up on a Thursday at 8 am, when the service center opened. I met my advisor, Will, who previously helped me through the steering wheel heater saga.
The new update, (TSB 15-072), fixes an issue with the navigation display screen. The Honda Service Bulletin notes that the display screen goes blank, rendering the entire system inoperable.
The repair process is simple: the dealer inserts a USB drive with the updated software into one of the Pilot's front ports and uploads a new version of its software. According to the TSB, the entire upload takes 20-25 minutes. Unfortunately, I was unable to verify how long it actually took to upload the fix. I was given an estimated time of 1.25 hours, so I sat in the waiting area and took out my laptop.
I got carried away with work, and approached Will's desk a little less than two hours into the process. He found a notice from a repair technician stating that the Pilot was ready to drive away, and said that he had no idea when the notice was dropped off.
I don't know how long I would have waited if I hadn't asked.
City Driving During February and March Reduces Fuel Economy
While our 2016 Honda Pilot saw a nice mix of city and highway driving in February, a month full of stop and go traffic in March dealt a blow to overall fuel economy. After it was all said and done, our overall average dropped from 20.4 mpg at the end of January to 19.7 mpg at the end of March.
We traveled 1,755 miles in February, with two of the eight fills related to Dan's comparison post between our Pilot Elite with its nine-speed transmission and a Pilot EX with the six-speed. Over two evaluations loops that totaled 217 miles, we found the fuel consumption of the Elite and EX were nearly the same in combined driving.
Additional Pilot Elite fills during the month brought February's average down to 20.0 mpg, reducing overall fuel economy slightly from 20.4 mpg to 20.3 mpg.
March was different. Our Pilot spent most of its time in the Los Angeles area, racking up just 761 miles in the process. City-heavy traffic is especially unkind to the Pilot's fuel consumption, which hit an all-time low (12.6 mpg) during one fill-up. The month's average ended up being 14.7 mpg, which reduced overall economy to 19.7 mpg. A road trip I took to Vegas at the beginning of April should see the needle swing back the other way.
Worst Fill MPG: 12.6 mpg
Best Fill MPG: 25.8 mpg
Average Lifetime MPG: 19.7 mpg (5.1 gallons/100 miles)
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City/26 Highway)
Best Range: 400.6 miles
Current Odometer: 10,201 miles
The 2016 Honda Pilot in Elite trim comes standard with variable intermittent rain-sensing wipers, a feature we don't often have the opportunity to test here in sunny Southern California. But last week a light April shower prompted me to wake our Honda's wipers from their slumber, freeing them to swing back and forth as needed during my morning drive across town.
As typical, the rain didn't last long and we were back to dry conditions by the afternoon. I didn't give the wipers a second thought until I pulled into an automatic car wash to spruce-up the Pilot's exterior. Swish, the wipers sprung back to life.
I moved the control firmly back to the "Off" position. Not likely to be seeing rain here again anytime soon.
Three-row crossovers like our 2016 Honda Pilot sometimes get an undeserved reputation for not having much cargo room. That's because they have those pesky third-row seats in the way. Fold them down and there's plenty of room for a run to the Goodwill.
At least that what I was thinking when I loaded up our Pilot over the weekend. Between the lowered floor well at the back and wide open space created by the folded third-row seats, I didn't even have to squeeze stuff in.
Obviously, when driving carpool or otherwise utilizing the third row, the cargo area is significantly compromised. But how often do you have a full house on board? Probably not that often. The rest of the time, the Pilot, and other three-row SUVs like it, have plenty of room for passengers and cargo.
Fuel Economy Update for March - More Miles, Same MPG
A fuel economy trend is emerging now that we are 12,000 miles into our test of the 2016 Honda Pilot. And the trend is status quo. We added just over 1,700 miles to the Pilot in April but it wasn't good enough to change any of our lifetime figures.
I even tried to sneak in a freeway-heavy 400 miles and side trip to Legoland in the final days of the month, but to no avail. Nothing budged.
Take the jump to see how the Honda is performing...
Worst Fill MPG: 12.6 mpg
Best Fill MPG: 25.8 mpg
Average Lifetime MPG: 19.7 mpg (5.1 gallons/100 miles)
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City/26 Highway)
Best Range: 400.6 miles
Current Odometer: 11,925 miles
One unique feature on our 2016 Honda Pilot is this ridiculously simple yet effective adjustable armrest. Every time I use it, I wonder why more SUVs and crossover don't use a similar design.
Most driver seats just offer up the center console as the best place to rest your right arm. It works fine for the most part, although much of it depends on your individual seat position. If you like your seat as high as possible, that center console might seem uncomfortably far down. If you like the seat on the floor, that console is probably too high.
With this setup, the armrest not only moves with the seat, you can adjust the angle just by ratcheting it into place. Once you get used to it, other seats feel like they're missing something without it.
Honda has been using this setup for years. I remember first finding it in the Odyssey minivan many years ago and I loved it then. Glad to see that it has made the cut in the latest Honda family vehicle.
Our 2016 Honda Pilot is asking for some new fluids. Some new oil and a filter, to be exact. That's what the "B16" maintenance code flashing above means. It's a follow up to the "A1" code we saw around 7,500 miles. At this point we're nearing 13,000 miles so it seems about time for a refresh.
That same code also asks for a tire rotation and a fluid swap for the rear differential. Nothing out of the ordinary there, although I'm sure the rear diff fluid is probably just fine. As long as the dealer isn't charging too much for the whole package we'll probably have everything on the list done.
Having an oil life monitor is a real plus. Instead of merely having the oil changed at various predetermined intervals, it's actually checking the condition of the oil to determine when it needs to be changed. In this case, we went around 5,000 miles before getting the maintenance light. If we had been adhering to the old "every 3,000 miles" rule, we would be nearing our fourth oil change instead of our second.
We'll let you know the final cost after all the code has been cleared and the bill has been paid.
A reasonable person cannot consider our long-term 2016 Honda Pilot to be slow. In our testing it had a sub-7-second 0-60 time and traversed the quarter-mile in fewer than 15 seconds. This is plenty rapid for a three-row SUV.
And yet...
In day-to-day driving the Pilot feels more ponderous than I've come to expect of the brand. This is a byproduct of the Pilot's size, mass, somewhat numb-feeling steering, and, yes, its powertrain.
"But wait," you protest. "Didn't you just finish saying that the Pilot is rapid? And blathered on about reasonable people, which you clearly are not?" Hear me out. The Pilot's around-town demeanor has little to do with its full-throttle urge. Sure, whack the throttle to the floor and it will ultimately do good stopwatch-y things. But in the innumerable part-throttle excursions when in city driving or when in any kind of traffic, the Pilot is somewhat dull-witted in its responses.
Probably the biggest contributor to the Pilot's blunt-seeming character is down to its ZF-sourced nine-speed transmission, which I've previously derided. Don't get me started again on this gearbox, which I hope soon becomes an automotive mulligan.
Beyond its bumbling transmission, the Pilot's throttle action is too heavily damped. So much so that it noticeably affects throttle response. Give it a big throttle input and a bunch of nothing happens while the throttle and transmission confer amongst themselves. Maybe this is intentional, so as not to upset the softly sprung chassis. Beats me. All I know is this is not the alert, sharp Honda I've come to know.
The Fourth of July weekend is upon us, and I'm taking the opportunity to drive our 2016 Honda Pilot up to Oregon once again to see my sister-in-law in Bend and my parents on the southern coast near Gold Beach. But this is a June fuel economy update. What does a July road trip have do with anything?
Well, I left town on the afternoon of June 30th and got 344.3 miles up the road. It's what we in the industry call a "head start."
The tank of gas that got us all the way north to a hotel in Turlock, California, belongs to the June update, which is frankly the only bright spot in an otherwise inefficient month spent close to town.
How bright? I just closed out June with a new best-tank mark of 26.4 mpg, and that was the first time any of us has surpassed the Pilot's 26-mpg EPA highway rating. And it stands in stark contrast to the 12.9-mpg tank that kicked off the month four weeks ago. The polar opposite of a road trip, that tank was a result of lots of running around in town with visiting family by a staffer that lives in a particularly gridlocked part of West L.A.
I frankly don't know how he managed it, and it's no fluke because it follows on the heels of the 12.3-mpg tank that ended May. As good as my tank was, it was not enough to counteract these and other weak city tanks (14.8, 15.4) and prevent the overall average from dropping. June began at 19.5 mpg and it ended at 19.3 mpg.
But my road trip is barely underway. I have nearly 1,800 additional miles to go. I should be able to offset all of early June's city-dominated mileage by the time I get home.
Worst Fill MPG: 12.3
Best Fill MPG: 26.4 (new!)
Average Lifetime MPG: 19.3 (5.2 gallons per 100 miles)
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City / 26 Highway)
Best Range: 400.6 miles
Current Odometer: 13,874 miles
Holy schnikes, our long-term 2016 Honda Pilot has a colossal center console cargo bin.
What you see above is an entire 2.5-gallon water dispenser neatly slotted into said bin. It simply dropped right in there.
Since the photo speaks for itself, nothing more needs to be said.
Our long-term 2016 Honda Pilot has a Jekyll and Hyde thing going on with its fuel economy. If you take it on the open road like Dan Edmunds did, it can generate some pretty solid MPG numbers (although that's not what happened the time before). But back in the city, we've seen numbers in the low to mid teens, well below the EPA city estimate of 19 mpg.
Fortunately for the Pilot's stats, July was dominated by Dan's surprisingly fuel-efficient Oregon trip.
We had to check the numbers twice. Yes, the Pilot really averaged 25.6 mpg for the month, besting its previous record by a whopping 3 mpg. Along the way, Dan set single-tank records of 28.8 mpg and 506.5 miles. It shows you what the Pilot's capable of when you dial in the right driving technique. Let's see if we can keep that momentum going.
Worst Fill MPG: 12.3
Best Fill MPG: 28.8
Average Lifetime MPG: 20.2
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City/26 Highway)
Best Range: 506.5 miles
Current Odometer: 17,494
I'm a big fan of the easy-to-read graphics in our 2016 Honda Pilot's navigation system. But I find it humorous that Honda offers the compass direction on both sides of the nav screen.
Here, I was clearly headed east, as was my passenger. I hope we continue in a unified direction.
Crossovers like our 2016 Honda Pilot are meant for hauling families, not rocks. Yet when it came time to pick up several bags of landscaping stones the other weekend, the Pilot got the job anyway. So, did it even notice the extra weight in back?
Not really.
The rocks added a total of 475 pounds in the cargo area. Throw in two adults and a 16-year-old girl and the Pilot was definitely weighed down a little more than usual. It was a little slower off the line, but after that it gained speed without much trouble. Shifts from the nine-speed automatic were unaffected, and the brakes had little trouble bringing it to a stop.
If anything, it actually felt a little smoother over certain kinds of pavement. That's often the case with a vehicle that's designed to hold multiple passengers and their cargo. Overall, I would say the Pilot felt like it would handle a fully loaded cabin quite well, whether it was passengers, cargo or a combination of both. Mileage would certainly suffer, but the ride quality, handling and stopping ability seem fully up to the task.
Summer's winding down, and our 2016 Honda Pilot spent more time on local roads in August compared to its road-trip-heavy July. As a result, its overall average mpg dropped, albeit just a smidge.
We covered nearly 1,800 miles this month and pumped in about 98 gallons. The monthly average came out to 18.3 mpg. Worst fill and best fill remain unchanged, while lifetime mpg falls from 20.2 to 20 mpg.
Worst Fill MPG: 12.3
Best Fill MPG: 28.8
Average Lifetime MPG: 20.0
EPA MPG Rating: 22 Combined (19 City/26 Highway)
Best Range: 506.5 miles
Current Odometer: 18,858
The maintenance minder for our 2016 Honda Pilot alerted us that an A1 service needed to be completed. So I scheduled an appointment with Honda of Santa Monica for 9:30 the next morning and arrived at about 9:35.
An A1 service is pretty standard stuff. According to Honda, the "A" stands for an oil and filter change, while the "1" stands for a tire rotation. I was quoted an estimated time of 90 minutes and a cost of $88. I left the Pilot in the dealership's care and retreated to the office, as it's only a mile away.
At the two-hour mark, I gave Honda of Santa Monica a call. I was transferred to service two different times and greeted with the same automated message each time: The service department was unavailable. Click. Finally, on my third call, I got through to my service advisor's voicemail. A few minutes later, my advisor called back saying he needed another 30 minutes with our Pilot.
Around 12:30 pm I received another call from my advisor. The Pilot was ready after a total of three hours. I was glad I didn't decide to wait in the lounge. I wondered if something out of the ordinary had happened with our Pilot, so I asked when I arrived to pick up the vehicle. I got what felt like a canned response about it being a busy morning but nothing more.
Maybe my presence at the dealership would've changed the timeframe, or maybe not. It wasn't clear why the service took longer than estimated. That left me disappointed with this visit overall.
The total for the A1 service came to $88.10.
