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Honda Civic Type-R buying guide EP3 and FN2 - Honda Civic Type-R (FN2) buying guide

Wacky styling, futuristic dash, high-revving naturally aspirated twin-cam and Honda engineering. What's not to like about the Honda Civic Type-R? We tell you.

Even before The Fast and the Furious brought so-called ‘rice rockets’ to a wider audience, Japanese performance cars already enjoyed a fanatical following. Not only were they excellent packages straight from the factory, there was a wealth of tuning options available.

Honda has frequently been at the forefront, using its ‘Type-R’ badge to denote a lightweight, semi-homologation special. One of the earliest cars to wear the badge was the brilliant NSX-R but perhaps the best-known is the Civic.

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The previous incarnation of the Civic Type-R, built from 2001-2005, was a cracking hot hatch with a strong enthusiast following, so when its replacement, code-named FN2, was launched in the UK in early 2007, great things were expected.

The new car’s shape polarised opinion, as did the space-shuttle dashboard. Honda was on safer ground under the skin, because the new Type-R got the same naturally aspirated 2-litre, 16-valve variable valve-timing ‘VTEC’ engine from the previous model. Power was up only a fraction, from 197 to 198bhp, but Honda had smoothed the VTEC’s marked step-up in power delivery by re-configuring the variable timing settings and introducing a different profile for the high-speed cam.

The new car used the same, brilliant six-speed manual gearbox and a slightly shorter final drive, but the kerb weight had gone up by around 60kg, which slightly blunted any performance gains. We recorded 0-60mph in a respectable 6.8sec (identical to the previous version).

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On the road, you still had to keep the revs up to make properly quick progress, but that’s always been the Type-R way. What was slightly disappointing was the chassis, which lacked a little feedback and interaction. The electrically assisted steering was particularly lacking in feel. But the Civic had plenty of grip and a sporting ride, and when you were slotting the stubby gearlever around the gate and making that VTEC engine sing, it still had plenty going for it.  

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For the real hardcore driver, though, there are a number of variants worth considering. The Championship White was a special edition that arrived towards the end of 2008, boasting a mechanical limited-slip differential that really sharpened the handling and brought some genuine involvement. Equipment-wise, it was specced to the same lavish standards as the ‘GT’ version which accounted for 90 per cent of Type-R sales.

There are also two Mugen versions that you might come across. The rarest is a full-on road-racer of which just 20 examples were built by Mugen's UK operation and cost an eye-watering £38,599. With 237bhp, it was a proper little Touring car.

Then there was the Mugen 200, which came out in Spring 2010 and effectively replaced the Championship White, having the same limited-slip diff and similar cosmetic tweaks. As the name suggests, just 200 were produced. Best of all is the Japanese-market Civic Type-R, actually a four-door saloon, never officially imported to the UK but one of the true greats.

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It was a sad day when Honda announced that it would cease production of the Civic Type-R. The engine doesn’t meet the 2011 Euro5 emissions regulations and Honda didn’t want to dilute the Type-R’s essence to comply. You have to admire that sort of engineering purity. It also means that if you want a Civic 
Type-R, then pre-owned 
is now the only 
way to go.

'I bought one'

Mohammed Jounis - 29-year-old student Mohammed has only owned his Type-R for five months but he’s already smitten.‘I’ve had the car for five months and I really like it. It’s a great everyday car and the space inside is really good, especially in the back – I can get three friends in no problem.

‘It’s my first new-shape Civic, so the interior and in particular the dashboard took a little getting used to. But I like the fact that it’s clearly all designed with the driver in mind – everything is angled towards you and is in just the right place. ‘I love the way the car drives – it’s real fun. The engine is very responsive, as is the chassis. It feels nimble yet sure-footed and very well balanced, even for such a small car. It feels very stable and the ride is pretty good, although it can feel a bit ‘crashy’ at times.

‘The grip is great though – I’ve never felt like it was on the verge of getting out of control. You can really chuck it around and it just sticks. It can be a bit noisy at times but the stereo’s really good too, so I just turn that up…’

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