I remember seeing this as a wee lad. T'was then I thought that a small car was what I wanted!

 

what is that? dastsun, honda?

 

I believe that is the first Honda ever sold in the US. 3 cylinder if not mistaken

 

It's a Honda 600. It used a motorcycle engine with a chain drive to the wheels.

 

Is that the stock suspension?!

Now I see where the current Nissan Z got those door handles from!

 

Actually, I think it was a 2 Cyl. 600ccs! The gear shift is oddly placed right on the firewall. Funky but probably fun. Never drove one.

But Rossi is right: This was the first Honda sold in the USA. Wow. And to think, it was basically a Mini copy . . . Ha! Where's Honda now?!

 

I remember seeing those on the road and just giggling at them...so cute and tiny! My mom got the next generation Civic, still very small, which had a very funky shiftable automatic tranny! She LOVED that little thing! And...it was almost Electric Blue in color!


Clover

 

Another picture of another Classic Mini when I was in the UK. It was 20 years ago that I went.



Anybody know what this is? There were lots of them in England when I went. That's a phone booth in the background. The microvan was tiny. To get a feel for its small size, notice how much shorter it is than the pedestrians walking by (despite the curb).

 

Okay folks. Let an old man wade in to clarify. That is a Honda 600 Z coupe. 2 cylinder, air cooled, front wheel drive 4 speed and a blast to drive. On flat ground it could achieve 70 mph. It was not powered by a motorcycle engine. This was a real car.

It was replaced by the Civic.

 

Well... let a young one correct it... It was replaced by the CVCC (later called the Civic)

 

Thanks, minimort! That is the model that Mother had back in the early 70s, the CVCC!!


Clover

 

Actually the CVCC was a name for a non catalyst anti-smog engine that was put in the cars after the first year or two of Civic production. I owned both of these cars ... new.

 

You're right, my bad. The Civic came out in '73, with the CVCC variant in '75. Both before my time. Sorry!

 

"Controlled Votex Combustion Chamber," right??

 

Well, all I know is that my mom had both of them! She loved her little Hondas. She drives a BMW Z4 now! LOLOLOL!


Clover

 

Referring back to the original photo in this thread, the actual orange was really orange (it had more red in it than the photo).

This was one of the first cars we saw with a common sump for the engine and the transmission. All the attributes that we think of today when you think of Honda were already evident in this car. We marvelled at the thinking and precision in a sewing machine sized package.

 

It's the pits getting old. I remeber these like it was yesterday. In fact I had a good friend that had one. BTW, he was a good 6'2" or 6'3". The car was very nimble as you might expect. It wasn't a rocket, but it was fun. Honda has come a long way in 30 years.

 

Compound Vortex Controlled Combustion.
It was stratified charge engine where the spark ignited a pocket of richer fuel mixture, from which the flame front then could spread to the harder to light but cleaner burning lean mixture.

But an even more fun older Honda was the S800 sports car produced between 1965-70. Imagine: 4 cylinders and 800cc developing 70 hp at 8000 rpm back 40 years ago. Honda only made a few more than 11K of them. You can Google for pix and descriptions.

To put the S800 in historical persepctive, that was the era when Honda swept the motorcycle Grand Prix championships with its high-revving multi-cylinder bikes.

Neil
05 MCS

 

Cool post, Neil! Thanks!

Actually, the 1st car I ever bought was in 1986. It was a '79 Honda Civic with 'four on the floor!' That car got me through most of college, and it was a hoot to drive. It was basically the same size as the current MINI, too. So, I guess I've gone full circle. Here's a link with more CVCC info . . .http://www.autocluster.com/id53.htm

 

My older sister had one of these when I was a little kid. I can remember her cominig into the house and crying to my parents that my older brother and his friends had picked the car up and put it between these two trees next to our driveway so that she couldn't get it out. This happened regularly! The car must have been so light!

BTW.. you can drive this car in the newest Grand Turismo game on Playstation 2.

 

LOL! I have to say, that's funny! I can almost picture Jan Brady screaming, "Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!"