There is something very special about a high-revving sports car. The sound, the feeling, the overall driving experience. Its quite exhilarating and Jason Cammisa and Hagerty agree. And, as Jason says in this video, the highest recorded redline from a street-legal production passenger car is 9,500 RPM. Can you guess what that redline figure was on? Amazingly, it was on one of Honda’s first cars, the S500. This is what set the standard for Honda's legendary talent for high-revving engines.
More Impressive Than Lamborghini
Jason argues that Honda's first car was more impressive than Lamborghinis, who also made their first car at around the same time, the early 1960s. It almost didn't get made. In fact, Honda was almost prohibited from becoming a car company.
Concerned for the viability of the industry, in 1962, the Japanese government passed a law that would allow only three companies in Japan to build cars. Toyota, Nissan and Mitsubishi were already there. Through in-depth articles in the Asahi Shimbun newspaper, Sōichirō Honda was finally able to obtain a repeal of this law. The very first Honda 4-wheeled vehicle was a small truck, called the T360. Three months later, the S360 was born on largely the same mechanicals.
A Revolutionary Engine
The S500 though, became the production car, and it spawned the S600 and the S800. And in terms of power, the S360 had a 356 cubic centimeter, or 21 cubic inch four-cylinder engine. That is a small engine! As the names indicate, the engines eventually grew, though still remained under a liter. Hondas four-cylinder engine was undoubtedly the car's party piece. It was a masterpiece, with an aluminum crankcase, double-overhead cams, and four carburetors to name just a couple of features. Plus, it was water-cooled, which was a change form the air-cooled motorcycle engines Honda had been designing. As another example of the motorcycle heritage, the rear wheels were chain-driven.
It is tiny. An MX5 Miata, positively dwarfs it. Small and lightweight, the S800 turned out to be quite fast in a straight line.
The Coupe Version Was More Practical Still
The S800, as Jason says, is great fun to drive. It has a comfortable driving position, light steering, and heavy, but highly effective braking performance. shifter Jason says the shifter would shame a new Miata, it's so good. The gearing is quite short, in top gear, at 60 mph the engine is spinning at 5,000 rpm. That’s not that different than first gear in a Dodge Viper.
When Honda pulled the plug on the S800, they focused on cars for the mass market. The concurrent N360 was a small four seater with transverse front-wheel drive that looks very much like the original Austin Mini. Slightly larger engined versions of that model were the first cars Honda's sold in the US. The successor of that car became the Civic and you know what happened from there. The next sports car did not come until the S2000, thirty years later for Honda's 50 year anniversary.
Source: YouTube