No, this picture wasn’t taken in 1988; it was taken last week. Funnily enough, I didn’t really notice in what superb shapes both of these were in until I just opened up the picture on my large monitor. Just another couple of quarter-century old Civics enjoying the benefits of Eugene’s restorative rains.
I am reminded of my daughter’s 1979 Civic hatchback that she had for four or five years. The red paint, mags, and tinted windows sold it to her, but she got lots of good use out of it. I just wished it’d been a 5-speed instead of a 4-speed; I’d probably have bought it from her when she was done with it.
If they have anything to do with that Toyota pickup, I bet the bottom half of it is just as clean as the top half looks!
I’m no Honda fan, but I always liked the clean and functional look of that generation Civic hatchback, lots of glass and and a nice low cowl, I have not seen one on the road in years, I would like to find one as a little around town driver.
Carmine, I agree with your design comments. In this era Honda was quite restrained, something we could use a little more these days from them. I no longer see these older 80’s Hondas here in New Jersey and often wondered what killed them…….body rot or engine/transmissions. What was the Achillies Heal of 70’s/80’s Japanese cars whereas there are plenty of surviving American and German cars still on the road from this era?
Cheapness, not of the car itself, but the fact that it was a small economy car, a disposable razor of a car like many economy cars, they were bought for little, run for a while, then they moved down the rung. etc..etc. These were better a rust prevention that earlier Civics, but they still did rot a bit. It depends on the owners, its easy to find, lets say, a clean big full size car from this era, like an Olds 98 lets say, usually because those were bought by older folks who may have garaged the car and driven it less than a daily driver compact.
I had an ’86 Accord automatic which died at 13 years of age (and 150k miles) due to a faulty auto trans. But really, it’d have been fixed if its body weren’t so rotten. I think, personally, that it was body rot which killed most of these cars in this part of the country (midwest), along with a failure to recognize them for what they were. I hear that in fairer climates, the crazy complicated carburetors are what did them in. That seems fair; we certainly never enjoyed our Accord’s propensity to fast idle at 2500 rpm and rarely settle down beneath 1250 rpm-it was easily the worst aspect of the car.
I had a 2001 Honda Accord that died of a broken transmission in 2011 with 130,000 miles. Does Honda alway have problems with transmissions?
Not always; I guess larger Hondas during the late ’90s and early ’00s were particularly vulnerable. I have to wonder how much of my family’s Accord’s transmission and master cylinder failures were related to having to hold the car still at 2500-2750 RPM when the engine was cold. Honda stuck with carburetors for way, way too long.
I’m in NJ also and while the Civics of this era are just about completely gone, I do still see late 80s Accords once in a while. There are also a pretty fair number of 90-93 Accords on the road here, rusty, but still mechanically sound.
That generation of Civic is one of the best vehicles that Honda has ever built IMO. I have owned three of them, and my father-in-law still uses one as his daily driver (and it is north of 300k miles I think).
The level of visibility out of them is unparalleled by today’s vehicles, largely due to automakers having adopted the European pedestrian impact safety standards. [soapbox on/] Does it make sense to hamper the driver’s visibility in order to protect people that they may hit? A few years ago, a local man slowly pulling into his own driveway tragically ran over and killed his neighbor’s kid who was on a tricycle – the last in a string of kids on trikes/bikes. He was in a SUV and thought that all the kids had passed by on the sidewalk so he proceeded forward. Had he been driving that Civic, the accident would have never happened.
There are still amazing numbers of these old Civics on the Wet Coast, saved from the scourge or road salt. These were darned good cars that can give many years of good service.
But then again, new Hondas are darned good cars that can give many years of service and are cheaper now to boot.
Many new car suffer from poor visibility. My 2008 Fit was excellent in that regard. I recently looked at the new Accord it is also sports good visibility.
Agree with you 100% on current Hondas. They caught hell for the 2008 redesign of the Accord for having grown too large, but as far as reliability goes, my ’08 Accord has gone 80,000 miles and the only unscheduled service it’s needed was replacing the rear brakes at 45,000.
I had a sedan in the same shade of blue as the 3-door shown here. It was an ’84 that I bought new and kept for 14 years and 144,000 trouble-free miles before giving it to a friend in desperate need. She kept it going at least another three years…and I believe it was sold, not junked.
I’m sure the timetable is different in the East, but here in Arizona, these seemed to have a 20-year timer on them…and at that point, something would break that would be worth more than the $585 book value and that was that…off to the crusher.
THAT is a gorgeous picture. I was a year old when the 3rd gen Civic was introduced to the US market and four years old when it was phased out, but my currently 29 year old eyes can see just how sleek and modern it was relative to a lot of the competition. It’s a truly beautiful machine with 30 years hindsight. The 1988 model was merely following in its footsteps in terms of design and in terms of tech, the 1992 and 1996 models did the same.
Nice to see these, even up here in Seattle, thanks to no road salt and being away from the coast, so 20+ YO Hondas still exist easily. The only things that kill them off now are accidents that total them out, or a major mechanical failure at high mileage.
I had a second gen Civic that I bought in 1992 when it was 9 YO, bought new in Texas somewhere, I forget where by the original owner. It was very much rust free when I bought it, and it still was rust free but sadly got rear ended, which is why I sold it off at just shy of 183K miles in 1998, after putting some 70K on it in that time frame.
I had the fuel injected variant of the 88 Accord sedan, the LX-I trim with all the power goodies, including the moonroof, my first car with both a moonroof, and fuel injection. Had the 5spd manual and while a very nice car that looked sporting, but had lost some of its edge by then due to weight increase, and size increase so didn’t feel as quick off the line, nor as agile either, but a good car none the less.
Nice fine there Paul.
I’ll take that Civic tall wagon in the background. Have had a great experience with a 1991 (265,000+ miles) but body hardware is getting past the point of no return.
Great photo. These used to be a common sight everywhere, even owned by the same family (as these two may still be.)
My sister still has the 1985 Civic 1.5 ‘S’ 3-door hatch that she bought sometime in the early-mid 90s. It replaced her previous 1982 Civic 5-door wagon that was wrecked in a crash. Her ’85 is like the blue one above, except being New Zealand-spec it has different alloy wheels and the flush headlights. Being an ‘S’ it also had factory sunroof and side stripes. She loved it – it was zippy (190km/h top speed which was excellent for the time), economical, highly reliable, and very roomy for what it was. It’s now on its 3rd or 4th time around the (metric) odometer, still runs sweetly but hasn’t been remotely roadworthy for at least 6 years due to extensive and impressive rust. Although my brother-in-law is a panel beater by trade, the rust reached a point where it was too much hassle sorting it every 6 months to pass our 6-monthly warrant-of-fitness (WOF) inspection – without which cars aren’t allowed on the road. It proved easier to buy my sister a newer car (a Toyota Curren). But despite the Curren or their Holden Commodore SS (aka Pontiac G8) she still remembers her Civic with great fondness (and it’s in a paddock by their house, so they can’t exactly forget it!). I still think they’re nice looking, with those glorious low waistlines. Will the real Honda ever come back do you think? Because the Honda of today bears little resemblance to the Honda that built those great 80s (and 90s) Civics and Accords…
Nice finds! Maybe we’ll see a CC on the wagon one of these days (hint, hint).
I did the prior generation: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-asian/curbside-classic-1987-honda-civic-4wd-wagon-shuttle-the-automotive-swiss-army-knife/
Ah, forgot that one. Will have to re-read 🙂
The blue hatchback actually looks pretty sharp with those wheels.
I agree. I don’t remember seeing those wheels before either — are they original? As earlier commenters stated, these were neat looking little cars — the replaceable headlights look pretty good too.
These are my second-favorite Hondas with my first being the ’88-’91 generation. I prefer the ’88-’91’s fuel injection & have enjoyed a rough ’88 CRX for several years now. Never liked any other Civics outside of these two generations.
That’s funny, because I was just warming up to mention how much I like that car, except for the ugly wheels…
They’re definitley not original to that car, but they’re OEM takeoffs from something else. I know I recognise them, but I can’t place them.
I thought they were from an 84-87 Prelude.