Acura: NSX News
#4322
Moderator
Since the driver got out okay, I don't feel bad at all.
Maybe if they stuck to the original, glorious sounding V10 powerplant, it would be out already. Instead, the car went way off a road course, and now this. I'm thinking Yumcha is right. They're thinking "fuggit, we can't complete anyway. Let's just trash the thing"
Maybe if they stuck to the original, glorious sounding V10 powerplant, it would be out already. Instead, the car went way off a road course, and now this. I'm thinking Yumcha is right. They're thinking "fuggit, we can't complete anyway. Let's just trash the thing"
#4323
Senior Moderator
Since the driver got out okay, I don't feel bad at all.
Maybe if they stuck to the original, glorious sounding V10 powerplant, it would be out already. Instead, the car went way off a road course, and now this. I'm thinking Yumcha is right. They're thinking "fuggit, we can't complete anyway. Let's just trash the thing"
Maybe if they stuck to the original, glorious sounding V10 powerplant, it would be out already. Instead, the car went way off a road course, and now this. I'm thinking Yumcha is right. They're thinking "fuggit, we can't complete anyway. Let's just trash the thing"
#4324
I drive a Subata.
iTrader: (1)
Come on. We all know it couldn't compete against GTR. So, they just set it on fire.
Nice exit strategy, Honda.
Nice exit strategy, Honda.
#4326
AZ Community Team
#4327
takin care of Business in
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#4328
Team Owner
The rear is where the car’s twin-turbocharged engine is located as well as its gearbox and one of its 3 electric motors. It’s not clear what caused the fire but we do know the air intakes and vents on the latest prototype are larger than those on previous prototypes as well as the original concept from 2012, suggesting the design has required additional cooling.
Were they talking out of their ass or we missed that all these years.
So if true, the NSX will be DI V6 + Twin Turbo + 3 battery for tranny, driving and turning + SHAWD+ whatever other crap they have in there.
I can't see how that car is going to be reliable by NSX and Acura's standard.
#4329
▒JDM ¥ KING▒
NSX is super HOT!
#4330
You'll Never Walk Alone
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The RDX has some nice features but for sure I'd like to get something like the TLX or 3G MDX. However, as you know, housing expense is ridiculously high and so I don't really have the budget to buy $50k+ cars. Same goes for the NSX, I'd preferably get a 2002+ one for the 3.2L 6MT and styling tweaks but those are also $60k+....lol...I will see but I might end up with a NA1.
While the NSX has always been my dream car, as a Honda enthusiast, I still like the S2000 very much. Despite the age of the car, it's still a joy to drive, especially when you rev it up. As for the 1G RDX, I know it's not exactly a popular car, but I've always wanted one for its combination of SH-AWD, turbo engine, features, and size. It's a pretty fun to drive CUV. With the Flashpro, the turbo lag is greatly reduced while the top end is noticeably better. It feels more like a large V6 with good off the line acceleration and pulls decently hard all the way to redline. I look forward to putting mods on both of these cars
Those ppl who said GTR is like a video game, they obviously have not really driven the GTR on the track. I have driven it before but not on the track, but i rode in one on the track and let me tell you, if that is a video game, then i wish all sports cars can be like video game.
if he really cares about passion, emotion and all that shit, then NSX should be a raw mechanical V10 or V8, not some V6 hybrid with all the computerized assisting technology.
if he really cares about passion, emotion and all that shit, then NSX should be a raw mechanical V10 or V8, not some V6 hybrid with all the computerized assisting technology.
Haha it's almost as if they were trying to get the car on fire...they were even wearing fire suits during the test!
#4331
I drive a Subata.
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#4332
You'll Never Walk Alone
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Everyone missed this??
Were they talking out of their ass or we missed that all these years.
So if true, the NSX will be DI V6 + Twin Turbo + 3 battery for tranny, driving and turning + SHAWD+ whatever other crap they have in there.
I can't see how that car is going to be reliable by NSX and Acura's standard.
Were they talking out of their ass or we missed that all these years.
So if true, the NSX will be DI V6 + Twin Turbo + 3 battery for tranny, driving and turning + SHAWD+ whatever other crap they have in there.
I can't see how that car is going to be reliable by NSX and Acura's standard.
So yes, it will be DI V6 + twin turbo + 3 motors + battery + DCT + SHAWD, etc.
#4333
AZ Community Team
#4335
I drive a Subata.
iTrader: (1)
#4336
AZ Community Team
Agree, the C7 has significant upped the ante in performance and it's overall quality/refinement is in the class of cars 2X it's price.
IMO, that's gonna be the hardest market competition the 2G NSX will come against.
#4337
Engineer
No wonder the Goodwood display was static!
#4338
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#4339
Team Owner
is there even Vtec in Honda's FI cars anymore?
should be called Turvtec.
should be called Turvtec.
#4340
Senior Moderator
This car will be further delayed and Ito will tell us by Sept that for economic reasons they are postponing/cancelling the release of this car. True story!
#4341
Senior Moderator
#4342
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
#4343
I drive a Subata.
iTrader: (1)
Doubt it. Things like this happen all the time, and it would explain why the drivers were wearing such fire protective suits. When testing a car like this, it's always a possibility.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
#4345
Senior Moderator
Doubt it. Things like this happen all the time, and it would explain why the drivers were wearing such fire protective suits. When testing a car like this, it's always a possibility.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
STILL...that being said, a brand like Honda, IMO is desperate for some GOOD PR regarding their halo/flagship car after it's been beset by cancellations, delays, more cancellations that has left a fanbase reeling. Speaking for myself, I was guardedly excited about the incoming NSX. So, to have it go up in smoke like this while testing is a black-eye that from a perception's perspective, Honda did not need to have. Above all. Horrid timing.
Just my 2 cents.
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is300eater (07-24-2014)
#4348
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MuGen7Modulo (07-24-2014)
#4350
Everyone missed this??
Were they talking out of their ass or we missed that all these years.
So if true, the NSX will be DI V6 + Twin Turbo + 3 battery for tranny, driving and turning + SHAWD+ whatever other crap they have in there.
I can't see how that car is going to be reliable by NSX and Acura's standard.
Were they talking out of their ass or we missed that all these years.
So if true, the NSX will be DI V6 + Twin Turbo + 3 battery for tranny, driving and turning + SHAWD+ whatever other crap they have in there.
I can't see how that car is going to be reliable by NSX and Acura's standard.
#4351
I drive a Subata.
iTrader: (1)
#4352
#4353
Team Owner
#4355
2G TLX-S
#4356
They'll have to take it back to the dealer to recreate the problem ... LOL LOL
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Nabooly (08-08-2014)
#4357
Senior Moderator
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Tonyware (07-25-2014)
#4358
Senior Moderator
Doubt it. Things like this happen all the time, and it would explain why the drivers were wearing such fire protective suits. When testing a car like this, it's always a possibility.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
It could have also been something like a leaking fuel line on a hot exhaust manifold. if the car had the dual turbos there's no shortage of heat sources where springing a fuel leak would result in catastrophe.
The point is we don't know what happened, and we don't know how serious this issue is. It's not like it is a production NSX.
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ttribe (07-25-2014)
#4359
AZ Community Team
The Acura NSX at 25
Really good article about the launch of the 1G NSX 25 years ago.
Forgot that it was launched only 3 years after the formation of Acura.
Hadn't read these background stories before.
http://autoweek.com/article/car-news/acura-nsx-25
Forgot that it was launched only 3 years after the formation of Acura.
Hadn't read these background stories before.
http://autoweek.com/article/car-news/acura-nsx-25
On Feb. 10, 1989, executives from Honda and a newly founded division known as Acura piled into a conference room in Chicago's historic Drake Hotel to rehearse the unveiling of an unbelievable new car -- a Technicolor vision for the future, something never before built by Honda or any Japanese automaker.
As the public relations department went over its lines, Tadashi Kume, then-president of Honda and an instrumental figure in Honda's Formula One efforts, presided. The people from Honda America were acutely aware that the Big Boss from Japan, Kume, rarely made a stateside appearance unless it was for something serious. Next door, Ford was in the middle of a full-on press conference. Honda kept its rehearsal respectfully quiet.
While the executives busied themselves with the presentation, Kume sauntered over to the red-and-black prototype on the stage. He climbed in.
Either the keys were already in the car, for one reason or another, or he put them in.
He cranked the ignition.
The engine sparked to life, then it roared as Kume proceeded to rev to redline -- right in the middle of the Ford conference. Everyone was shocked. "Mr. Kume, stop it!" yelled Kurt Antonius, Honda's spokesman emeritus, gesticulating wildly. "They're gonna hear this!"
The bombshell dropped the next day, the eve of the Chicago Auto Show. Journalists packed the same cramped, low-ceilinged room wall-to-wall, their bulky cameras primed for the moment. Kume described one engineering achievement after another: forged pistons…titanium connecting rods… all-aluminum monocoque…and an 8,000 RPM redline, which he had tested the day before…
When Kume was finished, Antonius pulled the cover off the New Sports eXperimental, the NS-X (the hyphen was later dropped). There was nothing to say from the podium, so he said, "ta-da!" The entire presentation had taken a scant 10 minutes.
One can only imagine what this sleek-wedged spaceship must have looked like to journalists during the tail end of the 1980s, a time when the future was always tantalizingly close. Perhaps it was like witnessing the debut of the Citroën DS 34 years earlier, watching a car that had "fallen from the sky." Maybe like the Lamborghini Miura chassis on display in Turin just 10 years after that -- naked, purposeful, utterly enthralling.
In Chicago, Antonius saw journalists crawling on their elbows and their stomachs, trying to slide closer to the car as Kume spoke, diving under the car to gaze upon the all-aluminum suspension. The press kit they received, complete with black-and-white photos, had six pages devoted to the engineering alone.
The NSX was "the car of the moment, like no Ferrari or Porsche," said Sports Car International. "The quintessence of engineering sophistication," said Popular Science in June 1997. It was the best midengined car Automobile Magazine had ever driven; the magazine later voted it their Automobile of the Year. "It could rock the sports car establishment like never before," we wrote. Everyone wanted to drive it, even in winter: "Excuses were created, lame arguments put forth, masthead hierarchy invented, ancestry insulted. Things got ugly."
"It's the best sports car the world has ever produced," said Don Fuller in the September 1990 issue of Motor Trend. "Any time. Any place. Any price…we've spent over 100 years developing the automobile. After driving the NSX, it's been worth the wait."
Acura was just 3 years old when it launched the NSX in America. When Acura debuted on March 27, 1986, there were just two vehicles: the Legend and the Integra. But there was always another car, right around the corner. "I don't believe we told them anything about another sports car," said Tom Elliott, who served as American Honda's executive vice president from 1983 to 2005. "We told them there was going to be another model. We told them the direction for Acura -- sporty and personal, a lot of things that would lead them to believe there would be a sports car."
Elliott, who started at Honda barely a year after he graduated from college in 1969, was all set to attend the Chicago unveiling. Instead, he fell sick with pneumonia. But before the show, he and Antonius and two other colleagues found themselves sweating in a conference room, poring over a list of proposed names for the prototype sports car from a list that Japan had sent. They had to come up with a temporary name to use at the Chicago show -- otherwise, it'd just be known as the "Acura Sports Car."
Nobody wanted to call it that.
Sadly, neither Antonius nor Elliott remembers the alternate names. How great would it be to drive an Acura Utopian Turtletop? "To me it wasn't as big a deal," said Elliott. "We had to have something, and internally, I can't remember the code name they were using. But it was always regarded as 'New Sports.'"
The resulting moniker was a combination of Japanese hyperbole and American attitude: New, Sports, eXperimental.
NSX.
"We got so much publicity from the launch," said Antonius, "and they had problems getting the actual name of the car, and they said, shit, let's just keep NSX! Everybody loves the name! The advertising agency liked it; everyone internally said, 'You know, it's got a nice ring to it.' And so, we kept the name NSX!"
To launch the NSX, Acura went to the Highlands Inn, overlooking Big Sur. The hotel was crawling with Honda. Every executive, every engineer worth his title flew into Monterey to make sure the car would be perfect, and -- more importantly -- to gather valuable opinions from the opinion-makers. Two nights before the press was due to arrive, in the wee hours of the morning, an engineer by the name of Tama took a car out for final suspension checks. On Carmel Valley Road, he hit a deer. The creature crushed the right front quarter panel and limped off, its nerves undoubtedly rattled. Equally distraught, Tama returned the car with a flurry of apologies.
All of Honda was in a panic. There were only a handful of NSXs on hand, flown over from Japan. Would they be enough to accommodate the maelstrom of journalists? Antonius placed a call to Torrance and fortune smiled: a car was being taken apart for dealer training. Same color, too. Some poor sap drove all night to Big Sur with the spare fender, installed it in time, and the press was none the wiser.
For the rest of the trip, Honda employees jokingly referred to Tama as "Tama-deer."
A few days later at Laguna Seca, the press took a break from driving the NSX. Antonius asked if he could take the car for a quick lap. "You know turn 11?" he asked. The big, sharp left-hander right before the main straightaway. "I wasn't used to rear-wheel drive. And in front of the president of Honda, and in front of the president of Honda R&D, I spun out the NSX and I missed the wall by a foot."
Antonius spun a full 360 degrees, his career flashing before his eyes. "I saw [it] going down in flames," he said. "And I had to go around again because I missed the pit entrance, and drove around the next lap about 30 mph. Came into the pits with my head down, and I got out of the car -- and they all surrounded me clapping and laughing. I was so embarrassed."
A month later, Honda went to Portland International Raceway for the short lead program. Parker Johnstone, well before his IndyCar days with Comptech, drove dealers and journalists around the track. (He even taught Elliott's wife how to drive stick.) Ed Taylor, vice president of Acura, rode with him for a few laps.
Months before the car was to go on sale, Taylor, who remembered the Chicago press conference differently ("All those damn reporters wanted to talk about was the profitability of the dealers!" he said. "And I'm dodging them like a champion. I was busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest.") wrangled his way into one of the eight NSXs and went on tour, driving with his wife to his native Seattle, and then the 1,200 miles back to California.
No spies, no press, no Twitter, no virality. Only the clever or the diehard knew what they were spotting. "They'd slow down, roll their windows out in traffic," he recalls. "'What are you doing with the car? It's not out yet!' They were like, 'There's something wrong with you!'"
In Whidbey Island, Wash., a gaggle of cyclists surrounded Taylor until he told them what it was. In Bakersfield, a man in a Porsche followed them right to the motel and wouldn't let up until he pored over this rival car.
"One of the nicer experiences that I had in the car business," he said. "A rare privilege, really."
As long as the NSX was in production and Honda provided gainful employment, Taylor would take early production NSXs out for the weekend and proceed to scare his neighbors in Laguna Niguel. "One of the NSXs was purple, and I hated that color," he remembered. "Some of the stunts I pulled…"
He chuckled, remembering who he was talking to: a journalist. "Minor stuff, by most standards."
Climb into an NSX and sit in the Seat of Senna, narrow, and tidy -- its bottom cushion is like sitting on three individual pillows, and the surprisingly upright seat never goes low enough. Unusual in 1989, its sloping dashboard deserves consideration as a design classic. In the '80s, the world was obsessed with fighter-jet controls right next to your fingertips, and the NSX followed suit. Devoid of ornamentation, its thin, three-spoke steering wheel could have come from an Integra. It doesn't tilt, only telescopes. What's good for the diminutive Brazilian, evidently, is damn good enough for everybody else. The dashboard is low, somewhere around the height of your elbows, and there's practically no bodywork in front of the wraparound windshield. Everything comes at you right now. You, dear driver, are the true King of the Road, Master of All in Your Gaze…
This NSX, lent by Honda, has around 40,000 hard-fought miles. It feels stable and solid, a testament to its chassis, but at the same time it creaks and ticks like television static, from the targa roof down to the front suspension -- the barely-any-sound insulation means road bumps reverberate like cannon fire. Ba-BOOM. Ba-BOOM.
Up Deer Creek Road as the sun sets, the NSX's 3.2-liter V6 fills the valley with a gentle growl. Up until one lays into the throttle, it remains as stealthy as an Accord. But give the top-mounted gas pedal a firm squeeze, preferably from a white-socked loafer, and the car barks to life: a chainsaw staccato, emerging from behind and startlingly close. In 1995, the NSX became the first car to use drive-by-wire -- in a world before eco-programmed gas pedals, it's disappointing to realize that not a single manufacturer today can nail down the immediacy and responsiveness of this 20-year-old throttle.
The gearbox's narrow throws shift with little eagerness, but still trigger a delightfully mechanical sound: guh-CLUNK, guh-CLUNK. Brakes and clutch offer feel down to the millimeter. The steering is slow by today's standards, powered but just barely so. The car never feels rushed, frenetic: it is content to drive at your own pace, as edgy as you wish to push it, as comfortable as you demand. It is faster than its numbers suggest, more passionate than its heritage denotes -- it is a sum greater than its technological achievements.
Twenty-five years later, and 10 years after the last example rolled off the Suzuka line, we must consider the NSX in a modern context. That's always the problem with pioneers, isn't it? When something so revolutionary falls from the sky, legions of imitators whittle away its groundbreaking essence, the wheels of progress chip away at its shocking impact, until revisiting it pales in comparison. In 1989, Honda threw the NSX into a fray occupied by the Lotus Esprit, the Corvette ZR1, the Porsche 911 and the benchmark Ferrari 348. Today, NSX aspirants can buy the Lotus Evora, the Audi R8, the Corvette Z06, the eternal 911 and the Ferrari 458 Italia, all of which are being benchmarked for the next NSX -- all of which feature elements of practicality and livability undreamt of before 1989. "Performance with no compromises," said Honda R&D head Hiroyuki Shimojima. Was the NSX good because it was reliable? Was it good because Ferraris were catching on fire?
Twenty-five years later, Ferraris are still catching on fire. Yet there have been five midengined V8 Ferraris since 1989, and the NSX is facing a revival, one that hinges on technological 180, based on a purely modern affection: its three electric motors (one supplementing the V6 engine) and all-wheel drive will likely beat corners into submission instead of finessing them. Its dual-clutch automatic substitutes driver control with computer-programmed technology. Its motors and all-wheel drive seem seem diametrically, philosophically at odds to the original NSX -- the idea of simplicity as a virtue having passed with Senna. Acura's focus is not just cutting-edge technology but also marketable technology -- it's just as impressive to sell a fashionable hybrid with three electric motors as it is to sell all-aluminum construction. What's good for the NSX, after all, is good for the RLX.
"If you look at technology in modern sports cars, particularly exotic cars, what Honda is working on is pretty much in line with other manufacturers," said Elliott. "The original NSX, the responsiveness of a naturally aspirated engine, the light weight, that was the direction Honda was going for. Nowadays, you have hybrids, you have AWD, you have turbochargers -- the exotic car market has changed a lot. If you want to be competitive, you have to change with it."
Enthusiasts so enamored with the original must keep this in mind. There is no doubt that the current engineers of the NSX, like project leader Ted Klaus, are aware of their own legacy -- little doubt that they won't do everything in their power to live up to the original. When the new NSX debuts in 2015 as a 2016 model, built in Marysville, Ohio, instead of Takanezawa, it won't be so much a rejection of the original's principles as it is a reinterpretation of a technological zenith.
There's nothing more New, Sports, or eXperimental than that.
Special thanks to Rob Alen, Ed Taylor, Kurt Antonius, Tom Elliott, Chris Martin, and Vince Manganiello for making this story possible.
As the public relations department went over its lines, Tadashi Kume, then-president of Honda and an instrumental figure in Honda's Formula One efforts, presided. The people from Honda America were acutely aware that the Big Boss from Japan, Kume, rarely made a stateside appearance unless it was for something serious. Next door, Ford was in the middle of a full-on press conference. Honda kept its rehearsal respectfully quiet.
While the executives busied themselves with the presentation, Kume sauntered over to the red-and-black prototype on the stage. He climbed in.
Either the keys were already in the car, for one reason or another, or he put them in.
He cranked the ignition.
The engine sparked to life, then it roared as Kume proceeded to rev to redline -- right in the middle of the Ford conference. Everyone was shocked. "Mr. Kume, stop it!" yelled Kurt Antonius, Honda's spokesman emeritus, gesticulating wildly. "They're gonna hear this!"
The bombshell dropped the next day, the eve of the Chicago Auto Show. Journalists packed the same cramped, low-ceilinged room wall-to-wall, their bulky cameras primed for the moment. Kume described one engineering achievement after another: forged pistons…titanium connecting rods… all-aluminum monocoque…and an 8,000 RPM redline, which he had tested the day before…
When Kume was finished, Antonius pulled the cover off the New Sports eXperimental, the NS-X (the hyphen was later dropped). There was nothing to say from the podium, so he said, "ta-da!" The entire presentation had taken a scant 10 minutes.
One can only imagine what this sleek-wedged spaceship must have looked like to journalists during the tail end of the 1980s, a time when the future was always tantalizingly close. Perhaps it was like witnessing the debut of the Citroën DS 34 years earlier, watching a car that had "fallen from the sky." Maybe like the Lamborghini Miura chassis on display in Turin just 10 years after that -- naked, purposeful, utterly enthralling.
In Chicago, Antonius saw journalists crawling on their elbows and their stomachs, trying to slide closer to the car as Kume spoke, diving under the car to gaze upon the all-aluminum suspension. The press kit they received, complete with black-and-white photos, had six pages devoted to the engineering alone.
The NSX was "the car of the moment, like no Ferrari or Porsche," said Sports Car International. "The quintessence of engineering sophistication," said Popular Science in June 1997. It was the best midengined car Automobile Magazine had ever driven; the magazine later voted it their Automobile of the Year. "It could rock the sports car establishment like never before," we wrote. Everyone wanted to drive it, even in winter: "Excuses were created, lame arguments put forth, masthead hierarchy invented, ancestry insulted. Things got ugly."
"It's the best sports car the world has ever produced," said Don Fuller in the September 1990 issue of Motor Trend. "Any time. Any place. Any price…we've spent over 100 years developing the automobile. After driving the NSX, it's been worth the wait."
Acura was just 3 years old when it launched the NSX in America. When Acura debuted on March 27, 1986, there were just two vehicles: the Legend and the Integra. But there was always another car, right around the corner. "I don't believe we told them anything about another sports car," said Tom Elliott, who served as American Honda's executive vice president from 1983 to 2005. "We told them there was going to be another model. We told them the direction for Acura -- sporty and personal, a lot of things that would lead them to believe there would be a sports car."
Elliott, who started at Honda barely a year after he graduated from college in 1969, was all set to attend the Chicago unveiling. Instead, he fell sick with pneumonia. But before the show, he and Antonius and two other colleagues found themselves sweating in a conference room, poring over a list of proposed names for the prototype sports car from a list that Japan had sent. They had to come up with a temporary name to use at the Chicago show -- otherwise, it'd just be known as the "Acura Sports Car."
Nobody wanted to call it that.
Sadly, neither Antonius nor Elliott remembers the alternate names. How great would it be to drive an Acura Utopian Turtletop? "To me it wasn't as big a deal," said Elliott. "We had to have something, and internally, I can't remember the code name they were using. But it was always regarded as 'New Sports.'"
The resulting moniker was a combination of Japanese hyperbole and American attitude: New, Sports, eXperimental.
NSX.
"We got so much publicity from the launch," said Antonius, "and they had problems getting the actual name of the car, and they said, shit, let's just keep NSX! Everybody loves the name! The advertising agency liked it; everyone internally said, 'You know, it's got a nice ring to it.' And so, we kept the name NSX!"
To launch the NSX, Acura went to the Highlands Inn, overlooking Big Sur. The hotel was crawling with Honda. Every executive, every engineer worth his title flew into Monterey to make sure the car would be perfect, and -- more importantly -- to gather valuable opinions from the opinion-makers. Two nights before the press was due to arrive, in the wee hours of the morning, an engineer by the name of Tama took a car out for final suspension checks. On Carmel Valley Road, he hit a deer. The creature crushed the right front quarter panel and limped off, its nerves undoubtedly rattled. Equally distraught, Tama returned the car with a flurry of apologies.
All of Honda was in a panic. There were only a handful of NSXs on hand, flown over from Japan. Would they be enough to accommodate the maelstrom of journalists? Antonius placed a call to Torrance and fortune smiled: a car was being taken apart for dealer training. Same color, too. Some poor sap drove all night to Big Sur with the spare fender, installed it in time, and the press was none the wiser.
For the rest of the trip, Honda employees jokingly referred to Tama as "Tama-deer."
A few days later at Laguna Seca, the press took a break from driving the NSX. Antonius asked if he could take the car for a quick lap. "You know turn 11?" he asked. The big, sharp left-hander right before the main straightaway. "I wasn't used to rear-wheel drive. And in front of the president of Honda, and in front of the president of Honda R&D, I spun out the NSX and I missed the wall by a foot."
Antonius spun a full 360 degrees, his career flashing before his eyes. "I saw [it] going down in flames," he said. "And I had to go around again because I missed the pit entrance, and drove around the next lap about 30 mph. Came into the pits with my head down, and I got out of the car -- and they all surrounded me clapping and laughing. I was so embarrassed."
A month later, Honda went to Portland International Raceway for the short lead program. Parker Johnstone, well before his IndyCar days with Comptech, drove dealers and journalists around the track. (He even taught Elliott's wife how to drive stick.) Ed Taylor, vice president of Acura, rode with him for a few laps.
Months before the car was to go on sale, Taylor, who remembered the Chicago press conference differently ("All those damn reporters wanted to talk about was the profitability of the dealers!" he said. "And I'm dodging them like a champion. I was busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest.") wrangled his way into one of the eight NSXs and went on tour, driving with his wife to his native Seattle, and then the 1,200 miles back to California.
No spies, no press, no Twitter, no virality. Only the clever or the diehard knew what they were spotting. "They'd slow down, roll their windows out in traffic," he recalls. "'What are you doing with the car? It's not out yet!' They were like, 'There's something wrong with you!'"
In Whidbey Island, Wash., a gaggle of cyclists surrounded Taylor until he told them what it was. In Bakersfield, a man in a Porsche followed them right to the motel and wouldn't let up until he pored over this rival car.
"One of the nicer experiences that I had in the car business," he said. "A rare privilege, really."
As long as the NSX was in production and Honda provided gainful employment, Taylor would take early production NSXs out for the weekend and proceed to scare his neighbors in Laguna Niguel. "One of the NSXs was purple, and I hated that color," he remembered. "Some of the stunts I pulled…"
He chuckled, remembering who he was talking to: a journalist. "Minor stuff, by most standards."
Climb into an NSX and sit in the Seat of Senna, narrow, and tidy -- its bottom cushion is like sitting on three individual pillows, and the surprisingly upright seat never goes low enough. Unusual in 1989, its sloping dashboard deserves consideration as a design classic. In the '80s, the world was obsessed with fighter-jet controls right next to your fingertips, and the NSX followed suit. Devoid of ornamentation, its thin, three-spoke steering wheel could have come from an Integra. It doesn't tilt, only telescopes. What's good for the diminutive Brazilian, evidently, is damn good enough for everybody else. The dashboard is low, somewhere around the height of your elbows, and there's practically no bodywork in front of the wraparound windshield. Everything comes at you right now. You, dear driver, are the true King of the Road, Master of All in Your Gaze…
This NSX, lent by Honda, has around 40,000 hard-fought miles. It feels stable and solid, a testament to its chassis, but at the same time it creaks and ticks like television static, from the targa roof down to the front suspension -- the barely-any-sound insulation means road bumps reverberate like cannon fire. Ba-BOOM. Ba-BOOM.
Up Deer Creek Road as the sun sets, the NSX's 3.2-liter V6 fills the valley with a gentle growl. Up until one lays into the throttle, it remains as stealthy as an Accord. But give the top-mounted gas pedal a firm squeeze, preferably from a white-socked loafer, and the car barks to life: a chainsaw staccato, emerging from behind and startlingly close. In 1995, the NSX became the first car to use drive-by-wire -- in a world before eco-programmed gas pedals, it's disappointing to realize that not a single manufacturer today can nail down the immediacy and responsiveness of this 20-year-old throttle.
The gearbox's narrow throws shift with little eagerness, but still trigger a delightfully mechanical sound: guh-CLUNK, guh-CLUNK. Brakes and clutch offer feel down to the millimeter. The steering is slow by today's standards, powered but just barely so. The car never feels rushed, frenetic: it is content to drive at your own pace, as edgy as you wish to push it, as comfortable as you demand. It is faster than its numbers suggest, more passionate than its heritage denotes -- it is a sum greater than its technological achievements.
Twenty-five years later, and 10 years after the last example rolled off the Suzuka line, we must consider the NSX in a modern context. That's always the problem with pioneers, isn't it? When something so revolutionary falls from the sky, legions of imitators whittle away its groundbreaking essence, the wheels of progress chip away at its shocking impact, until revisiting it pales in comparison. In 1989, Honda threw the NSX into a fray occupied by the Lotus Esprit, the Corvette ZR1, the Porsche 911 and the benchmark Ferrari 348. Today, NSX aspirants can buy the Lotus Evora, the Audi R8, the Corvette Z06, the eternal 911 and the Ferrari 458 Italia, all of which are being benchmarked for the next NSX -- all of which feature elements of practicality and livability undreamt of before 1989. "Performance with no compromises," said Honda R&D head Hiroyuki Shimojima. Was the NSX good because it was reliable? Was it good because Ferraris were catching on fire?
Twenty-five years later, Ferraris are still catching on fire. Yet there have been five midengined V8 Ferraris since 1989, and the NSX is facing a revival, one that hinges on technological 180, based on a purely modern affection: its three electric motors (one supplementing the V6 engine) and all-wheel drive will likely beat corners into submission instead of finessing them. Its dual-clutch automatic substitutes driver control with computer-programmed technology. Its motors and all-wheel drive seem seem diametrically, philosophically at odds to the original NSX -- the idea of simplicity as a virtue having passed with Senna. Acura's focus is not just cutting-edge technology but also marketable technology -- it's just as impressive to sell a fashionable hybrid with three electric motors as it is to sell all-aluminum construction. What's good for the NSX, after all, is good for the RLX.
"If you look at technology in modern sports cars, particularly exotic cars, what Honda is working on is pretty much in line with other manufacturers," said Elliott. "The original NSX, the responsiveness of a naturally aspirated engine, the light weight, that was the direction Honda was going for. Nowadays, you have hybrids, you have AWD, you have turbochargers -- the exotic car market has changed a lot. If you want to be competitive, you have to change with it."
Enthusiasts so enamored with the original must keep this in mind. There is no doubt that the current engineers of the NSX, like project leader Ted Klaus, are aware of their own legacy -- little doubt that they won't do everything in their power to live up to the original. When the new NSX debuts in 2015 as a 2016 model, built in Marysville, Ohio, instead of Takanezawa, it won't be so much a rejection of the original's principles as it is a reinterpretation of a technological zenith.
There's nothing more New, Sports, or eXperimental than that.
Special thanks to Rob Alen, Ed Taylor, Kurt Antonius, Tom Elliott, Chris Martin, and Vince Manganiello for making this story possible.
Last edited by Legend2TL; 08-01-2014 at 11:03 AM.
#4360
I love how ppl on a honda/acura forum are such honda haters. Why are you still on here? The forum for the car you have sucks or something? You need Internet friends?
It is too bad honda can't build cars that are reliable and of the same build and material quality as Government Motors.
Honda motors are garbage.
Noone complains about honda switching from double wishbone suspension on all 4 corners to strut setup in front and beam setup in rear. Noone even knows the difference. They just complain about power numbers and bashing fwd.
I don't blame honda at all for their lineup. I blame the consumers. They make cars that sell for profits, unlike original nsx or s2000 that both lost honda money on every car they sold.
It is too bad honda can't build cars that are reliable and of the same build and material quality as Government Motors.
Honda motors are garbage.
Noone complains about honda switching from double wishbone suspension on all 4 corners to strut setup in front and beam setup in rear. Noone even knows the difference. They just complain about power numbers and bashing fwd.
I don't blame honda at all for their lineup. I blame the consumers. They make cars that sell for profits, unlike original nsx or s2000 that both lost honda money on every car they sold.