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1999 honda civic mog6/22/2023 Turning the skinny key engages a shrill beeeep instantly familiar to Honda vets of the time, and should you then open the door, there's the equally telltale beep-beep-beep-beep / beep-beep-beep-beep. There's the standard Honda steering wheel of the time with its horn buttons, spokes annoyingly lower than 3 and 9, and a diameter that's a half-inch wider than the 2020's. Opening the Si's tinny door only deepens the time portal vibe. Yet, it's also obviously old, and unlike other flawless old cars, this one was affordable and hardly an exotic when new. The Si's paint gleams, the interior is flawless, the wheels are without blemish … it's in the same condition as any of those new press cars that pass through. Opening my garage door feels like peering through time. The '20 is here for some historical context and to provide one last chance to enjoy the current-generation Si and the coupe in general before they sail into the sunset for good. In fact, it has precisely 2,836 fewer miles than the 2020 Honda Civic Si that's also parked out front. There are only 1,178 miles on the odometer, which is less than what the vast majority of new cars we test at Autoblog have. Hell, it might have literally been one of those cars had it been sentenced to the gantlet of Honda's press fleet rather than a pampered life inside the company's HQ museum. Smash cut to 21 years later, and there's a '99 Civic Si in my driveway, looking exactly like the ones that graced those car magazines at the turn of the century. Admittedly, the Electron Blue Pearl paint was pretty cool. It had only 160 horsepower, the interior of any old Civic, and I distinctly remember thinking the omission of ABS was absurd. Yet, with a closet full of car magazines and a drivers' license about to be acquired, I do quite vividly remember the Civic Si coming out and the rave reviews it received. There was no poster of a 1999 Honda Civic Si on my wall, and it certainly wasn't on the shortlist (or even long one) of contenders for my first car. This will not be one of those "meet your heroes" types of retro car reviews.
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