Honda Ballade
Honda has built up a formidable reputation in South Africa. The reputation encompasses value, quality and reliability. It is a hard earned and well-deserved reputation for the most part, and Honda continues to weave into the fabric of South African car culture. The curious thing about arriving at a solid and enviable reputation is that the very decisions and risks that took a company so far become risky themselves. The company no longer builds a reputation but defends one.
The Ballade is a much loved model, with a history as a nononsense fuss-free driving experience. If I were to have gotten into this new model a decade or two ago, I would have been totally impressed. The trouble is I wasn’t. I come to this after driving many of Honda's innovative and creative offerings. The new Ballade put simply, feels cheap. The interior is disappointing with materials usually only seen in economy models built in dubious countries. We expect more from a Japanese maker. Perhaps this is a result of this unit being built in that engineering mecca, Thailand? Whatever it is, on first glance the interior is a let down, with very little to sway your opinion. Even the factory fitted and Hondabranded Bluetooth kit felt aftermarket, failing to pause the integrated iPod connection and housed in the A-pillar with buttons, where in the duration of my 1 week test, I failed to identify a single one. It looks and works like an afterthought. The sound quality was also suspect with, unusually for modern OEM installations, a mic that made it hard for my callers to hear me. And this was the model they called the Elegance.
As always the nuts and bolts of a car are always in the suspension and drivetrain, and here we have uninspiring bordering on bland and bad. NVH levels are not good with intrusive wind noise at freeway speeds. The suspension is overly soft with excessive body roll in cornering for a modern sedan priced at just under R200k. The 88kw 1,5 litre engine feels lazy and the gearing in 5th a little low, perhaps as a consequence of needing to overcome lacklustre acceleration and resultant short gearing. The claimed 10 second sprint to 100km/h seems as ambitious as the 8l/100km consumption claim. The gearbox was however excellent. Either way this car is a drag in the daily cut and thrust of motoring, and passing manoeuvres will need to be well planned.
Simply put, the car has missed many opportunities to win hearts, but will still win many buyers due to the Ballade and Honda reputations. Not Honda's best in my opinion. The jury is divided and in recent debate with some other motoring hacks, there were many who felt it was a lot of space for the money. I hold fast and say that from R193,900 I expect more. From Honda I expect more and from a name like Ballade I expect more. Perhaps I would have been more impressed had this car not had the Ballade name on its boot and been position with far fewer niceties, a different price-point and been a value offering?
