There was a time when Honda made a supercar. Called the NSX, it was the ultimate exercise in simplicity
of purpose and delicacy of engineering. It was light of weight but high on power; a 290bhp
katana that sliced through the roads powered by a big V6 and this new thing called VTEC.
It was developed by a real F1 driver – arguably the greatest F1 driver
of all time – but more importantly, it proved you could make a supercar that worked.
You turned the key and it stayed running. You could go in traffic and it wouldn't overheat.
It didn’t leak oil. Jeez, you could even see out of the thing.
And now, 25 years later there's finally, finally, a new one and God what a gorgeous car it is.
Mechanophilia? Google it, with something like this phwoar you can understand.
Now because this car has been in gestation for so long, and because it’s been out in the
US for a while now, you're probably already familiar with the specs. A 3.5-litre twin-turbo charged V6 coupled with no
fewer than three electric motors which is good for a total of 565bhp, effectively there's four-wheel drive
because the rear wheels are driven by the engine, while the front get an electric motor each.
And all the power goes through a nine-speed - NINE speed - dual-clutch gearbox.
Now, to say this thing is fast is to state the outrageously obvious. Due to the fact that
the electric motors offer instant power and also plug the torque gaps while the gearbox
swaps cogs, it can spring from 0-62mph 2.9 seconds. 0-100
happens in just over six seconds, and it'll go all the way on to around 191mph.
Give or take, that’s pretty much on par with the LaFerrari, the P1, and the 918. And I have to say it’s been a long
time since I’ve driven a car that’s titillated and terrified me in such equal measure. I think the
last one, was the Radical SR8 VX, and this thing really is on that level of
insane. It’s the first car in years that’s made me sit back and genuinely think, in the common
parlance, F***…
Now, while the original NSX was primarily aluminium, this car is instead built around an
aluminium spaceframe with a carbon floor. The side panels are plastic. The bonnet is aluminium. Roof? Carbon
etc. etc. so this is a very light car. Of course, the hybrid powertrain adds a lot of
weight back in, but due to the fact that the electric motors offer it genuine, honest-to-god torque
vectoring, it feels so light on its feet that it’s just insane.
The electirc motors can also actively juggle and adjust power and torque between the front wheels thousands
of times a second under hard cornering, and so you can take corners flat out that
would just wipe you out in pretty much any other car. In theory, Honda says you should be able to keep the car perfectly level
under any and all conditions, and in practice, well, yeah… That…
It's a slightly different story in the wet, or with cold tyres. Because with the sheer amount of instant torque available
the car gets slippier than even the most elusive bar of prison shower soap... But in the dry, or with warm tyres,
it just grips, and grips, and grips and then some.
It's just... it's insane.
Now, you've also a choice of 4 different driving modes: Quiet is your most absoute basic mode which is
handy whenever you're on cold starts and don't want to vibrate the neighbours windows. Above that,
you've got Sport, then Sport Plus and finally Track…
Now I could go into the finer details of how these adjust things like turbo boost pressure, throttle response, steering etc.
But really all you need to know is its a lot like waking up in the morning, then having your cup of coffee, then downing an entire
magnum tin of Monster Energy… and then eating a whole box of Pro Plus pills. YEAHHHHH.
One thing to note about this car however is that everything’s by wire. Drive by wire, throttle
by wire, and brake by wire. So that can take a little bit of getting used to and you will need to use more
brake pressure than you think to properly slow it down, but it’s nothing you can’t
get used to after a couple of miles.
The steering’s direct and super accurate as well, while the giant carbon ceramic brakes bite hard
and resist to any attempts I can make at getting them to fade, while the whole car feels
like it’s set up with sort of black magic that means the speed at which it can accelerate,
decelerate and change direction is just surreal. In a word...awesome.
In short then, this is a very, very special car. So does the interior have the same sense of drama
to match the way it drives? Well, no, but then is that such a bad thing? After all, there’s no
silly gull-wing doors to get caught in or anything like that, and visibility all round is good.
In fact, the A pillars on this car are actually thinner than those on the original.
The centre console here – which I reckon is a dead ringer for the original NSX – is also fuss
free and easy to use. I can understand that buyers might want their car to look a little bit more special but now you have to
remember that, but remember most of your money goes towards the powertrain.
There are a couple of things that I really don’t like all that much about it, though. For a start, these shift
paddles are abhorrently plasticky. The SatNav is kind of crayola compared to the rest of the car.
And the key – no gorgeous machined Monel key like
the original here – aside from the NSX lettering on it, it could be for a Jazz or for anything.
Not gonna set anybody’s knickers alight fishing this out of the bowl at your local
key party put it that way.
And then finally, I'm sorry, but the sound. What’s the best sounding V6 car currently on sale?
Jaguar F-TYPE? That thing screams and howls and is baleful, whereas this one just kind of honks along...
Of course you can forgive it for all that as long as it drives well... and it does.
Well what about in terms of boot space, well don't let anybody tell you that supercars can't be practical.
I mean, just look at the amount of room in this boot here. Compared to something like an Audi R8 which is
just all engine and no space. This is really, really usable indeed. There's a little bit of a transmission tunnel
because the 9-speed gearbox stretches all the way back to the back bumper. But it's more than enough for a few
weekend bags, for your shopping, or for...yeah.
And the price is alright, too. The NSX starts from around £135,000– slightly less
than a Porsche 911 Turbo S and about on par with the Audi R8 V10 Plus.
Of course, that still is a lot of money to anybody, but compared to the £1 million-plus hybrid
hypercars, it’s something of a bargain. And of course this is also how automotive technology gets
democratised, by starting off expensive in halo cars and then slowly trickling down. For example,
remember when carbon fibre was exclusively used in F1 cars? Or how about the revolutionary
all-aluminium construction of the original NSX, which now crops up in all kinds
of everyday road cars? Maybe even yours…
And yes, while your LaFerraris, and your P1s and your 918s and all that sort of thing beat this car to the hybrid halo car punch, this
Honda manages to pack hypercar-rivalling performance for a fraction of the horsepower and a
fraction of the price. So in 25 years time will the second
generation Honda NSX be remembered as fondly as the original?
Well, I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t.