2016 Honda Civic Hatchback, a spiritual successor to the original Type R?



After many teasers and previews, the tenth-generation Honda Civic hatchback has finally been unveiled in full glory. The five-door hatchback from Swindon UK, armed with a turbocharged engine and a stick shift, could potentially become the spiritual successor to the legendary EG/EK Civic Type R hatchback.

Right off the bat, the car’s final aesthetic is a close to the Honda Civic Prototype concept unveiled at Geneva. It retains the saloon‘s aggressive and sporty looks, while the rear end gets a new central exhaust setup, just like the prototype.2017-honda-civic-hatch-tengen-2

Powertrain options for the new Civic depend on where it’s headed. For the United States, the lineup begins with the all-familiar 1.5-litre four-cylinder turbocharged with two different tunes – 174 hp for the entry level and 180 hp for the Sports variant. Torque is the same for both variants at 220 Nm. For the first time ever, the 1.5-litre turbo is mated to a six-speed manual gearbox, but a CVT is available as an option.

For the UK and Europe, a choice of 1.0-litre, 1.4-litre and the 1.5 turbocharged petrol engines will be offered with the Civic hatch. The hybrid and the hotter Type-R is also in the pipeline, with latter being strapped with a 2.0-litre turbocharged lump.2017-honda-civic-hatch-tengen-3

New to the Civic is the independent rear suspension setup, which makes a return after the old torsion beam setup is retired. This should make the Civic all the more improved dynamically, and could likely stack up to more established hatches such as the Volkswagen Golf and Ford Focus.

The Civic Hatchback will be on sale in the United States in September and will make its official debut at the upcoming Paris Motorshow. For those of you who cannot stop drooling over this, don’t worry, it will surely find its way here through parallel importers. Would you pay a premium for it, though?


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