In March 1986, Honda launched a new luxury brand called Acura, which originally offered two models: the luxurious new Legend sedan and a sporty compact hatchback called Integra. Based on the Civic platform, the Integra wasn’t a luxury car, but it offered an appealing combination of performance, practicality, economy, and fun-to-drive road manners. In fact, on balance, the first-generation Integra might have been the best Honda product of an era many people still regard as “peak Honda.”
Recently, Rich Baron ran a retrospective on forgotten Japanese sporty coupes of the early ’90s, including the Mazda MX-3, the Nissan NX, and the Isuzu Impulse/Geo Storm. A number of commenters asked why that post didn’t include the Acura Integra. The answer is that the Integra is hardly forgotten: It was fairly successful through its first four generations (although the U.S. car was renamed “RSX” in 2001), and it’s still very well-remembered, which led American Honda to revive the Integra nameplate in 2023.
However, we’re concerned here with the first-generation Integra, which arrived in the U.S. in 1986 and was replaced in May 1989.
Some background: Honda originally established the Acura brand because they wanted to move beyond the economy-car image Honda had had since the ’70s while also increasing their American dealer base (with the ambitious goal of surpassing Chrysler Corporation in total U.S. sales). Those new Acura dealers would need a cheaper companion to complement the pricey Legend, which would start at about $20,000 (a relative worth of almost $65,000 in 2025). Rather than antagonize American Honda dealers by slapping Acura badges on existing U.S. models, Honda decided to federalize a Japanese-market model called the Quint Integra.
Launched in Japan in February 1985 to replace the earlier Honda Quint (never sold in the U.S.), the Quint Integra was based on the Civic platform, but it had new styling with sporty concealed headlamps, more equipment, and a 1.6-liter DOHC engine with four valves per cylinder. Initially, Honda offered the Quint Integra in three- and five-door hatchback forms, with the five-door riding a longer wheelbase. A four-door notchback sedan was added in October 1986, but that version never came to the U.S., probably because it looked way too much like the Civic sedan for anyone’s comfort.
Otherwise, the Acura Integra, which debuted on March 27, 1986, was very similar to the JDM car except for its left-hand drive and 5-mph bumpers.
The Acura version was available in three- or five-door form, in two grades: RS and LS. Both grades had the DOHC engine with PGM-FI fuel injection, four-wheel disc brakes, torque-sensitive power steering, 195/60HR14 tires, and the array of minor convenience items American buyers had come to expect from all but the most basic Japanese cars. A four-speed automatic transmission was optional, but more than half of buyers chose the standard five-speed manual.
Although both the RS and LS had the same size wheels and tires, Integra RS models made do with wheel covers, while the LS had alloy wheels. (The ones on the cars in the photos are not all original — some seem to have been borrowed from a second-generation Integra.) The pricier Integra LS also had cruise control, an AM/FM cassette player with graphic equalizer, and better carpeting.
The three-door LS had a pop-up sunroof, while the five-door had power windows and power door locks. Regrettably, air conditioning was a dealer-installed option, part of American Honda’s odd and sometimes vexatious “no factory options” merchandising strategy. (Honda was not nearly so rigid about that in other markets.)
A 1986 Integra RS three-door started at just under $10,000, making it almost exactly half the price of a base Legend, but close to $2,000 more than the Civic Si hatchback — not exactly a bargain. You did get more of almost everything with the Integra, but Kiplinger’s Personal Finance noted that Acura had built in some rather indulgent profit margins.
For some fans, the phrase “’80s Honda” immediately suggests double wishbone suspension, but the first Acura Integra was based on the 1984 Civic and shared its compact “Sportec” suspension, which used modified MacPherson struts in front, with torsion bars instead of coils. The Integra had different spring and damping rates than the Civic, along with a thicker anti-roll bar.
The rear suspension used coil-over shocks with a lightweight beam axle on trailing arms, located with a Panhard rod. Unlike the Volkswagen “twist beam” rear suspension, Honda articulated the beam axle so that it wouldn’t prevent body lean, preferring to use a separate anti-roll bar instead. This was also thicker on the Integra than on the Civic.
Under the hood, the Integra had the 1,590 cc DOHC D16A1 engine. Not previously offered in the U.S., this was essentially a bored-and-stroked version of the SOHC Civic engine, with a different twin-cam head. The engine was an interesting compromise: To provide good midrange torque, it was very undersquare (greater stroke than bore), with mild valve timing and long intake runners, but lots of valve lift, light reciprocating mass, and more valve area let it rev eagerly to a 7,000 rpm redline. Honda had obviously aimed this engine at the 1.6-liter Toyota 4A-GE engine, and they claimed a very slight edge over the Toyota in power: 5 PS (JIS gross) in Japan, a whopping 1 hp in the U.S., where the D16A1 was rated at 113 net hp and 99 lb-ft of torque.
Today, 113 hp rates exactly one yawn, but 71 hp per liter was still outstandingly good for a normally aspirated street engine back then, and only the Integra LS five-door weighed over 2,400 lb. With the typically slick Honda five-speed gearbox — and you REALLY wanted a five-speed with this car — Motor Trend hit 60 mph in 8.9 seconds, while Car and Driver managed 8.8 seconds and a 16.5-second quarter-mile ET, going on to a top speed of 117 mph.
You weren’t going to terrorize many 5.0 Mustangs with performance like that, but those numbers were very respectable for a normally aspirated four-cylinder compact. Better still, the Integra engine was smooth and zingy, and it returned 25 mpg on the adjusted EPA combined scale, on regular unleaded gas.
American testers of the time liked the ride and handling of the Civic and CRX, and they loved the Integra, which had fatter tires, better brakes, precise power steering, and good handling balance. The Integra actually rode smoother than the Civic, and while it didn’t have the body control of a Volkswagen Golf GTI at higher speeds, it wasn’t as brittle as the VW at low speeds. C/D‘s Csaba Csere called the Integra “a mature personality that offers comfort and performance in approximately equal measure.”
CC commenters from outside the U.S. will inevitably point out that the Integra was no match for a contemporary Peugeot 205 or 305 GTi in ride and handling, which was mostly true (although the Pugs’ willingness to get sideways wasn’t always a good thing). However, U.S. buyers didn’t get those models, and the Peugeot models that were sold here didn’t cover themselves in glory in other respects — like assembly quality and reliability, areas where the Integra scored very well.
That said, having owned several Hondas of this vintage, I can testify that the Honda products of this era were not without stain. Here were a few Integra blemishes, in no particular order:
- The usuriously priced dealer-installed air conditioning was not very powerful (my Prelude, with factory air, was better).
- Honda cassette decks were junk, and would inevitably succumb to head corrosion with age.
- The driver’s seats didn’t have enough lumbar support.
- Gearing of the five-speed Integra was too short for relaxed interstate travel, while the taller-geared but jerky four-speed automatic was like giving the engine a big dose of ketamine.
- If you wanted to take full advantage of the chassis, you needed to budget for better tires than the economy-biased Michelin MXV radials Honda seemed wedded to.
- The power sunroof (added to the LS three-door for 1988) cut into headroom and would inevitably leak if you left the car parked too long in the rain on anything other than a mostly level surface.
Also, while Hondas of the ’80s and ’90s were well-built and tended to be mechanically reliable, they were demanding to maintain for daily drivers, requiring valve lash adjustments every 15,000 miles (a troublesome three-handed chore), plus a new timing belt (and preemptive water pump) every 60,000 miles to prevent expensive fraternization between valves and pistons.
On the other hand, looking at these pictures of the Integra also fills me with longing for the good things Honda used to offer in this era: expansive low-cowl visibility; fine ergonomics with un-gimmicky controls that make you wish touchscreens had never been invented; big, legible instruments; and the feeling that almost everything is where it should be and works like it ought to.
This is why I would argue that the first-generation Acura Integra was peak “peak Honda.” It’s all about balance: The Civic was cheaper, but not as refined; the CRX was more tossable, but kind of a pain as a daily driver and not a very pleasant highway car. The Accord was roomier, but not as quick or as agile as the Integra; the Prelude was at least as sporty, but significantly less practical. Also, in most Honda-badged models of this period, you had to go way up the price ladder to be spared from wretched feedback carburetors. (The JDM Integra offered carbureted engines into the ’90s, but American Honda mercifully didn’t federalize those.)
Given the small size of the Acura dealer network, which started out with 60 franchises and hadn’t yet topped 300 dealers by the end of the model run in May 1989, the first-generation Acura Integra sold pretty well: about 163,000 cars in three years, approximately half of Acura’s total business. Normally, sporty cars did best in their first year or so and then faded, but Integra sales actually increased each year.
There were so few changes during the run of the first generation Integra that they’re scarcely worth mentioning: a mid-cycle refresh for 1988 brought new bumpers, a new instrument panel and steering wheel, a few interior design tweaks, and an extra 5 hp and 4 more lb-ft of torque, but that was about it.
If I were to pick one of the Integras pictured in this post, I’d take the 1988 LS five-door (although I’d really prefer blue to white). The five-door Integra was more practical than the three-door — you could put adults in the back seat without making them mad at you — and I’d much rather have the LS five-door’s power windows and locks than the three-door’s unfortunate sunroof.
Were there more exciting cars in that era? Sure, but few were as well-rounded. The Integra was sensible but not stodgy, fun but not frivolous. For some, that made it just about right.
Related Reading
Vintage Car And Driver Review: 1986 Acura Integra LS – Nicely Integrated (by Rich Baron)
Curbside Classic: 1989 Acura Integra LS – A Hot Hatch For The Civic Minded (by J P Cavanaugh)
Curbside Classic: 1988 Honda Quint Integra GSi (DA1) Notchback Saloon – Squinty McQuintface (by Tatra87)
Still a stunning-looking car.
They bombed over here, of course.
Did they ever get the suspension ‘fix’ that Rover applied to the 200/Ballade? Problem was, one rear trailing arm was fixed & the other pivoted, so different spring rates were needed across the axle! It reduced the awful ‘corkscrewing’ on bumpy roads.
It was still a few years before Rover taught Honda about suspension travel, spring/damping rates & not using bicycle tyres…or before Rover actually admitted they needed The Honda Way of building the damned things.
It wasn’t that Honda needed to be “taught” about suspension travel: They had significant philosophical differences with Rover over suspension tuning philosophy. European chassis engineers like lots of suspension travel to absorb bumps, which means firmer damping to retain body control and prevent float at speed, which means a more pronounced reaction to low-speed bumps. Honda wasn’t happy with those tradeoffs; they felt it sacrificed too much ride comfort on slower American and Japanese roads, and they had become very keen on lowering cowl height for aerodynamics and visibility, which made them increasingly concerned with camber control. So, their suspensions were better-suited to the U.S. or Japan than Europe or the UK — horses for courses.
Candidly, it was also a lose-lose situation: Even if Honda had gone all-out for the long-travel/firm-damping/don’t-mind-the-camber approach, the best response they were likely to get from the British and German press would have amounted to, “Hmm, it seems those [pick your racial or nationalist slur] are trying to imitate their betters, pity they still lack Pedigree and a desirable [German] badge.”
That last comment, Aaron, is not quite right. For sure, silly nationalism infected all motoring writing, but it was remarkably true back in the day that if you had the opportunity to jump directly from a fancied new Japanese car into an equivalent (or near-enough) European, the difference in feel was profound. The steering feel, the damping – perhaps especially that – the ride, often the seat qualities, the just-so assistance to the brakes, attention to wind noise, and, in this country, the contrast to the Japanese lack of attention to road noise transmission, could not be unfelt. Paradoxically, as nick graves alludes to, this was often whilst sitting in a demonstrably lesser quality-feeling car, unless perhaps Merc or BMW.
Perhaps it’s a chicken v egg thing, but I always took the apparent badge snobbery to be no more than a reflection upon what buyers would seek (and the Japanese trying to emulate) that was the genesis of those comments.
WE have a massive range of ex JDM cars in New Zealand, the all have the same problem, they are built for the really good roads Japan have, suspension and tyre packages suit those conditions and are tuned for comfort and fuel economy, not roadholding.
Controlling suspension travel for good roadholding is the trick, the aftermarket is drowning in ideas on improving what the factory did, you choose its your car,
A former workmate has a classic Mitsubishi wagon twin turbo V6 manual its stock and mint, rare now most of them met the scenery at speed because as a factory hotrod it is fast ridiculously fast but you cant drive it fast on anything except smooth roads I had a demonstration it just skips and bounces sideways, on smooth rds its awesome, AWD it sticks like the proverbial to a blanket, but he isnt interested in modifying it.
The Integra was one of the cars I cross-shopped before buying a new 1989 Mercury Tracer. The Acura was more powerful, quieter, and more fun to drive, but the bargains that could be had on that little-known Mercury (basically a top-line Mazda 323) were too good to pass up. Had I bought the Integra, I probably would have gone with the LS three-door. I sat in the back seat; although it had noticeably less legroom than the five-door (which itself wasn’t all that roomy), it somehow managed to be comfortable nonetheless, with headrests, big wraparound armrests with storage, and good thigh support built into the cushion. I too have long been infuriated with Honda’s no-options policy, which is a big part of the reason I’ve never owned a Honda product – they never seem to have the equipment mix I want.
I remember how Honda justified the need for a separate Acura brand to escape the “economy car” image, and also remember that Honda had outgrown that image years before. Car and Driver agreed with me.
Nothing screams “1980s” like a graphic equalizer. These were first used in high-end home stereos to neutralize the acoustical quirks of the room they were in by emphasizing or de-emphasizing certain frequencies. Theoretically they shouldn’t be necessary in a car since the audio system manufacturer knows beforehand the shape and the acoustical qualities of the car they’ll be in. I attribute the graphic EQ’s former popularity in cars to their high-tech appearance.
The other reason for the Acura brand, which was really more about the Legend than the Integra, was that it let American Honda have their cake and eat it too. They could certainly have sold the Legend as a senior Honda in the States, but they were worried that doing that would hurt Accord sales. The fear was that dealers would try to put buyers into the more expensive Legend (as kind of a Honda Taurus) rather than selling the Accord — American Honda very much did not want that, since they had just gone to all the expense of building the Marysville plant to build Accords in the U.S. Making the Legend a different brand let it be a flagship without demoting the Accord to second-tier status.
The Tracer was an interesting car: As I recall, it was not well-promoted, and I think people were not sure how it was suppose to relate to the Mercury Lynx or Topaz, but owners were really keen on it and thought it was Mercury’s best-kept secret.
It’s been a long time since I sat in the back of a first-generation Integra, but my Prelude was not dissimilar: If you could wedge yourself back there, were under about 5’10”, and weren’t prone to claustrophobia, it wasn’t really uncomfortable, just small. It was way better than the back seat of the A70 Supra, where occupants taller than about 5’4″ would be banging their heads against the rear glass on every bump.
I totally agree about graphic equalizers: They were very trendy for the same reason JDM cars got really into digital instruments with videogame-like displays. I think the Integra one had some kind of spectrograph light function, so the display could flash along with the music.
Here’s what I mean about the Supra. Ouch!
The Tracer replaced the Lynx.
Introduced to the U.S. market in March of 1987, the Tracer was sold alongside the Lynx for the 1987 model year. There was a bit of overlap before the Tracer replaced the Lynx.
Yes, and beyond that, because the Tracer was about the same size and category, I think people who didn’t read car magazines or consumer auto guides didn’t immediately grasp that the Tracer wasn’t just a restyled, renamed version of the Lynx, which was not a particular inspiring car. Lincoln-Mercury didn’t hide the fact that it was 323-based, but they obviously weren’t eager to shout, “No, no, it’s not a warmed-over Escort, it’s a Mazda 323 and it’s actually pretty good!”
Ford NZ had a one make race series to promote their version of the 323, they sold well on the back of that, Laser 1.5 S was the model, Mazda did not build an exact equivalent here or in Japan, it was restyled every year or so and gained a Mercury badge in the US, Ford OZ built their Capri for export as that brand, it was a restyled 323 Cabriolet.
Actual ford Escorts from the UK are not the same car, they arent actually as good in the reliability stakes.
I cross-shopped the Integra against the 3rd-gen Accord DX. I chose the latter because while the Integra had sharper roadholding and that revvy twincam, the 2.0L Accord had more punch, a smoother ride (bumpy CA freeways), and was a bit cheaper; both were good choices. No regrets about the Accord, it served me well.
BTW I got an aftermarket stereo.
I too was in the market in 1986, and by far did my most extensive search for a car, not only trying similar cars in a particular class but also trying other classes. For instance, I test drove both the Bertone X1/9 and Toyota MR2 (big surprise…these were too small since I only own one car at a time), even a Ford Taurus MT5 wagon of all things. I narrowed my choices to the Honda Accord Hatchback and the Volkswagen GTi. Ended up with the GTi…main reason was due to Honda’s option packages which are common with all manufacturers now but weren’t in 1986. As mentioned, you had to get to the LXi model Honda to get fuel injection, but then you also got power windows and locks (which I didn’t want). For some reason I can’t recall, I never thought about the Integra…besides being a bit smaller, Civic vs Accord size, they probably would have been a closer match to what I was looking for than the Accord. I knew about them, but didn’t even test drive one, which makes the search seem somehow incomplete in retrospect (I didn’t back then….seemed I was frequently at some car dealership that year).
My co-worker bought a new Accord (sedan) a couple years later before he got the job working with me in our southern location, he was finishing grad school in New York and opted out of the air conditioning which he soon regretted after moving here, so he had the aftermarket A/C installed. It added a A/C button to his climate controls, and subtracted $1000 from his wallet which was a lot in 1986 dollars….we used to obsess over that button and called it his $1000 button ….guess we were mean to rub it in. I was in the same boat 5 years prior with my Scirocco, which I drove without A/C till I got the GTi which of course had to have A/C but otherwise had few options (a crank open sunroof was one of them).
Sold the GTi when I bought my current Golf, 25 years ago. It seems that there are hardly any current cars I’m interested in which I guess is part of the reason I’ve kept the Golf so long….back then the car search took awhile, now I’d have trouble even finding candidates, most seem to involve some compromise from what I’d like. Lots has changed since 1986.
“..these pictures of the Integra also fills me with longing for the good things Honda used to offer in this era: expansive low-cowl visibility; fine ergonomics with un-gimmicky controls that make you wish touchscreens had never been invented; big, legible instruments; and the feeling that almost everything is where it should be and works like it ought to”.
Perfectly phrased. I’d add to that only that they got styling so very right across the same period. (Well, Legend excepted. Was never much of a looker, apart from those original and quite-cool wheel-arch bulges).
We’ve never had Acura badges here, probably because Hondas were always full imports, sending up the prices and thus always sold as a semi-premium-ish choice anyway. The five door Integra was only sold by BL dealers (or whoever they were then) as a Rover 416i, the idea presumably being that if one turned up to buy a Rangie or 3500, one might snaffle a 416 for one’s spouse or maid (or something).
So our only Integra was the hot-engined 2-door. I borrowed a well-worn auto years ago, and it was still a ripper of a thing. The journos who picked upon these cars new for having insufficient wheel travel were dead right, though. The ride wasn’t kind to my bum, and if a corner had the bumpies, the car just did not stay in place. Still a beautiful-looking, very lovely car, however.
Thank you, Aaron, for another excellent write-up. I think your summary at the end is spot-on: the Integra was a great all-rounder.
I had an 1986 RS 5-door, and described my experiences with a long comment on the “Hot Hatch For The Civic Minded” Related Reading article. Summary: I loved the car, but I didn’t really fit in it. I moved up a size, to a Saab 9000. Same configuration, less fun, but a lot more comfortable.
I had a 1988 LS 5-door, albeit the automatic. It was a beater, but in far better condition than the car that was supposed to be my first car. Originally my father’s, it was the car I used for my driver’s road test and would borrow whenever I could. Once he upgraded, it was my set of wheels and would remain my favorite until my current car, over twenty years later.
My ex has a 86 Civic automatic it goes wrong now and then but never anything serious its a bloody good car.
I like the ergonomics of the switches. Let’s put them all in a row, throw in a couple of fake switches. Still better than putting them on a unresponsive touch screen (or worse some joy stick controller) and bury them in a menu. Maybe voice control is a better solution or god forbid AI.
Honda dealers got their slice of the pie when the Accord Coupe was introduced for the 1988 model year, it was very much in demand and rejuvenated the Accord line overall a bit, seemed to be cross shopped against the Integra specifically and in some ways sort of a budget Legend Coupe…Not that Honda dealers were short of customers in that time frame by any stretch of the imagination.
I too adore this generation of Integra, such a simple formula, built with precision and styled to (in my eyes) perfection with really no aesthetic advantage or disadvantage between the two formats (3/5door). Add the “premium” badge and it was a recipe for success that continued for two more generations and then sort of thudded out when Acura decided to just bin the stellar nameplates for alphabet soup. Yes the Integra name is “back” again now, however I have yet to see one on the road, or at least notice it, and I couldn’t tell you if there is more than one model or exactly how many doors it has.
Sometime in the mid-nineties a colleague offered me her 3 door 1st gen Integra in exchange for my pickup, for a weekend move. I recall being excited about this, as our fleet at the time was the Ranger and a Vanagon. Sorry, but I was disappointed. Neither of our cars had A/C, but they also didn’t have a giant sloped rear window subjecting our kid in the backseat to the greenhouse effect. Yes, this must have been one of those Integra’s without the dealer added A/C. And the rev-happy but pretty weak down low engine didn’t really lend itself to family driving. Decades later I almost bought a used RSX before ending up with our Golf. It felt very nice but ultimately I decided I liked the refinement of the VW and the 1.8T powerband, over the more explicit sportiness of the Acura.
I was coming off of back-to-back Accord sedans (1980, 1984) and jumped at the ’86 Integra at launch. Judging by the VIN it was one of the first 1500 cars sent to the U.S.
Down on power compared to today, of course, but handling was spot-on with the five speed. A minor annoyance: The sunroof was non-sliding and the glass had to be lifted out and stored under the hatch or left at home.
A major annoyance was the cost of (admittedly rare) parts replacement. After losing the car in a divorce my ex complained bitterly about the $350 she had to spend on a new wiper motor. That’s in 1991 bucks.
The current Integra Type S is an incredible car.
300+HP Type R turbo 2.0L engine, 6 speed manual trans. Front wheel drive only.
Tight suspension, huge brakes, not too heavy.
However, the price is shocking…
2025 Integra Type S
https://hypebeast.com/2023/11/acura-integra-type-s-test-drive-review
“Most satisfying”? I vote “Prelude”.
See, I had a Prelude Si 4WS, and I liked it a lot, minus most of the same standard Honda complaints (buzzy gearing, useless cassette player, vexing sunroof). I still love the styling, and the bigger engine had more torque under 3,500 rpm. But, it was really not very practical except for a single person, it was thirstier than the Integra, and it was enough heavier that it didn’t feel as light on its feet. So, as an all-around car, I feel like the Integra wins on points.
When I bought my 86 626 I wasn’t really aware of Acura. I did cross shop at Honda to look at their Accord. The Honda dealers attitudes just rubbed me the wrong way. So I ended up with the 626 partly because the dealer was so amiable and because the car was good. It cost just under $10K like the Integra. Had I know about the Integra then who knows. Yet no AC and an engine that needs some pampering would give me pause. However, I still love the look of the car to this day.
My sister had an Integra five speed manual. She loved the car but the pond scum Acura dealer upsold her like crazy every time she went in for service. In less than 20,000 km for example, the dealer was doing complete fluid changes. They wanted to adjust the valves on every oil change. This led her to trade the Integra for a loaded Chevrolet Astro.
When she bought the Astro, she told the salesman she didn’t want a car with high services costs. She was assured that the Astro would be basically maintenance free. She then failed to change the engine oil even once. At 50,000 km, the engine expired. It cost a fortune to fix and after that, she did regular oil changes.
I did my part to contribute to the Integra’s iconic status as the ultimate Honda of the 1980s by “selling” several Acuras and Hondas to work colleagues. As the self-annointed car guy in my office, I was frequently consulted for recommendations by my coworkers when our corporate headquarters moved from NYC to Texas in 1988. Many of the New Yorkers involved in the move had either never owned a car (one person never even had had a drivers license) or had not owned one for several decades while residing in the city. Most just wanted some affirmation that the car they wanted was indeed a good pick within the context of the U.S. automobile market of the time.
In all, I “sold” two Integras, three Accords, and a Civic, despite having never owned a Honda product at that point in my life. Three other colleagues already owned four 1984-86 Civics between them, and all loudly endorsed Honda/Acura products as well. Fortunately, all of these cars turned out to be good ones and provided many years of reliable service, so I never had to deal with the consequences of an unhappy “customer”.
Back in the day I looked at the Integra and was favorably impressed, but I bought a CRX. Slightly lower-priced and, IMHO, more sporty. Honda and Acura buyers cross-shopped vehicles in their lineups and there was a lot of cannibalization among the different models. Still, it seemed to work out in the end and almost everything they built back then could be considered a sales success.
Acura as a brand really went well, as a marketing exercise it worked twice brilliantly and cost almost nothing to develop, how they did it is noted by Aaron very well, Honda built the Integra out of the best stuff the parts bin had to offer or just rebaged and retrimmed something already in production and they could jack the price up because they are good,
Local boy racers know their way around their chosen brand parts bins,
They do handle well, that is true, but you do know about the sideways PSA platforms I see that but motoring scribes that got scared by them clearly dont know why they had rear steering designed in or how to exploit that feature, I chatted with some Honda people one night I went for a coffee one night the trip is 117 kilometres point to point over three ranges and a couple of interesting gullies, you will end up in a queue behind a truck eventually its two lane blacktop all the way with 3 lanes on the climbs in a turbo diesel PSA car it is fun because you can drive it flat out the same chassis had turbo 2.0 petrol engines that could go fast enough to test the limits the diesel simply cant, one night after overtaking a truck a couple of cars followed they dropped back then caught up a few times but never tried to overtake it was a fun trip fast no use of brakes. when I got back to my car caffeine in hand there were 3 young guys looking at my car and pointing and I got the WTF is that and is it RWD because it hangs the tail on corners at speed, Ah no, its torque activated passive rear steering and FWD, they understood and the trip back was even more fun, one car scouting and two having a go at a twisty section.
PSA tuned those rear axle mounts and Citroen retuned the front suspension from the Peugeot originals and if your cruising in town a Uturn isnt something you slow for, right angle turns at 50 mph yeah just steer as long as the engine is pulling the car will do the forklift thing,
Honda turned out a really good car, dont get me wrong they are smart people they tried active rear steer it was expensive to do and they gave up.
Any opinions on the new Integra? It seems to be hewing pretty close the original formula of Civic+ and, amazingly, is still a 5-door hatch with available manual transmission.
I test drove one when my then-GF was looking to replace a 78 Cutlas aeroback sedan. I had an 85 GTI at the time, and was not really on board with Honda yet. I remember that the engine seemed weak on low rpm torque, and the automatic made it worse. I remember my conclusion: it’s nice, but it seems to cost a lot for what you get.
I also remember Honda service (from a co-workers car), which always seemed expensive. You either wrote a fairly big check or a really big check, depending on whether it was time for the “a” service or the “b” service.
On the flip side, a neighbor owned one for years and he loved it the whole time.
My wife bought a gently used Integra to replace her ’89 Corolla that was totaled back in the early 90s (long before I showed up). She drove it cross country a few times, and I think it’s probably her favorite among the cars she’s owned. I know I would have enjoyed it had I been around at the time.