SMOOTH RIDING FOR DEVOTED HONDA FAN
Rare Japanese import a head-turning car for proud owner in this Prairie town
There’s a children’s camp song about a little wagon, where “the front seat’s broken and the axle’s draggin’.” Fortunately, that’s not the case with Paul Tait’s 1999 Honda Accord SiR wagon.
Although it’s been customized and slammed to the ground, the Airdrie-based builder says his daily driver rides like a champ.
“I drive it to work and I drive it to shows,” Tait explains. “And with two kids in the family, I need it to haul backpacks and other gear.”
Tait says he’s been a devoted fan of Honda automobiles since he was a teenager. He’s customized many of them, and this is his sixth Accord — and his second Honda wagon. The first Accord wagon he had was a 1992 model that was in rough condition. When he found out how good the sixth generation (1998–2002) Japanese-home market Accord wagon was, his course was set.
“I was working for a company in B.C. about 12 and a half years ago,” he says. “We were importing Nissan Skylines and other Japan-market-only vehicles and I got to see many of the righthand drive cars that were around at that time.”
Accord wagons were no longer sold in the North American market after 1998. That makes any later generation Accord wagon a rare sight in Canada. Transport Canada rules regarding vehicle importation stipulate that to import a car from Japan, it must be 15 years old or older.
“Because a 1999 Honda Accord was too new at the time I first saw one, I had to wait to be able to get one into the country,” Tait says.
In 2015, working with a friend in Airdrie who regularly imports vehicles, Tait managed to reach a buyer based in Japan.
“I told him what I wanted and how much I could spend,” Tait explains. “When this car came up at auction, I hadn’t even seen pictures of it, but my guy bought the car — and I got lucky.
“Importing a car from Japan can be a crap shoot. You don’t get to the see the car until you actually get it.”
Luckily for Tait, when the Accord landed in Alberta, he says the car was “almost immaculate,” with original paint, a pristine interior and just under 100,000 kilometres on the odometer.
Tait couldn’t wait to customize his dream car.
“I just wanted something different to build,” he says. “These Accord wagons aren’t very sought after and they were discontinued in the North American market in this sixth generation. But they’ve got the big 2.3-litre double overhead cam four-cylinder motor with VTEC, and that engine only came in that model.”
Tait planned to leave the Accord basically stock but wanted to alter the stance of the car by lowering it and changing the wheels. A coilover kit was installed and Tait drove the Accord that way for about a year, even commuting it to his job as manager at the Airdrie Visions installation bay during the winter months.
“It rode great, but it just wasn’t what I was really after,” Tait says. “I wanted to put it on air ride, but nobody made a kit, so I worked with a kit built for a domestic Accord; they’re the same but different.
“I got a good deal on the components, with all new struts, compressor, tank and a management system.”
In the cargo bay of the Accord, Tait neatly mounted the airride components and set up the wiring while his friend Michael Kinney, a pipefitter by trade, bent and routed aluminum lines to handle the air. Next were custom wheels. It took him time to determine the largest wheel he could fit without doing major body modifications, and he adds that he didn’t have an unlimited budget, so they had to be relatively inexpensive. What he finally selected were 17-inch JNC 005 rims in gold and ordered them directly from the company in California. They’re now fitted with Kumho tires.
With no other modifications, and still in its original paint, Tait’s Accord is a sharp-looking car. And it does get driven. He has added 41,000 km in the few years it’s been in the family.
“My wife comments all the time about the number of people staring at it,” he says. “My eightyear old son likes it a lot and calls it the fancy car. But my 11-year old daughter? Well, she doesn’t appreciate all the attention.”