Throwback Thursday time!

"Gidges" (gijs571) 02/28/2019 at 15:05 • Filed to: None

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Have you ever had a car you were supposed to be using as a cheap and sensible driver, yet you fell in love with it... and fell hard? That’s the case with my ex ‘99 Accord. God, I miss that car.

It was a car with many flaws, some pretty big ones, but when I turned the key those were all soon forgotten. The exhaust was big and stuck out a lot from the rear bumper, but it made such a nice deep growl. It had been rear ended, but those were everyday battle scars. The radio wasn’t working because it had a wiring issue in the antenna, but you didn’t need the radio when you could hear that beautiful VTEC symphony. It was a 1.8 SOHC, often dubbed as “fake VTEC”, but it was there, more then enough to put a smile on my face.

This wasn’t your usual boring, old, mid class saloon. This was a car with soul. This sounds very cliche, I know, but it’s true. She was quite literally a red hot piece of passion. There wasn’t any faded pink to be found, the beautiful red colour shined on the darkest of days without exception. I was never able to walk away without taking another look back and smiling proudly to what was my car. A proper car like only Honda was able to make them back in the 90s.

At some point I decided it was time for some new shoes, her old ones were worn and too small in my eyes (15"). I’ve decided on picking 16" JR3's, and she turned into a showstopper. The energy radiating from the car now went through the roof. She was shining brighter then any star on a clear night sky.

And than the summer came... It was hot and very dry, and me and some friends decided our destination of this year would be the Czech Republic. There was only car up for this job, and that was the Accord. Well over 2000 kilometers in one week and the car felt like it could take many more. Nearly reached 170 km/h on the German Autobahn and she was still able to go faster. The bumpy Czech roads, busy city centers and the scorching hot weather weren’t able to stop the mighty Accord. Hell, she even posed for some pics of some fellow red locals (and another Dutch tourist, never met them).

But unfortunately all good things come to an end, and so did the ownership of my lovely Accord... The true damage that was inflicted by her rear ending started to show. Next to that she also started to burn oil... and Hondas either consume no oil, or they become true oil boats, and unfortunately the latter was the case. Add in the fact that diesel became more interesting to me since I travel a lot for work nowadays meant I had to sadly say goodbye to my lady in red in favour of a younger, more serious German businesslady.

She met family, made friends, but most importantly; she stole my heart. What was supposed to be a sensible, yet interesting daily driver turned out to be a forbidden love. One that was sadly doomed to fail in favour of owning the Excel, which I can’t let go yet, if ever at all. This car really grabbed a hold of me and refused to let go. I’m even doing my best here to hold back a tear in my eye, that’s how much this car meant to me. Luckily she received another year of APK (MOT), so here’s hoping she found a loving home. I know you’re out there, and I hope you know I miss you and wish you the best. It’s not a farewell, it’s until we meet again.

RT > Gidges 02/28/2019 at 16:12

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May you reunite with the power of VTEC one day.

Gidges > RT 02/28/2019 at 16:26

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ATR has always been high on my wish list!

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > Gidges 02/28/2019 at 17:44

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Every day. This was supposed to be a temporary vehicle until I could afford something expensive and German again, but I've fallen in love. The combination of the practicality of a mini-minivan and a 6MT can't be beat, and we'll never see the likes of this again. I may buy another car or three, but this little bugger isn't going anywhere...

Longtime Lurker > Gidges 02/28/2019 at 21:59

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I think I’ve seen pictures of this car before. Where else on the internet have you posted pictures of it?

Klaus Schmoll > Gidges 03/01/2019 at 09:28

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Hello there! I also had a CG8 for almost 5 five years. In contrast to your experience it didn’t really do anything for me. I bought it as a one owner, perfect service history car in 2011 for € 2.4k, when I needed a cheap-ish car asap. It was mostly reliable, comfy, and had a great stiff chassis. Would be interesting to know which other late 90s japanese sedan came from the factory with strut tower braces. Unfortunately, this stiff chassis exposed the one major flaw this car had. The 1.8 just felt gutless. The “fake V-tec” made it fee l like it had 90 hp at best, then V-tec kicked in and things got a tiny bit more interesting until fuel cutoff ended it way too soon, and with the 5 speed you had shift into a where you would start out of V-tec ran ge all over again. The chassis, suspension and steering could have handled much more power with ease. Maybe the 2.2 is the engine to go for with these.

BTW, it would happily cruise at 200 kph on the Autobahn, just don’t ask about fuel economy.

All in all, it wasn’t a bad car. I took it on some long journey and it did fine, but I had to call roadside assistance twice. The distributor cap can be forgiven. Plastics age and the car was 17 years old at the time. What got really annoying was the little part in the steering column that reads the key’s code and then starts the fuel pump. It took ages to get the correct part because Honda’s parts system is fucked. Apparently it’s pretty common to get the wrong part even if you order with the vin. Happened to me twice.

Well, it wasn’t bad, it wasn’t oarticularly good at anything, it didn’t have the biblical Honda reliability, it was just a car that did car things.

Gidges > Longtime Lurker 03/01/2019 at 15:57

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