Civic Type R Canceled In Europe
The Honda Civic Type R has become the latest casualty of the new Euro V emissions standard, reports Autocar, and it will be discontinued for the European market at the end of this year. Weirdly though, production of the British-built Civic Type R will continue, and the two-liter “touring car with number plates” will be exported to the South African and Australian markets. To which we say, the Type R is a low-volume model anyway… why not send a few to the US? Sure, if you directly convert the UK price to dollars, a top-spec Mugen Type R costs a whisker under $40k… and we’d guess more Americans would spring for a Volt at that price. And yes, it would certainly suck some enthusiasm out of the all-important CR-Z launch. Still, Honda needs to stop making sense and do something that proves it hasn’t forgotten its roots in the US market. Sending a few hundred Type Rs to the US is worth a thought… or is the whole idea as silly as testing a Type R against an Audi R8?
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It would have to undergo a lengthy and possibly harmful federalization process.
What I'm wondering is how ridiculously stringent do these regulations have to be to kill a Honda Civic? Even if it is a Type-R.
We're getting an all new Civic in spring-summer of next year, so this may just be temporary. On the other hand, Honda is saying that the CR-Z is the future of Honda sports models; so they may remove the Type-R altogether for the coming generation. Word is though, that an Si model for the US is confirmed for 2012 and that it will most likely have the 2.4l engine from the TSX.
I would also be surprised if the Type R were canned for good in Europe. While it might be a low volume model on the Continent, it is still (IIRC) the best selling hot hatch in the UK - in spite of its foibles. The versions with a mechanical LSD are definitely much closer to being par for the course than the bog standard ones, not to speak of the grey imported JDM CTR sedans, which apparently are the most sublime front wheel drive cars out there. You might want to check the prices for the top of the range Mugen ones - while they are the closest to a touring car most mortals can buy, they cost ~40k GBP, which is more like 55k US$ or thereabouts.