When the Japanese automaker Toyota wanted to show the world what their latest super car, the LF-A could do, they entered a pair of preproduction Supra successors into a number of exhibition style endurance races at the world famous Nurburgring. Following a similar path, Honda’s domestic racing program has just announced that they will be returning to the island nation’s top tier of motor sport when they debut their next generation super car, the HSV-10 GT on March 20 at the beginning of the 2010 Super GT season. It is only fitting that the NSX’s successor, the Honda Sports Velocity turns its first wheel in competition at the at the Suzuka Circuit, being that it is the automaker’s own test track, making it an even more important initial run for the HSV because you know that all of the people that are going to decide the new sports vehicle’s fate will be in attendance.
Despite the exotic V10 powered future NSX rumors, the new HSV-10 GT is powered by a low displacement 3.4 Liter V8 with a maximum output of over 500 HP. The high output engine is mated to a Ricardo sequential manual gearbox, the same unit used by Nissan and Toyota in their Super GT machines, ensuring that their drivers will be hard pressed to miss a shift. With a body that is somewhere between 21st century NSX and an ASL Garaiya from the Japanese Autobacs tuning shop, the future HSV-10 GT is guaranteed to carve out a place for itself in Japanese automotive culture.
Updated 01/18/10: Official specifications released; new image gallery added.
Updated 01/22/10: Check the Honda HSV in action at the Suzuka race track where the car is preparing for the Japanese 2010 Super GT Series. More video after the jump.
The Japanese automaker Honda is gearing up for the 2010 Tokyo Auto Salon later this week where they will unveil the Insight Sports Modulo Concept. Following the trend of sporty and practical factory tuned models, the Sport Modulo modified Insight is the world’s largest engine builder’s way of saying that even hybrid models can be fun. As it comes from the factory, the Honda hybrid comes with excellent aerodynamic numbers, a comfortable passenger compartment and a fun chassis all a reasonable price, this Sports Modulo Concept expresses the joy of driving through an “Exciting Eco” theme. The automotive re stylists have enhanced the Insight’s appearance with a new ground effects package made up of chiseled lines and larger air dams. With the Sports Modulo concept vehicle, Honda hopes to demonstrate what their in house customization program has to offer the next generation hybrid buyer.
The automotive term EV comes with an unnecessary stigma of being slow and boring. However automakers like Fisker and Tesla are creating fun to drive sports cars with green power trains and zero emissions, but the ability to have your cake and eat it too comes at a price. However the world’s largest engine builder tried to make things different when they introduced the CR-Z sports coupe concept at the Tokyo Auto Salon.
Honda has finally unveiled the long awaited production version of the CR-Z hybrid coupe at the 2010 North American International Auto Show with sales slated to begin as early as summer and will be followed up with a European version later on in the year. The CR-Z is powered by an IMA hybrid system made up of a 1.5 Liter gas burning engine combined with an electric motor that provides an additional 14 HP for a grand total of 124 HP and 131 lb-ft of torque. The concept’s design remains mostly unchanged for the production version with its low slung roof line, sporty rear spoiler, aggressive profile and LED lights that are being used for the first time in one of Honda’s production vehicles.
The Japanese automaker Honda has unveiled their New Small Concept aimed at stirring up interest in the Asian market at the Auto Expo 2010 in New Delhi. The design previews an upcoming compact offering from Honda that is set to go on sale in 2011 in India and Thailand. The Honda New Small Concept is an interesting looking vehicle, like all concepts the idea of the design is tantalize the imagination, push the boundaries of what a production car could be and force consumers to ask "how come my car doesn’t look like that?" By breathing so much life into the design of this egg shaped sub compact with futuristic lighting and few well placed creases in the car’s sheet metal.
Honda claims that the car features a wide platform with a low center of gravity that offers enough interior space for five people and will feel planted on the road. As urban environments become more and more congested, especially overseas, consumers are demanding more maneuverable people movers that can negotiate the cramped streets where space is a commodity. With what Japanese stylists are calling "Efficient Energetic Exterior" design, the dynamic body of the Honda New Small Concept is letting the world know that with front forward fenders highlight the presence of the vehicle. You can expect that whatever India’s 2011 small car will be, it will quickly spread across the globe.
Honda’s latest concept car offering made its cracking debut at the 2009 LA Auto Show and from the looks of things; it’s everything we thought it would be, for better or for worse. Called the Honda Personal-Neo Urban Transport – P-NUT for short – the new concept is Honda’s entry to the micro coupe market. Although concept cars generally are a hit-or-miss upon first glance, the P-NUT’s aesthetic appearance falls on the latter. We’re quite not sure how to explain it, except that it looks like some sort of gigantic flat iron, which, if you’re keeping track, isn’t a good thing.
We’ve seen some pretty crazy concept vehicles over the years and the P-NUT surely ranks among one of the weirdest we’ve seen in a while. For starters, the car has no side mirrors, which isn’t all too surprising given that this is a concept. In place of the missing mirrors – at least we think so – is a back-up camera. We’re also still waiting for an explanation as to where the headlights are – of course, it’s in the front but we find it hard to believe that those two slits are the actual headlights.
The Japanese automaker Honda has just reveled the first details on their all new crossover variant based on the popular Accord sedan, the Accord Crosstour, as it will be known will be placed at the top of the Honda Accord family and is slated to go on sale this Fall after today’s online debut.
The new Accord Crosstour’s design is inspired by the Accord’s familiar body lines and adds a bolder front grille that is complemented by a bolder and more muscular front bumper giving the Crosstour an aggressive stance while the wedge shaped C pillars add a bit of a fastback appeal to the sporty CUV. The flowing roofline narrows smoothly into the rear of the vehicle to create an attractive set of hips, which also makes for a rather large cargo area that can fit a bit more than the traditional sedan.
With the Honda Accord Crosstour, the world’s largest engine manufacturer is getting into the game of plus sized luxury sedans that offer the practicality of a wagon while at the same time giving the owner the appearance of driving an SUV. It should only be a matter of time before we see an Acura badged variant to compete with other high end crossovers.
Honda has been presented at SEMA Show with a 2010 Accord sedan equipped with Mugen accessories. The list of accessories will be available at Honda dealers starting November 11th.
The Mugen accessories for the Accord will include: 18-inch alloy wheels, front sports grille, front under-spoiler, side spoiler, rear under-spoiler, sports floor mats, machined aluminum oil filler cap and a distinctive front emblem. All of the painted parts will come color-matched to one of five popular Accord sedan colors: Polished Metal Metallic, Crystal Black Pearl, Alabaster Silver Metallic, White Diamond Pearl and Taffeta White. MUGEN, under license by M-TEC Co., Ltd., of Japan, has been closely associated with Honda for decades in the design and manufacture of racing and premium performance components.
The Japanese automaker Honda has just cooked up a new pet friendly Element for the U.S. market. The compact crossover is well known as a go anywhere do anything kind of vehicle, the car’s resilient interior allows you to play all day at the beach, store all your surf gear inside and simply hose out all the sand when you get home. Knowing how much consumers are already spending on their animals, Honda figured that the 2010 Honda Element Dog Friendly was the next logical step to winning over, over accommodating dog owners.
Starting at only $20,525, this new Element is full of features for man’s best friend. The entire cargo area behind the rear seats has been transformed into a pooch’s traveling palace. First of all Fido will be able to effortlessly enter and exit his new perch atop the back bumper via a very sturdy looking ramp that if wide enough could handle a wheelchair. Once inside the pup will ride on a plush foam cushion covered with a neat Dog Friendly Element print. In order to keep Rex cool Honda’s Dog Friendly engineers have built in a ventilation fan and to make sure that he won’t go thirsty they have come up with a trick dog bowl that ensures minimal spillage even around the hairiest of hairpins, guaranteed to keep that extra member of your family comfortable even on the longest of car rides.
The Dog Friendly Element is powered by Honda’s reliable 2.4 Liter i-VTEC four cylinder engine and shifted with a five speed automatic transmission that can send power to either the front wheels or with Honda’s Real Time 4WD power all four. The only thing left for Honda to install is a video monitor so that the passengers can check on the family pet while he is riding in his kennel on wheels. If you have any doubts about how safe this setup is you can rest assured that Honda has chosen the Takata Corporation to design the whole thing. Now you might be asking why is that name so familiar, if you have ever seen a racecar driver strapped in with a really cool looking green racing harness, those are Takatas.
Taking a page out of a design that was made over four decades ago, Honda has released the first look at the retro-looking EV-N Concept. If you think you’ve seen that front design before, you probably have; it looks like the N360 micro car.
A small four-seat, electric car, Honda created the EV-N with an attempt to bridge old-school flavour with new-school technology. The car, which is set o be unveiled at the Tokyo Motor Show in a few weeks, comes with a solar panel roof, door-mounted U3-X personal mobility devices, and the all-new car-communication technology, the Honda Electric Mobility Loop (HELLO) -
it’s a technology that allows Honda’s outfitted with it the chance to ‘communicate’ with each other, hence the name HELLO.
That’s as much as we know about the EV-N for now. We’ll keep you posted on anything new that comes up leading up to Tokyo where the car will be introduced along with the CR-Z concept and the Skydeck concept.
While it’s definitely lacking in international appeal, the Tokyo Motor Show still figures to attract a strong local audience all eager to see the latest vehicles from the Japanese auto giants.
One car that’s expected to be unveiled in Tokyo is the concept version of the
production-ready Honda CR-Z hatchback. It’s not a fancy super car or an electric concept, but the CR-Z is just about as good as were going to see in Tokyo.
The car, which has been widely reported to start production by next year, will come with a 1.5-liter four-cylinder engine that has been tinkered with Honda’s Integrated Motor Assist technology as well as a six-speed manual transmission that takes the driving reins away from the car and back to the driver.
With the relatively thin depth of the Tokyo Motor Show this year, you can expect that a lot more people will be paying attention to what Honda - and all the other Japanese car brands, for that matter - has to offer.
And with the announcement that the CR-Z is coming for the show, you can expect a lot of curious eyes loitering around the Honda booth by then.
Honda HSV-010 GT When the Japanese automaker Toyota wanted to show the world what their latest super car, the LF-A could do, they (...)
01.22.2010
Honda Insight Sports Modulo Concept The Japanese automaker Honda is gearing up for the 2010 Tokyo Auto Salon later this week where they will unveil the (...)
01.13.2010
Honda CR-Z The automotive term EV comes with an unnecessary stigma of being slow and boring. However automakers like Fisker (...)
01.11.2010
Honda New Small Concept The Japanese automaker Honda has unveiled their New Small Concept aimed at stirring up interest in the Asian market (...)
01.5.2010
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12.28.2009
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11.30.2009
Mugen CRX at the 2009 SEMA Show Just so that you understand that there is nothing new about Honda performance and racing specialist’s game, this (...)
11.23.2009
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