NSX - Japanese Supercar

The Honda NSX (Acura in the US) seemingly came out of nowhere and shook-up the establishment in 1990. Ayrton Senna, honed it to perfection and being Japanese, it brought reliability to the Supercar world. 

The NSX is still a sexy looking car after 20 years, sure its name even sounds like SEX...NSX. Honda have a new one released, but currently only for GT racing. Rumors about a production ready model are beginning to surface and with the world wide fan base of the NSX, it should be a no-brainer.

I suppose there are a ton of arguments for and against the NSX being a Supercar, but as far as I'm concerned, anything that looks like this, sure is. Never mind being mid-engined, rear wheel drive, light weight, built by a world champion F1 team...etc...

I saw this NSX the other day when I was having lunch at Happy Gillis. I walked over to it and was a little surprised to see how dirty it was. Usually when you see a car of this caliber it practically blinds you from fresh-wax-shinyness. The wife's friends has a NSX and his looks like it should be in an auto concourse every time I see it, but not this NSX, it might as well have been a Honda Civic daily driver.

Then, the second surprising thing happened when we saw the owner get in and drive away. We supposed it belonged to some young fella with more money than sense and I looked around the restaurant and saw some likely suspects. But when two old guys about my grandfather's age got in and took off, I was blown away. You know what they say about books and their covers. I hope I'm driving a car like an NSX when I'm their age.

1991 Honda CRX

 

My car looked more like the first picture than the second one, but with Walmart hubcaps. 

With the CRX coming back, I could be tempted again...

My first real Japanese; slick, sexy and fast. This was the other woman I was checking out while the Colt was in getting her surgery. A used car lot down in Kansas City, Kansas had her into Bob's to get a full service. I asked Bob what he thought of it and he said it was sound.

It was way out of my price range at the time, but I got Dad back in Ireland to send me a small loan, one I'd pay-off during the summer.

Even though only three years younger than the Colt, it was light years ahead in power and refinement. Almost felt like a modern car. It's tuned 1.6 liter engine revved freely all the way to the red line every time. Reminded me of the AX Gti that I use to have.

The blue CRX was my first automatic car and my left leg didn't know what to do with itself for the first few hundred miles in that car. But at times traveling at over a hundred miles an hour on hwy 152 at three in the morning my brain-sensory more than made up for the loss in my left leg.

The CRX was a complete workhorse of a car. It would go anywhere, anytime, anyhow and even though it was a two-seater, it had a trunk that was enormous, you could have easily fit five dead bodies in there on a desert run if you found yourself in such a predicament; a Japanese mafia man's dream.

It made the weekly 183 mile run to North-East Missouri a breeze. A fill of gas went forever and back then when gas was practically been giving away for free, I could fill it for about twelve bucks.

Only problem I ever had was to change the water pump after a year or more of hard driving. However, since I was living out in the country I took her on a lot of dirt roads and into fields that should be the preserve of 4x4s. I could have opened a coffee shop with the amount of donuts I made in the fields. One night I tried to go up a little hill and the dart shaped nose of the CRX stuck into the side of the grass hill, like er, a dart. I had to back her out, pull a bunch of grass out from the front grill and learn to live with a split front splitter.

A few years later I posted her for sale in the KC Star and a young man in King City, MO desperately in want of a CRX answered the add and when I saw his sad little face and hundreds short of the asking price, I practically gave him the car. I felt a sweet car like that, needed a sweet driver like him. It was like giving a child up for adoption, my little Japanese orphan.

Can you believe "Extra Window" was a selling point?