The New Honda Civic Type R is Completely Insane!

All images courtesy of Honda

I'll admit that at one point I thought Civics were great cars. Since then I've moved on as my automotive tastes have shifted, but part of me still wishes consumers in the United States could have that one Honda unicorn, the Civic Type R. While you might see guys who slap a Type R badge on the back of their Civic, in reality you can't get them here, and that guy didn't tune his to be just like the Japanese Domestic Market (JDM) Type R.

My desire to see a Type R offered on this continent has grown by quite a bit after seeing the new model. Honda has really flexed its muscles with this one, producing a front-wheel drive car that pumps out 280 horsepower. That kind of power is coming from a turbocharged i-VTEC 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, which isn't that much bigger than the one that was in my Civic back in the day. The redline is set at a screaming 7,000 rpm.

Honda is making quite a few tall claims about the car, which has not been fully revealed yet. While we don't know the torque output from the engine (and the horsepower figure is just a ballpark, apparently), it is supposed to be greater than what has been produced by every other Type R vehicle ever made. That includes the Integra and, even more unbelievable, the NSX. The throttle response is also supposed to be faster than on all other Hondas. And even better, it only comes with a six-speed manual transmission, the way performance cars were meant to be driven.

Among the little information that is known about the new car is the fact that there will be a +R button that will be located on the steering wheel. Drivers just push the button and the steering response, torque-mapping of the engine, and the dampers at all four corners of the vehicle change settings. This is to switch the car into track mode easily.

Essentially, the new Civic Type R is a real road-legal racer. Honda has said that the goal with the car is to make the fastest production front-wheel drive car at the Nurburgring, which seems to be a pretty realistic aspiration at this point.