With the ever rising global oil price, Honda finally unveils a minivan to answer the global demand for a people mover which adheres to current global energy crisis. Entering the compact minivan category, on 29^th of May 2008, Honda of Japan unveils its latest addition to the compact minivan car category, the curiously named Freed. A review from information established on a website might be corny, but you will find a lot of enlightening facts, especially if you can’t read Japanese Kanji. So, a complete paper review based and witty comments from yours truly, after the click.

A compact minivan… What do you expect from a car on that category? First a compact… Small… Then mini… Small again, and minivan… Synonymous with large. So how can two definition of small can combined with one definition of large? Well, you got Honda Freed, Honda Japan latest weapon in the war to take the hearts of people movers everywhere.

The category for this car might be a little misleading. The Freed is neither large nor small, it’s both. Kind of confusing isn’t it? Well, let’s see from its size first.

The Freed is smaller than the CR-V

If you look carefully on the figures, compared to Honda CR-V the Freed is smaller both in length and width. The CR-V length and width is 4520mm and 1820mm respectively, while the Freed bows down at 4215mm and 1695mm. It does brings up the compact aspect of the car isn’t it? With the bigger CR-V seats 5 and the smaller Freed seats 7-8, does it make the Freed totally cramped on the inside? Well, let’s take the subtle design cue from the first Honda Freed teaser movie.

Honda used triangle and a box to indicate the base design of the car. Any 5^th grader would know that box/square shapes offer the best optimal space in geometry. However, any industrial design graduate can identify that a box shaped car is not the best of design applied to a car. It offers the best optimal space yes, but it sure is damn hard to make it look attractive… Unless they put a “retro” marketing gimmick on the promotion front. There’s also the problem with box design equals to bad fuel consumption as the coefficient drag from said design is phenomenally bad. So to answer those questions, Honda of Japan came up with the triangle box combo. The triangle symbolize the front of the car while the box symbolize the rest of the car shape. Therefore, this design philosophy holds several obvious meaning. The car will still be aerodynamic enough as not to hamper its coefficient drag and offers an optimal amount of cargo/passenger space.

But why the car is so tall? At 1715mm, the Freed towers over the CR-V at just 1690mm. Considering that the Freed uses 15” tires and the CR-V uses a set of 17” Well, I don’t know for sure about that one. But if I may use my analytical skill acquired from those expensive masters degree classes, it is apparent that the Freed uses the same platform of Honda latest sensation, the Fit. The Fit uses Honda now famous compact global platform, indicated with under the front seat fuel tank, smart seats (fold, tumble flat kind of smart) and McPherson strut + Torsion beam suspension combo. So if you look at Fit’s front seats lower area, you will find a hump of which the front seats are bolted on… That’s the fuel tank. So what about the Freed? From the pictures, it looks like it has a flat floor but none of the hump underneath the 1^st row seats. Well guys, look at the Freed picture below.

Raised floor have to be balanced with raised roof

As you can see, there’s a huge space between the floor of the interior and the lower part of the car. Civil engineers called this space as common utility conduit… Or something (just googled it). This is a space where everything from exhaust pipe, transfer case + drive shaft for the 4WD system, fuel tank, fuel line etc is hidden without the need for an ugly hump. So the interior can have a flat floor, but the drawback of this design is that the interior volume is taken from the raised flooring. BMW X5 also have similar design. It has flat flooring despite its fancy 4WD system that obviously will require a considerable hump along the center of the car, akin to any other 4WD or Rear Wheel Drive cars. So Honda take the next obvious path to offer maximum interior space, they increase the roof line, and there you have it, the Freed sort of lanky design.

One more design cue that the Freed is based of the Fit is its suspension system. Like the Fit, the Freed uses Mcpherson Strut on the front wheels and torsion beam setup on the rear wheel. The width of the car is also the same, hovering at 1695mm, the Freed is only taller and longer than the Fit. Now, usually Honda doesn’t mess with their global platform and will not try it according to economic of scale rule. This is because Honda and other Japanese auto maker have a magical gnome that enables them to produce cars which share platforms at a very minimal retooling cost. Well, truth be told, the bigger Honda StepWGN also features a McPherson Strut front suspension with H-Shape Torsion Beam on the rear. It also features fuel tank underneath the 3^rd row seats, just like any other car. So does the Freed is a stretched Fit or a smaller StepWGN? I don’t know, Honda hasn’t release a press information for the Freed yet (at least on the website). However, looking at the raised 3^rd row seats, it seems that the fuel tank is located under it.

What about the interior size? Honda Freed seats 7-8 people, while having a size smaller than the CR-V that seats 5. Well, from the paper review, we see that the interior width of the Freed is comparable to the CR-V. Weighing at 1440mm for the Freed and 1465mm for the CR-V; a 25mm difference is not noticeable in real world application. However, one can judge the interior size of the car judging from the length of its wheelbase. Although shorter, the Freed actually has longer wheelbase, allowing more room inside the car compared to the CR-V. For example, the middle seat of Freed is bigger by 5mm… Too small to be noticed, but it can still be considered as bragging rights.

The front seats are also comparable, with the CR-V front seats has a width of 530mm and the Freed is 510mm. Mind you that the physique of Mongoloid race are considerably smaller than Caucasoid race, so 510mm is enough to accommodate Asians generally small posterior.

Then we come to the biggest question of them all… What about its leg room? Especially on the 2^nd and 3^rd row seats. First look at the pictures with the people here.

Noticed that the 2nd row right hand seat is slightly more forward than the left seat

Ah! An ample space… And a whole lot of visual trickery. Honda recently used foreign, and mostly used Caucasians as their display model, why? Because usually they are bigger and thus when they are smiling, they are not sitting in a cramped car. But look carefully. The 2^nd row right hand seatbelt looked awfully stretched, indicating that the right hand 2^nd row seat is slided to the extreme front. Why? Because the 3^rd row seat leg room is way cramped. Just look at the next picture.

Look carefully at the head rest position in relation to the C-pillar

See the difference? The head rest and seats sits right next to the C-pillar, indicating that the seat is slided back for her to seat comfortably. Now… I read that people in America wanted this car to be made available there… Well guys, you truly are out of luck. This car will never fit 7 of your size and stature… Except if you are ABC or the likes.

The trim levels: 5-7-8 seater

Now, the Freed came standard with a 14” wheels, CVT and a 1.5L i-VTEC engine producing 118PS @ 6600 RPM. Even though it’s the same engine found on the new Fit and soon Fit-Aria (that’s Fit sedan), I’m flabbergast about the power decrease from 120PS. Freed’s engine bore-stroke is the same as the Fit’s engine, and so does the compression ratio. So why the power decrease? The torque is similar, but the power comes a bit short. But well, 2PS difference will never be noticed… Especially on a minivan.

2PS less than the Fit RS 120PS engine

Although using the same engine as the Fit, and the same gearbox, the Freed only returns 16.4 Km/Liter of fuel (Honda internal test). Compared to Fit’s 19.6 Km/Liter of fuel. Considering the Freed weighs in at 1300KG, and the Fit at 1080KG, it’s obvious that the size, weight and aerodynamic profile of the Freed stressed the 1.5L engine by a lot. But still, Freed’s fuel consumption can still be considered good.

Optimal use of interior space

The 8 seater version has tumbling seat, making way for a roomier entrance to 3rd row seats

The Freed pricing starts at a modest 1.638.000 Yen and tops at 2.257.500 Yen. For the dirt cheap version, The Freed got another nick name for it, called the Freed Flex, as it only features two row of seats. Paying more for this car will gives you all the premium features of an expensive car. Power sliding door, smart key system, 15” wheels, Vehicle Stability Assist system complete with ABS and traction control, front airbags, and self leveling head lights. For an extra, you can also choose Honda Navi system (Japan only navigation system) and panoramic roof for the Freed Flex (only!). There’s also a 4WD system that comes with a 5AT transmission, but it also comes with a worse fuel consumption.

Plenty of room, Freed Flex offers a huge cargo area

The standard 3 row seats Freed comes in two flavors, the 7 seater or the 8 seater. As the name implies, the 7 seater comes with pilot seats on the 2^nd row and is expected to be the most popular model. Unique to the 7 seater type, standard for all seating configurations, both the 7 and 8 2^nd row seats have a sliding mechanism for better leg room adjustment. The 8 seater have a 60:40 split tumble mechanism. Finally, the 3^rd row seats folds 50:50 upward to the sides, not very efficient and not very Honda like, but it gets the job done.

For those who want to import this car, might just buy the 7 seater version as the car doesn’t feature rear airconditioning system. Sure privacy window film can reduce the heat, but oh my… Asians weather are precariously evil in the summer time.

The 3rd row seats tumbles sideways

A montage of Honda Freed powered sliding door and smart key entry

Interior wise, the Freed stands out on many levels. First, there’s the two tier dashboard. Different from Honda Civic’s multiplex dash, the one on Honda Freed feature smallish digital tachometer to display engine’s RPM. The stripe tachometer might need sometime to get used to but with a CVT, who needs to watch the tachometer at all? On the upside, the dashboard have an internal mileage calculator and outside temperature information. Then, there’s the fact that the dashboard has a huge flat area to store and display various things on it. It’s actually dangerous to put any hard objects, but Asians loves to put something on the dashboard. Plush dolls, religion related ornaments (big and small), miniature cars, Gundam figures, anime figures, etc. So Freed’s dashboard allows for those who wants to put something on a flat surface.

Unique two tier dashboard to store things

Smallish tachometer but lots other useful stuff

I do want to criticize the air conditioning system on this car. It doesn’t have any rear vents to direct cool air to the back. It will be overwhelming to the guys sitting at the back on long hot summer trip. Especially on the 8 seater version where the cold air from the AC system is blocked by the 2^nd row seat.

My take on this car

Personally, I like the car, but not so much. It starts at 1.6 Million Yen, 400 Thousand Yen short of entry level Honda StepWGN which features much more ample interior room. Sure the K20 on the StepWGN makes this car as a gas guzzler compared to the Freed (12.2 Km/Liter compared to 16.4 Km/Liter), but it’s much of a better choice as family hauler on long trips. I imagine that the Freed is intended for Keii car owners who wanted a second car for short family trips.

Honda StepWGN, bigger, stronger, better… But more demanding

All in all, the Freed is a nice car from Honda. It’s compact, frugal and seats 7 to 8 people. For those who wanted to import this car, I personally recommend the G-Aero trim, the most expensive trim available. It lacks rear air conditioning system but the split captain seats will allow cool air from the front reach the back without problem.

The design of the car will not cater to the male “look at me I have manly image problem”. However, it strikes the right balance of cool and functional in my book. The curvy lines on the sides are very pronounced, while keeping a cute front end. Stay tune for an update once Honda unveils the annual Fact Book of its cars, especially for the Freed.

Source:
Honda Japan official Freed website

Disclaimer: All information and pictures are acquired from Honda Japan website. There might be misinformation as I interpret Japanese harshly.