REVIEW: 1989 Acura Legend Coupe. This GAME CHANGER Really WAS A Legend In Its Own Time. If Only Acura Could Re-Create This Mystique.

Honda certainly knows how to design Coupe

Too bad they just cannot make up mind embracing RWD

When I see a Legend Coupe or SC300/400 it makes me sad for those days during automotive history. The simplicity and elegance, married to the aggressive touches made these coupes so gorgeous and timeless. I would also put the S-Class Coupe in a similar category, along with the first gen A5/S5 and the G35 Coupes.

The TLX should have been reborn as the Legend. The pathetically terrible ILX needs to be updated to the current Civic platform and renamed Integra. The only name NEVER TO USE AGAIN is Vigor. THAT was the stumble that ruined Acura. The Vigor was a shit pile and people shunned it, so--I think De Nysschen was working for them then--they renamed everything to meaningless alphanumeric names.

De Nysschen was never in such a position to work for Acura in 1993, as 33 year olds didn't run divisions like that back then. Get your facts right.

Former Amati executive left Mazda and sabotaged Acura at Honda, before reversing course and started turning it around at the turn of Y2K (see 2004MY TL).

I remember driving the Legend sedan of a senior sales guy on the team when I was a kid in my first job in 1995. It was very nice indeed.

The V6 manual in these cars is awesome. Also, I remember the spoiler extended behind the trunk lid. That was radical...all other spoilers sit atop the trunk lid. And in my early 20s this was my first taste of what a sport coupe could be until the NSX came out and blew everything out of the water. This Legend lived up to its name.

Newsflash, Acura did NOT have a 4-year headstart on Lexus. Acura was launched in March 1986, while Lexus was formally introduced in January 1989 and launched from August and September 1989.

1989-1986 =/= 4 years. There was no Legend offered in USA in 1985.

Acura (Legend) was genuinely seen as a crown jewel regarding the Legend and got Honda's best, inspiring NSX development.

1981 is when development began and NSX in 1983-84. If not for USA execs prompting a name change and separate network to the chagrin of Honda family, they would've been Honda badged all around.

Legend was also a safety standout, even if the first generation wasn't the best structurally.

Honda began developing their own airbag system in 1975 to replicate the half-hearted effort by American manufacturers like GM.

MB beat them to the punch with launch of that in 1981 as an optional supplemental restraint (1983 in USA), as well as Ford domestically in 1985. In the end the Legend coupe introduced the first airbag by a Japanese automaker in 1987, after 12 years of development. Acura wasn't in the cards in 1975, but by 1987, it was the perfect choice in being upmarket.

Toyota, Mitsubishi, and Nissan sat on their asses by comparison in that area. They all waited until 1989 or 1990 (Mitsubishi) for simply just one, while Honda was already developing another one for the passenger.

In 1990, the second generation Legend debuted with both driver's and passenger side dual airbags, being again the first Japanese automaker to do so in 1990, alongside cars like the W126 & W124 Benzes, Lincoln sedans, and Porsche lineup.

Simultaneously, new NSX also boasted the first 3-spoke airbag steering wheel ever in 1990, whereas other OEMs had bulky ugly things for SRS or automatic seatbelts.

The new Legend range had also been engineered with various levels of offset crash-testing and debuted the first passenger airbag, with a vertical deployment apparatus.

The latter referred to a passenger airbag which deployed in an upward motion, to dissipate the airbag's energy at 200 MPH and avoid "punching" the passenger during deployment. This would later be universally adopted by the automotive industry in the rest of the 90s and 2000s.

Many people either died or went blind from powerful first generation airbags (pre-1998), that deployed horizontally and were easily set off in very low speed collisions, especially short women and children.

The 1990.5-1995 Legend was the only Japanese luxury vehicle back then with no death record due to airbag decapitation/injury, with the 1993.5-96 Q45 one step behind.

The 1992.5-94 LS 400 was responsible for the death of a child or two because of the rudimentary airbag design on the passenger side not fixed until its Gen 2 redesign in 1994.

With the exception of the Takata debacle, Honda has often been a leader in safety, whereas Toyota and Nissan excel in one area and or "just adequate".

Aside from that, Honda took great pride

Thanks for the walk down memory lane. My first car ever (purchased upon college graduation after I passed the CPA exam and got a job) was a 1990 Acura Integra 5-speed. Loved that car.

Nice, especially in Honda's golden age and excellent handling. Sounds relatively expensive compared to an ILX lol, in terms of APR and monthly payment per inflation?

And thank you.

Aside from that, Honda took great pride in the Legend and it showed. Although the 4th generation Accord borrowed from the Acura line for its redesign in 1989, it was designed parallel to the 1991MY Legend in late 1987.

The second gen Legend was respected worldwide, until the Bubble Economy collapsed in 1991-92 and forced cost cuts on the 3rd generation now in development.

By 1993 when the final design on the 3rd gen Legend was frozen, a new exec from shuttered Amati luxury division Dick Colliver, took over and somewhat messed up Acura.

In 1994, Dick ordered a renaming of Acura products to alphanumeric nomenclature from 1995 due to recommendations from consultants. This was due to Vigor sales struggling and to give the brand a "rebirth", because the Legend had a "street/hood image".

In 1995, Acura replaced the struggling Vigor with 2.5TL and 3.2TL. In early 1996, the new Legend now called 3.5RL debuted, a facsimile of the W140 S-Class and nothing like its sporting predecessor.

New 3.5RL was a cynical exercise in engineering, bitterness over losses during Japanese crash and recession. It was never the same again, even after a switch to the Accord platform and SH-AWD in 2004. Became RLX and died in export markets.

Fun Fact...from the genius' at Honda/Acura...RL = "Replace Legend".

I kid you not.

LOL, interesting mre (thanks). I can imagine that about RL. My question is, what the hell was Dick Colliver up to?

To go from developing a RWD 12-cylinder flagship at Amati, to screwing up Acura on purpose? The Integra was supposed to be redesigned way before 2001, but he had other plans and didn't push JP execs enough.

Mission Dumb Down Legend took shape thanks to shitty JDM Honda management in 1992 who differed from 80s execs, but Dick still is the guy behind the awful renaming.

The Legend coupe died at the end of 1995, in favor of the weakly executed and uber cheap, 1997MY Acura CL coupe, a transverse or East-West engine layout product launched in spring 1996 (debuted J-Series V6).

Although it may not have been RWD like the SC 300, but the Audi-like Legend coupe with a longitudinal V6 was a formidable competitor.

Today, the transverse CL coupe is dead for good reason, even if it had one last hurrah with the 6-speed manual Type-S coupe for 2003MY. Gen 2 CL was much more inspired than the joke of a product in Gen 1.

Honda became cynical and bitter, which showed in its high end products for years to come.

Are they really going to turn that around now? That remains to be seen, if the V6 TLX and MDX, plus ILX replacement are all consistently well received.

Jon Ikeda leading Acura is a good thing, as a Japanese-American bridge between stodgy Japan HQ and daring USA base, but one only hopes he made good headway the last 5 years.

Wow...what a love fest!