New Honda NSX at Tokyo Motor Show in November?

Honda’s R & D head Mibe Toshihiro has confirmed that Honda are building a new NSX, and rumours say the NSX concept could arrive at the Tokyo Motor Show.

Isn’t it strange how some cars are never appreciated fully when they’re in production?

Take the McLaren F1. It’s now perhaps the most desirable modern classic on the planet, with cars selling north of £3 million. Yet one of the last F1s had to be sold new for just $400k to get rid of it.

And the Jaguar E-Type, perhaps the most iconic car ever built – had become so unloved by the early 1970s that BL were giving them to sales managers as company cars because they couldn’t sell them. How times change.

Another car you can add to the list of cars that have taken on a far greater importance after their demise is the Honda NSX.

The Honda NSX was Honda’s attempt to out do Ferrari. In the same way Lexus copied the Mercedes S Class, Honda took the Ferrari 348 and tried to create a Japanese version – but one that was built to perfection.

The NSX got a 3.0 litre V6 with 270bhp (later increased to a 3.2 litre with 291bhp) and came in at around 1300kg. So performance was decent with a 0-60mph around 5 seconds and reliability was a given; the NSX was a proper daily driver – if you could afford to buy it in the first place.

But Honda lost interest in the NSX, merely tweaking it a little through its life (it ceased production in 2005) and it was never a great seller, perhaps because it lacked soul.

Despite that, a new NSX was planned, but in 2008 – at the start of the world’s current economic woes – Honda dropped plans for a new NSX.

But now the plans are back – as we confirmed back in July – and now Honda’s R & D head Mibe Toshihiro has confirmed to Autocar that a new NSX is a work in progress. As a sop to modern sensibilities it seems likely that a new NSX will get a hybrid setup of some description – perhaps even a plug-in.

But the new NSX will still be light and nimble, powerful and well made. And, if rumors doing the round today are anything to go by, we could see the new NSX as a concept at next month’s Tokyo Motor Show.

Which is definitely something to look forward to.