For the past two or three decades, you had a choice when you bought your midsize sedan: you could go with the four-cylinder and sip gas but be relegated to appalling right-lane submission to faster cars, or you could spend a bit more and get six glorious cylinders and a more premium feeling of thrust. But the V6 engine’s heyday is over, and the last victim of this is the Honda Accord.
The V6 Accord is dead. This is unfortunate news, but it is not surprising.
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AutoGuide reports that an all-new Honda Accord on the way soon for 2018—hot on the heels of the supposedly more exciting new Toyota Camry—will not have a V6 option, which has been a choice now since 1995.
In its place, interestingly enough, is the 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine from the Civic Type R, which is rated in that car at 306 horsepower. No word yet on what the power will be for the Accord. (The base engine will be the 1.5-liter turbocharged four you get in the Civic and CR-V.)
This is a shame, because the outgoing Accord’s 3.5-liter V6—rated at 278-horsepower and 252 lb-ft of torque—was a smooth and punchy motor that injected a nice degree of fun into the sedan. But two factors are at work here: the fact that Americans in general aren’t buying sedans anymore, and the general trend of downsizing that sees V6 engines increasingly replaced by smaller and more efficient but equally powerful turbo fours.
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Still, I will miss the V6 Accord. The last Accord Coupe V6, when paired with a manual gearbox, was a surprisingly fun machine. Alas, with no end in sight to the crossover takeover, it’s hard to see a future for any of those features—fun, coupes, manuals or V6s.
See you at the crossroads, V6 Accord.
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