Honda FCX Concept

I recently had the opportunity to drive Honda’s FCX concept in Tokyo at the Tochigi R&D centre. This was before the concept morphed into the FCX Clarity at the Los Angeles Motor Show and marked a coup for Honda being the world’s first commercially available hydrogen fuel.

The FCX is a revolutionary fuel cell vehicle but it is not entirely new. Honda has been manufacturing and selling the FCX since 1999 in North America. The earliest known concept used a PEFC (proton exchange membrane) fuel cell. The fuel stack was quite large, bulky, difficult to store and had a power output of just 78kW (roughly around 106PS), which in turn charged the 80PS output engine.

In 2002 Honda developed yet another proto of the FCX, this time using a far more advanced fuel stack called the FC Stack. The new car was a little more sedate looking and the engine could put out around 105PS though max torque was an impressive 282Nm. The problem however still lay in the bulkiness of the fuel cell stack which was placed in the transmission tunnel area yet managed to occupy a large space extending from the front passenger area all the way to nearly the rear hatch.
However with technology shrinking everything, the FC Stack now named V Flow stack grew around 65 per cent smaller than the older stack and could now fit in the centre tunnel between the front and rear passenger area.

The FCX Clarity utilises Honda’s V Flow stack in combination with a new compact and efficient lithium ion battery pack and a single hydrogen storage tank to power the vehicle’s electric drive motor. The fuel cell stack operates as the vehicle’s main power source. Hydrogen combines with atmospheric oxygen in the fuel cell stack, where chemical energy from the reaction is converted into electric power used to propel the vehicle. Additional energy captured through regenerative braking and deceleration is stored in the lithium ion battery pack, and used to supplement power from the fuel cell, when needed. The vehicle’s only emission is water.

If you have driven an electric scooter you would understand just how the FCX feels. With the ignition switched on what you feel is… nothing! Like most electric motors the FCX motor whizzes… the silence pre, present and post all the motions lending an eerie tomblike atmosphere inside. The instrument binnacle with its Starship Enterprise light array may appear mind boggling to comprehend. Until you realise that all it consists of is a speedometer, battery charge level (a juice level) indicator and driving efficiency (power or recharge) indicator.

But what you simply cannot be prepared for is the instantaneous acceleration. The FCX employs three drive motors, one turning the front axle and two smaller motors on each rear wheel, effectively making this an all wheel drive car. However, since there is no IC engine like clatter, my mind was led to believe that the engine was not switched on which relaxes your focus on how much pressure you need to apply on the throttle. So in complete ignorance of not having driven a fuel cell car ever before I simply stepped on the gas, sorry, electric pedal. Wham! Before you could blink we were literally rocketing past Mars. The sensation however is emotionless, there is no wheelspin, no loud gusty roar and literally no feel though of course the sudden change in inertia does throw you back into your seat.

For a vehicle that is as quick as the FCX, she sure lacks the fuss IC engines like to throw up. The driving sensation is lifeless, completely devoid of any character and as the future of automobiles may very well spell the end of motoring nirvana for petrolheads. Compare it to making love to a rubber doll, sans all the grunting and heaving and sweating. And while handling did seem impressive on the short loop Honda had prepared, the lack of engine noise or what we better know as revs, reduces your judgement of how much throttle input needs to be fed while taking a corner.

The interiors are very spacious, far more than what the exteriors may lead you to believe and ecological too. Honda claims that the seat fabric is made from the fibres of a plant they dub the Honda Bio-Fabric - a newly-developed, plant-based material that offers CO2 reductions as an alternative to traditional interior materials. And it’s got all the creature comforts like any conventional car; air conditioning, state of the art audio systems, Bluetooth connectivity, climate controlled seats and a navigation system which in addition to the regular maps also indicates hydrogen fuelling stations.

The FCX is the need of the hour solution to the motoring woes we ourselves have created, a solution that we desperately have to get into place. After all it’s only emission once the chemical reactions between hydrogen and oxygen have taken place is water in its purest form, it’s even rumoured to be perfectly potable. It may just kill the drama and sensationalism that has made the automobile such a glorious invention though I am quite sure the think tanks, be it at Honda or Toyota or wherever are devising a solution to that as well. Amen!