Ight Factor

Does more power equals more fun? Honda Civic Type R chief engineer Hideki Kakinuma tells that too much or too little power are not necessarily ideal.

SPORTS cars these days are in a race to produce more and more horsepower than ever before.

The advancement of the combustion engine has helped manufactures achieve such astronomic output of anywhere between 400hp to 700hp so much so, it is considered the norm these days.

The new Honda Civic Type R though, does not buckle under the weight of this trend.

For Honda, it is all about ‘fun to drive’ and that does not translate to more horsepower, more fun.

The new Civic Type R only produces 310PS or around 306hp.

In a recent interview with Honda R&D Co chief engineer and assistant large project leader of Civic Type R, Hideki Kakinuma, he revealed that the development of the new Civic Type R was all based around the philosophy of ‘fun to drive’.

“I believe that once people get behind the wheel of the Civic Type R, they will understand that 310PS is more than enough,” said Kakinuma who was present at the launch of the new Civic Type R at the annual Gaikindo Indonesia International Auto Show 2017 last week.

The Civic Type R was one of the highlights of the autoshow and with its looks alone, it’s definitely a scene-stealer.

For one, it is the most aggressive looking Civic visually and most importantly, it’s a track-ready car.

When Honda affixes ‘Type R’ at the end of a model, it means business.

The new Honda Civic Type R has a 2.0 litre VTEC turbo engine under the hood and the only transmission option is a six-speed manual.

It was clear that Honda wanted something special for its fifth generation Civic Type R which coincides with the 25th anniversary of the Type R nomenclature for Honda’s sports models.

And that’s exactly what they did. “This was a completely new direction for the Type R. We had to keep it simple and lightweight as a performance car but on the other hand, it also had to be a car you could drive daily. That was our biggest hurdle,” said Kakinuma.

In order to keep all these characteristics, the new Type R now comes with three driving modes - Comfort, Sport and +R.

“You must understand, this is the first time the Civic Type R is available globally. By introducing the three driving modes, it will ensure that the performance of the Type R is in no way jeopardized.”

Would not it have been more accessible for customers worldwide to have an automatic transmission instead?

“The choice of transmission was the first thing we discussed when we started the development of the new Type R.

“There was already a policy in place for the fifth generation Civic Type R that it had to be ‘fun to drive’ and we concluded that the idea of fun is with a manual transmission.

“Also, a manual transmission is more lightweight than an automatic and that’s why we opted for it.”

Kakinuma spent two and a half years developing the new Type R and has 26 years of experience as a Honda engineer in ride and handling having worked on such revolutionary sports cars like the NSX and the S2000.