Key performance
2018 Honda Civic Si is an inexpensive addiction
Last year Honda created the eighth generation of their ricerocket Civic Si with a much greater focus on aggressive performance.
For 2018 the car doesn’t change much – with just a couple of cosmetic additions.
But it does maintain the capabilities which made it a hit originally. In 1985 that car was the Civic CRX Si. It showed the rest of the world that Honda cars could be something other than small, inexpensive and economical.
The 2018 Civic Si is based on the 10th-generation Civic platform, which was the most substantial remake of the car in its history. Honda chose to make the car more fun to both drive and look at, with the hopes of shedding Civic’s bland vanilla cars and reputation.
This starts with a look that is seriously more aggressive, and that starts right at the front of the car. The chin spoiler looks to be off a racing car, and might as well be. The facia has much larger lower air intakes.
At the rear, the Si Coupe I tested still has the full-width light bar and adds a prominent raised wing spoiler and a chrome centermounted hexagonal exhaust finisher. Wheels and tires are also more aggressive looking, as well as adding performance to the car. They are18-in. split five-spoke alloy wheels with high-contrast finish and 235-series low-profile tires
The big deal with the Si is that for the first time both the Si Sedan and Si Coupe are powered by a 1.5-liter turbocharged, direct gasoline injected engine generating 205 hp. and 192 lb.-ft. of peak torque. The ponies gallop through a very nice short-throw, six-speed manual transmission. Granted there are more sophisticated, and better performing, transmissions out there, but for the fellows that find this car cool, the clutch is just about a requirement.
I’m guessing that if a person is motivated enough to buy the Si, they are more interested in having a big smile on their face behind the wheel rather than caring what kind of mileage they are getting. If they are smiling, they aren’t getting the EPA mileage rating of 28 mpg in city driving and 38 mpg on the highway.
While this power is certainly higher than most compact cars, this isn’t an all-out boy racer like Subaru’s WRX and Sti, or even the Golf R. That’s the job of the Civic R. Having said that, there is enough power, but what will get your heart all a-flitter is the handling.
The base Civic handles decently, so it is now a sport-tuned version based on the Civic’s rigid body suspension, with some specific added performance bits. These include highly upgraded chassis and drive components. Such as an adaptive damper system and helical limited-slip differential.
There are also stiffer spring rates, more rigid stabilizer bars and solid front and rear compliance bushings, the latter shared with the track-focused Civic Type R. Add in larger front brake rotors (12.3-inch) and wider 235/40 R18 tires. The Civic Si controls their direction with a dual-pinion adaptive electric power steering system with variable ratios, and specifically tuned for this suspension.
The result is Honda has gently pushed out the capabilities of the Civic Si towards the edge of the envelope, but without destroying the capability of the car to be used comfortably as a daily driver, which almost all of them are.
Keeping with the sports theme, the seats in the Si are heavily bolstered sport seats which will hold you in place should you get this Civic up towards the edges of adhesion in a corner. It, as well as the doors, steering wheel, shift boot and know all feature red stitching. The pedals and trim have a matte carbon-fibre look.
Much of the cabin and dashboard illumination is also red. With this on a dark night you can easily imagining yourself on the back straight at Le Mans, or perhaps in a submarine on a midnight patrol. Either is fun, and a good enough reason to buy an Si.
But this is a street car, and must include the comforts and capabilities expected of a modern, made-for-Millennials model.
All the expected features for driving assist and safety are there, as one would expect from Honda.
The Display Audio is integrated with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto seamless integrating your smartphone so you can use appbased navigation, streaming audio, voice-controlled search capabilities, and access to a host of Appleor Google apps.
All Si models come with a 450watt, 10-speaker premium sound system with AM/FM, SiriusXM Radio, HD Radio and Pandora capability. There is also a Driver Information Interface which adds selectable real-time information designed to support performance driving.
And driving is what this car is about. It isn’t a car to take racing, but it is a car with which to have fun, learn to control the dynamics of driving rather than merely aiming the hood at where you want to go.
It is the first step to driving schools, car clubs, track days, racing schools and eventual SCCA racing licenses. While completing the process is not in any way necessary, or even often done, it does explain why people buy cars such as these.
The Civic Si does a fine job of handling well. The engine is pleasantly more powerful than the base car, but it isn’t an overwhelming amount of power. Since it’s a turbo, it takes learning how to modulate the turbo power as it comes on, so the wheels accelerate smoothly.
The gearbox is pleasurable to shift, the clutch bite is quite high on the pedal and to me the clutch was bit mushy in quick shifting. The handling is what pushes this car out of the norm for compact cars.
If the car was a bit lighter and lower it would be a sports car instead of a sport sedan (okay, coupe). It is so much fun getting a corner right with this car that you work and work to get the correct entry speed that lets you come smoothly off the brakes and onto the gas in the corner so you cleverly use all the road available to you as you exit the corner.
The first time you get this right, you will probably have to stop the car, breathe deeply and love feeling what both your mind and body are expressing.
The price for all this isn’t bad at all. The Civic Si is currently starts with an MSRP of $24,100 for both the Coupe and Sedan. You can spend another $200 for performance tires and there are a serious number of aftermarket performance parts that dealers will install. These parts are of interest in direct proportion to where the Civic Si owner is on that path from driving schools to racing.
But the most important thing is that Honda has once again created a well-performing compact car with which to get excited about driving. Millennials beware, it beats even virtual-reality games. That’s because it is, virtually, reality.