Ford delivered 7 of their $450,000 GTs in July, an incredible feat since Multimatic hasn’t even put up the tents yet. Even though priced to kill the BMW i8, no one can afford to buy an NSX. Doesn’t matter how much carbon you spec, you need to be ok with losing $70,000 (private sale) in a segment where the cars either depreciate $35,000 or appreciate over the same ownership term.
Im grateful Honda gave this a second (third?) shot. It went from what would have been a Lexus LFA fighter for less than half the cost but was cancelled in 2009, just two years after the successor was announced in 2007 and barely a year before it was going to be released in 2010 (just ahead of the LFA and two years after the R35 GT-R). But the US car industry collapsed between 2007 through 2009. And when I say collapse I mean practically half of the US (the largest car market in the entire world at the time) stopped buying new cars without warning.
So the NSX was cancelled along with Acura launching in Japan.
https://oppositelock.kinja.com/automotive-reminder-1780580019
At the end of 2011, Acura announced they were going to try building an NSX again and in 2012 they showed off the concept we all know too well due to a roadster version appearing in Avengers that year. Six years ago we saw the current concept the NSX is based on and it hit market four years later. People havent even payed off their Accords from 2012 and we complain that it took Acura too long to build the current car.
Timeline:
2005 - NSX ends production (finally!)
2007 - NSX successor announced
2009 - Front-engined, V10, nothing like the orginal NSX is cancelled! Meaning no one was waiting on the car anymore. It’s done, it’s over, the end, fin!
2010 - 1st gen NSX can be purchased for $25,000, easily!
2011 - A rumor about the return of a mid-engine, ﹰV6 NSX to along with the mid-engine Corvette and 911 articles.
2012 - Completely new NSX Concept shown. Production promised for 2015. NSX Roadster appears in Avengers.
- Japan plummets into Recession. LFA was already launched so Lexus left it to one model year. NSX would have been cancelled again but since it was a US project and the US rebounded like RDJ’s career, the NSX survived.
2015 - Production NSX is shown three years after the concept (as promised) with the engine switched from transverse to longitudinal because Ohio is full of badass Honda people.
2016 - Everyone disappointed because first NSX test cars were given to the press on easy to live with Continental tires in order to show off how easy the car was to live with. Problem was that they introduced the car on a track where every other automaker delivers their press cars with summer/cup tires, $6,000 sport packages and $30,000 Nurburgring Packages that have a 5% tack rate. It isn’t a ringer if the equipment is optional for one model year!
This current NSX is so far ahead of any other Honda production car ever produced in terms of performance... what’s the next most powerful Honda car ever? The RLX Sport Hybrid? The CTR is provably in the top five most powerful cars ever produced by Honda.
Honda built a twin turbo V6 with three electric motors, switched the layout in under 18 months and hasn’t had any powertrain issues?! We all know Honda’s long history of luck with V6s mated to automatics.
I think the NSX Sport Hybrid deserves another look. Three sold in July is just wrong.