1988 Honda CRX DX review from North America

I got this car at the bitter end of its existence for six hundred dollars.

The rear quarter panels had rusted out almost completely; the previous owner had done some very bad low-budget repairs on it. This led eventually to the car's becoming structurally unsound.

Got in an accident due to two incompetent drivers; one in front of me, one behind. The one in front jumped the brakes and dove to the right with her left turn signal. The one in back tailgated me preventing me from doing a full threshold-braking stop. He was in a large Ford truck and if I had jumped the brakes he'd have crushed me like a grape.

Clutch went at 190,956 miles. I changed it only to break the differential three days later. As it was due for inspection, which it would never have a snowball's chance in hell of passing, I sent it to Linders' scrapyard.

It had a unusual knock under braking due to a warn part in the steering linkage.

You'll always remember your first car. I'll certainly remember this one; it kept me warm in the coldest of my 17 winters, it got 40 miles per gallon day in and day out, and Soichiro Honda and Ayrton Senna got the ride and handling dead right. Even on cheap "Akuret Metric" tires, it handled like a go-kart. It inspired terrific confidence in its driver and never, ever betrayed it.

Sixteen hundred pounds is what this car weighed. That's what a car should weigh. There's no wasted space, no extra material anywhere, no last minute additions, and no "where the heck are we gonna put this" in the ergonomics.

It went like hell to its very last day. With my 200+ lb father and I in the car, it covered 27 miles in 15 minutes with a slightly slipping clutch over generally rising grades. It was capable of 117 MPH and felt more confident at that speed than it did tooling around town.

Unfortunately, Honda hadn't counted on New England winters. They don't salt the roads in Japan; therefore, they were still learning about corrosion prevention in 1988 and only got it right for the '90 Accord and '92 Civic.