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Good news: Honda has confirmed the Civic Type R Mugen will go into limited production in the UK.
Bad news: it'll cost you - ready for this? - £38,599.
Yes, that's about £12,000 more than the Ford Focus RS, which packs a mighty 300bhp to the Mugen's 237bhp.
But Honda says you shouldn't think of the Mugen Civic as a normal hot hatch, but instead a Mugen-prepped race car for the road. A full racing Type R, they say, would cost around £165,000, so the road-going Civic represents a veritable bargain, especially as Mugen will build and tailor your Type R to your exacting specifications.
Watch the Mugen Civic hit the track
So what do you get for your large wodge of cash? Well, a limited-slip diff, mono-block racing callipers, lightweight forged alloys wheels, custom springs and dampers, and a bigger rear wing, to name but a few of the new shiny bits.
That 237bhp - from the same 2.0-litre naturally aspirated VTEC engine - is 20 per cent up on the standard Civic Type R, with torque boosted by 10 per cent thanks to new pistons, camshafts, ECU and a modified intake system.
Worth £38,599? Have a read of Tom Ford's review of the concept - and Piers Ward's test drive of the pre-production version - and you might start to think so. Exclusivity, too, will help: Mugen will build just 20 Type Rs, all in Honda F1-style Championship White.
Or would you prefer a Focus RS with change left over for a Fiat 500 Abarth?
Open Car Bar
What do you think?
Want to comment on this?
rustymx5 commented on this article
at 12:45 pm on 26 October 2009
I'd have neither. 38k is enough for a used E92 BMW M3. No contest...
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Mikeado commented on this article
at 02:27 pm on 26 October 2009
Impressive car, and full of impressive sounding bits no-doubt tuned to perfection by people who do just that all day long, but I'm sure you could tune your own Civic R to that spec for less money, perhaps even without Mugen parts. The same truth afflicts the GT-R V-Spec and the Evo X FQ-400. As for the Focus RS, both were subjected to the Nurburgring and the Mugen Civic R is 2.7secs quicker, largely I suspect because it's 221kg lighter.
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hondansx commented on this article
at 04:30 pm on 26 October 2009
still recon the old one is better in every way appart from styling
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Silv3RR commented on this article
at 02:40 am on 27 October 2009
it looks good... but it's expensive
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ecopreacher commented on this article
at 10:18 am on 27 October 2009
buy trees and save the planet!!!!!. No but seriously this car is probably going to be a hardcore track machine, if you want a hardcore track machine buy one of those megane r renaultsport r36rr things (r)
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