Good news, revheads - Honda here assures it has a solid supply line.

SUGGESTION supply of the latest Civic Type R will be constrained doesn’t gell with the New Zealand distributor’s understanding.

Honda New Zealand fully anticipates fast-paced desire for the FL5-generation car, whose local availability begins with reservations opening at midday today and stock arriving at the end of the moth.

Fans aren’t just revved up for the $69,000 five-door on strength of it being the most powerful and, potentially, quickest of its kind. They also know it’s the final iteration of the famous hot hatch to be powered exclusively by a petrol engine.

Yet a local high-up has indicated enough stock has been secured to meet that rush.

“We’ve got a really solid supply coming for its first year,” says Matt Woodburn (pictured), marketing and product manager.

Though he declined to give a count, he signalled an affirmative when asked if it would be more than 100.

If that plays out conceivably there’s little possibility of the core customer base being left empty-handed. In 2019, its last full year of sale, the preceding FK8, which sold for $63k from its mid-life refresh, $3k more than the 2017 launch price – achieved 55 sales. That appears to have been the Civic Type R’s strongest year here.

FK8 also achieved 300 national sales from 2017 to 2020, when availability here ceased. It went out of production in 2021.

At the October 26 media preview day, which could not be reported on until an embargo curtailed this morning, Woodburn questioned the veracity of reports from overseas about Honda having decided to limit FL5 supply to Japan to 400 examples per month – equating to 4800 vehicles per year. By end of August, Honda dealers there had reportedly taken 3000-plus orders.

“I have seen that on the internet, I have not heard that from official channels,” he said.

“There’s been a lot of noise about how many units countries are getting.

“Some of that is definitely not true, some of that may be factual, but we have not been provided any particular information saying which of those stories were true or not.” 

The sourcing point for FL5 is the Yorri factory in Japan, featured in the attached video,, whereas the previous two generations of the car shipped to New Zealand from Honda’s factory in Swindon, the United Kingdom, which closed 16 months ago.

There’s a new twist to the latest car’s assembly in that its powerplant comes from an engine factory in Ohio, the United States.

The latest version of the turbocharged 2.0-litre petrol that has been the sole Civic Type R powerplant sold here (earlier generations of the car, with a normally-aspirated mill, restricted to Japan) generates 235kW and 420Nm – an improvement of 7kW and 20Nm respectively over the previous unit.

The car as sold in Japan has the same torque but makes 8kW more power. Woodburn believes the difference comes down to factory perception about fuel quality here.

Despite the minor power difference, the FL5 is still the most powerful model ever sold in NZ and almost certainly the fastest to 100kmh from a standing start as well, though that’ll be up to independent testers to prove.

Honda won’t give factory figures and there was no opportunity to test this during the media taster, which restricted driving experiences to laps of Pukekohe circuit at a capped 160kmh.

On that note, how it goes on the public road remains a mystery – the previous versions certainly didn’t disguise their sportiness. One plus for everyday driving is that fuel economy has improved in this new generation.

Other performance highlights for the latest car are a redesigned turbocharger, increased air intake flow and a more efficient exhaust, a larger radiator and improved cooling, a lighter flywheel, a more rigid body structure with larger track widths, rev matching on all gears and improved brakes, with two-piece front discs with improved cooling.

The latest car still runs Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres favoured for the predecessor but now has 19-inch rims, down one inch on the previous car.

It also adds an Individual drive mode to the Comfort, Sport and R Plus settings meted previously. It gets a digital instrument cluster and a performance data-logging phone app. While that stuff is all about celebrating sizzle, it also ups on safety, being the first of its kind to adopt a complete Honda Sensing set of assists. It’s also the first Honda being sold here with traffic sign recognition.

Once again, each example achieves a serialised Type R build plate on the dashboard. Honda NZ’s example for press use and demonstration has ‘0000’; designating it as a pre-production example.

While this is the last blast insofar as full petrol goes, Honda has already ruled out a full battery-electric version, though a senior executive says the current platform – an underpinning shared with the current CR-V - can accept plug-in hybrid power.

“I wouldn’t exclude electrification,” Ko Yamamoto, technical advisor for Honda Europe, told British publication Autocar at European media event in July.

“We can’t do a pure-electric powertrain on this platform, but I imagine it can take up to a certain level of plug-in hybrid.”

Autocar reports Yamamoto “did not confirm” any future Civic Type R would use the current platform. That has fired conjecture the next Type R, due after 2026 or 2027 (based on past life cycles), will offer an electric option.

However, it is likely to remain front-wheel drive, rather than switch to all-wheel drive like other hot hatchbacks with similar power outputs, even though the current platform can cope with that.

Yamamoto was quoted as saying that while all-wheel-drive was feasible “I think four-wheel drive doesn’t really cope with the Type R principle. It’s not even necessarily quicker, but it is heavier.”