While Honda has brought to global markets a couple of electric vehicles, including the recently-released-in-Canada 2024 Honda Prologue, both those offerings were more of a toe-dip in the EV waters rather than a deep dive into electrification. Well, watch out for an upcoming massive splash, as the Japanese automaker is getting very serious about EVs, with a reported $40-billion investment that will result in at least seven all-new EVs by 2030.
And Canada, specifically Ontario, figures prominently in Honda’s electrification plans. In April, the automaker announced the establishment of an ambitious “comprehensive electric vehicle value chain” in the province that will include an EV production facility, a stand-alone battery plant, and a joint-venture cathode-active-material and precursor processing plant.
I recently returned from Japan, where I joined journalists from around the world to learn all about Honda’s electrification plans, including a deep tech dive into the 0 Series sedan, the first EV expected to be built at the Ontario factory, and a factory tour that showcased innovative and all-new production techniques the automaker has developed to make EV production faster, more efficient, and, most importantly, less expensive. I also enjoyed some track time, albeit limited, in a specially equipped Honda Accord designed to demonstrate the real-world driving dynamics of Honda’s 0 Series EV architecture. Let’s start with the soon-to-be-built-in-North-America 0 Series sedan.
What is the Honda 0 Series sedan?
We first laid eyes on this futuristic EV in concept form at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas at the beginning of the year, where it debuted as the 0 Series Saloon, alongside the 0 Series Space-Hub, the latter described by our own Matthew Guy at the time as “a spacious function-over-form white box.” Few details were released at the time — Guy’s wry sense of humour noted “precisely zero (pun intended)” — but my notepad was overflowing during the extensive workshop in Japan surrounding the sedan version slated for North American release in 2026.
It will be built on an all-new EV platform with a surprisingly thin battery pack and a compact e-axle, featuring a combination of a motor and inverter designed from expertise Honda engineers gleaned from the development of hybrid-electric vehicles. Notable is the size of the inverter, which according to Honda is 40% smaller than previously used ones. And that battery pack is six per cent thinner thanks to megacasting and 3D friction stir welding (two of those aforementioned manufacturing techniques and which we’ll get into a little later here).
A final note on that battery: Honda engineers are targeting battery degradation to just 10% after 10 years, achievable, they contend, by applying degradation diagnosis and prediction technology that utilizes driving data from five million Honda vehicles, most of those hybrids.
Honda’s design ethos for 0 Series is “thin, light, and wise,” so the sedan will be built close to the ground with short overhangs for maximum aerodynamics and drivability; it will also be 100 kilograms (220 lbs) lighter than Honda’s initial EVs, thanks to a simplified body structure; and will come with a host of so-called ‘intelligent technologies’ to make the 0 Series sedan a software-defined vehicle, or SDV.
The backbone of this system will be an operating system (OS) designed in-house, and featuring the continuous addition and upgrade of vehicle functions through OTA (over-the-air) updates. What we don’t know yet is the battery size(s) to be offered in the 0 Series sedan, but Honda engineers did cite an expected full-charge range in the 480-km (300-mile) neighbourhood.
One caution: as much as we’d like to see – and almost expect – Honda to come out with a well-priced (read: relatively inexpensive) electric vehicle, don’t expect the 0 Series sedan to be a “Civic-like” EV. This will be a premium vehicle with a possibly — probably — six-figure price tag, and a very-low-production-volume run.
As with many automakers, the company’s first EV is not designed to be a big seller, but rather a test balloon of sorts so that its dealerships and technicians can get their heads around marketing, selling, and servicing electric vehicles. The Honda Prologue didn’t really fit this mould due to its connections with General Motors. The production version of the 0 Series sedan is expected to make its global debut at CES in Vegas in January.
Manufacturing processes for the electric age
We often cite battery technology and software management systems as the main areas of innovation and advancement in the emerging electric-vehicle segment, but Honda is making a determined effort to bring how it builds electric vehicles into that conversation. And in so doing, saving money.
During our two-day tour, called ‘Honda 0 Tech MTG 2024,’ a highlight was an hour spent deep in the heart of Honda’s R&D manufacturing facility in the industrial city of Tochigi. Here we learned about a trio of production technologies that Honda has pioneered that will be integral to the production of its new EVs, beginning very soon at its existing facility in Ohio; and in two years’ time in Ontario.
The factory tour showcased innovative and all-new production techniques the automaker has developed to make EV production faster, more efficient, and, most importantly, less expensive
First and foremost was a massive machine called a megacaster, which takes liquid aluminum and casts it into Intelligent Power Unit (IPU) cases, also known as battery cases. The 6,000-ton machine uses high pressure to make high-precision cases that have just five parts, compared to the 60 used in the current generation of battery cases.
Furthermore, due to the unique production process, a variety of IPU sizes can be produced much more efficiently that current systems. Honda plans to apply this megacasting concept to producing large aluminum body-frame parts, which, like the battery case process, will save time and money. Six of these mega-machines are planned for Honda EV Hub Ohio, where an all-new Acura EV will be built beginning in late 2025; and one would expect similar machines destined for one of the Ontario facilities.
One of the big challenges when designing an electric vehicle is ensuring the battery case is suitably protected during a crash, particularly a side impact. The simple solution would be to use more high-strength steel in the A-, B-, and C- pillars, but that adds weight, which is a range-killer.
To address this conundrum, Honda engineers have developed a world first: a CDC joining technology that uses alternating current (AC) rather than the traditional direct current (DC) and allows for a reduction in body-frame weight without compromising the strength of the material. Think of it as a space-age riveter. And in the never-ending quest to keep costs down, the AC guns used to do this work weigh about the same as the DC welding guns, meaning the existing robots that do this work will not need to be replaced or redesigned.
And finally, this one is for all those flow-chart fiends out there. Using Artificial Intelligence, Honda has created a battery-cell assembly line that maximizes efficiency and accounts and adapts for station downtime by building in redundant systems. According to Honda, this will enable flexible adjustments to changes in production models and fluctuations in production volume. Translation: very little downtime when changing battery cell composition. In addition to AI, key to the system are automated guided vehicles (AGVs), essentially autonomous delivery carts.
Driving impressions of the 0 Series EV architecture
In a word, the driving impressions were somewhat underwhelming. Yes, the Accord mule I drove with a hint of anger around Honda’s test track accelerated quickly; felt confident under hard braking; and danced through the S-turns, but I’ve become quite used to all that in even your most garden-variety EV. To be fair, the vehicle felt very planted, and in the high-speed corners and tight hairpins there was very little body roll, testimony to that all-new EV architecture and low-slung battery.
It was not equipped with the steer-by-wire system planned for the 0 Series sedan, so the steering inputs I experienced, while impressive, aren’t relevant to the upcoming production EV.
One very cool feature that wasn’t on the Accord or CR-V mules, but which we still had the opportunity to experience, was enabled on a Honda e that was track-side. The Honda e is that adorable electric vehicle that recalls the Civic hatchback of the ’70s. It is sold in Japan, but with a small range and unlikely chance of passing Canadian crash-test standards, it never made it here.
Anyway, Honda engineers showed off a sound system that allows Honda e drivers to select a specific Honda vehicle, including the HondaJet, and then have their car mimic that vehicle’s engine sound during driving. In addition, the Honda e’s dashboard display will change to the corresponding vehicle’s display.
It might sound gimmicky, but every journalist who had some seat time in the static car was grinning from ear to ear, scrolling through the menu that included such iconic, and audibly pleasing, vehicles as the NSX Type S, the Civic Type R, the NSX-R, and the S2000. And unlike Hyundai’s mind-blowing engine sounds enabled in the Ioniq 5 N, this one projects the sound outside the vehicle, so passersby can hear.
Final Thoughts
Yes, Honda has been somewhat slow to take up the electric-vehicle torch, particularly when compared to Nissan and its very early adoption with the highly successful Leaf. But the case can certainly be made that Honda’s more methodical and measured approach to getting into the EV business hasn’t really set it back that far. What did set its EV aspirations back a little was the star-crossed partnership with General Motors in the development of the Prologue-slash-EV Blazer, where issues with GM’s Ultium battery packs and software glitches gave Honda a rare black eye.
With that relationship behind them, at least in terms of EV collaboration, Honda has clearly set course on its own journey down the electric vehicle highway, bringing its long-standing traditions of invention and innovation to this new and evolving world of mobility. And one that will see Canada play a very important role.
One of the stops on our Japanese itinerary was to the Honda Collection in Motegi, a must-see exhibition hall showcasing the history and vehicles that make this company so important not only to Japan, but to the entire world. What struck me was that in fewer than seven decades, Honda went from building a simple, gas-engine powered bicycle; to developing and building the world’s most advanced light jet, the Honda HA-420 HondaJet, of which 230 are in use, most of them in North America. It’s an amazing story arc for a company, and one that is still being written with an entirely new chapter of electrification unfolding.
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