The Car Tech blog

When the Acura TSX Sport Wagon arrives, it will look something like this...but with a pointier Acura beak.

(Credit: Honda)

Wagon fans rejoice!

After the public's abysmal reception of the Accord Crosstour and the Acura ZDX, Honda has decided to bring the Accord Touring to North American shores. This is a proper wagon, not an odd genre-bending XUV. The model will wear a 2011 Acura TSX Sport Wagon badge and will be available in fall 2010.

If you remember, the Honda Accord Touring was listed among our Top 10 awesome wagons you can't have. As you'd expect, we're very excited to see it coming off of that list.

I was just talking to my brother in New Jersey about how I was focusing my Car Tech blog on web videos featuring emerging car navigation technology. He asks me, "Well, what's available and/or new for Acura?" (incidentally, this is the type of car he drives to and from Rutgers 40 minutes each way). I decided to search for videos dealing with car navigation systems for Acuras, and sure enough I found a clip featuring the Acura TSX in-dash Navigation system.

The Acura TSX is one of Acura's newer luxury sports sedan models. While the car itself is mighty fine, the 2009 edition boasts a superb hands-free, voice-activated navigation system. This little sucker does more than just give you step-by-step directions to virtually any destination in the U.S., it can locate a whole bunch of other stuff too - service stations, banks, restaurants and damn near anything else you might be looking for when out on the road. The 2009 Acura TSX can also garner traffic conditions for your destination in case of any preferred or necessary re-routing. In my opinion, based on the video and other information available, this seems to be one of the more handy in-car nav systems available.

(Credit: Acura)

In order for the Acura TSX to be the BMW 3 Series fighter that Honda so desperately wants it to be, the sedan needs two more cylinders and rear-wheel drive. Acura aims to give us half of what we want for the 2010 model year with the TSX V-6.

The Acura's 3.5-liter V-6 bears a striking resemblance to the engine in the Honda Accord V-6.

(Credit: Acura)

The TSX V-6 will be equipped with a 3.5-liter--you guessed it--V-6 engine that looks suspiciously like the 3.5-liter mill that powers the Honda Accord. In Acura tune, the V-6 outputs 280 horsepower (nine more horses than the Accord). Torque isn't yet stated, but we can assume it'll at least match the Accord's 254 pound-feet of twist.

The new engine will be paired only with Acura's Sequential SportShift automatic transmission with steering-wheel-mounted paddle shifters, but we're holding our breath for a three-pedal version with Acura/Honda's excellent six-speed manual.

Acura's engineers didn't just toss a bigger engine under the hood and retire for celebratory drinks (although, that's exactly what we'd have done). The TSX V-6 features a larger 18-inch wheel and tire package and updated suspension tuning for sportier handling. There's also a new "V6" badge on the trunk to let everyone know what you're packing.

Like the now-lesser four-cylinder TSX, the 2010 TSX V-6 features standard leather interior, power moonroof, a premium seven-speaker sound system with CD, AM/FM/XM tuner, and Bluetooth HandsFreeLink. Optionally available is the Technology Package that includes the Acuralink satellite navigation system, rear-view camera, and the Acura/ELS Surround premium audio system.

Will a bigger engine and more power finally catapult the TSX into 3 Series fighting range? Some may argue that without the rear-wheel drive, the TSX won't match the dynamic of the BMW when driven in anger. However, considering that most sport sedans are never really driven in anger, I'd say the TSX V-6 has at least a sporting chance.

Click the image to access the gallery.

(Credit: Acura)

Having been given a preview test drive and a chance to play with the cabin gadgetry of the 2009 Acura TSX last month, we had to wait until the model's official unveiling at this week's New York auto show before we could share our first impressions. Now that the embargo has lifted, we can give you the full skinny on Acura's tech-heavy second-generation sports sedan. Check out our photos of the 2009 Acura TSX.

Click here for more 2008 New York auto show coverage.

Welcome to sunny San Diego

(Credit: CNET Networks)

You just don't expect snow in San Diego, but that's what we got last week at a launch event for the 2009 Acura TSX. Due to the terms of an embargo, we have to hold off on giving you any information on our driving experiences from the event, but we can tell you that, thanks to a freak snowstorm, we ended up stuck on a mountainside for the better part of three hours, much of it waiting for a snowplow to come and clear us a path to safety. Usually, this would have been a tedious wait, but by a great stroke of good fortune, your correspondent found himself in a car with Dan Bonawitz, vice president of corporate planning and logistics at American Honda. Bonawitz had some interesting things to say about some of the technologies on forthcoming Acura and Honda vehicles (aside from the top-secret 2009 TSX in which we were driving).

First, he mentioned that Acura's Collision Mitigation Braking System (CMBS), currently exclusive to the flagship RL sedan, would likely make its way to other models in the U.S. lineup in the future. While we're not expecting to see the radar-based system in the redesigned TL sedan, due to be unveiled later this year, we wouldn't be surprised to see it on future iterations of the MDX or RDX SUVs. The second tech-related tidbit was that Honda is not intending to bring the Internavi Premium Club to the United States. Internavi is a subscription-based service currently available in Japan that provides weather and user-submitted geotags on points of interest to drivers via an Internet connection. Instead, Bonawitz said that Acura vehicles in the United States would continue to use the AcuraLink architecture to stream data such as traffic and weather to their GPS navigation systems. Asked when Honda would be bringing out a successor to the Honda S2000, Bonawitz said that we can expect to see the current-generation model "for at least another year," which suggests to us that there might be something in the works for 2010. According to Bonawitz, 2010 is also the prospective date for introduction of Acura's delayed "NSX-replacement" V-10-powered supercar, which is expected to be based on Acura's Advanced Sports Car Concept.

The 2009 TSX will be unveiled in New York.

(Credit: Acura)

Acura has lifted the veil a bit higher on its forthcoming redesigned TSX sedan, which is set to debut at next month's New York auto show. The updated model will get a host of Acura's most advanced technology features, including the availability of a navigation system with real-time traffic, and the AcuraLink weather system, both of which will also come to the 2009 RL. Also migrating down the Acura model lineup is the ELS/Panasonic surround sound audio system, which we saw in the Acura RDX and MDX SUVs. In the TSX, the ELS system will be available in the form of a 10-speaker system with capability to play DVD-Audio. It also has a new Note function for XM Radio that makes it easy to save song information to recall at a later date. Like the 2009 RL, the new TSX also gets the capability to play music from USB sources, such as iPods and thumbdrives.

On the performance front, the 2009 TSX is more powerful than its predecessor thanks to a new 2.4-liter in-line four cylinder power plant generating 201 horsepower and 172 foot-pounds of torque. The model is available as standard with a six-speed manual or an automatic five-speed automatic transmission with sequential sport shift and the obligatory paddle shifters. Despite its increased power and size (the new car is 3 inches wider than the current model), the 2009 TSX improves its gas mileage and emissions figures with an economy of 21/30mpg and a ULEV rating from the California Air Resources Board. Look out for more detail and images of the new TSX next month.

The 2009 TSX will be unveiled in New York

(Credit: Acura)

Acura has begun to drip-feed us information about its updated TSX sedan, which will be formally unveiled at this year's New York auto show. Based on the single beauty show we got today, the styling of the 2009 TSX departs from that of the current model in several significant ways. The front end has the same beak-shaped arrangement that many of Acura's newer models, including the 2009 RL, which was unveiled last week. At the stern, the new TSX appears to have more of a raked rear windshield than the current model. It also appears to forgo the horizontal decklid of the current generation car, in favor of a smoother, more bulbous rear profile.

The new TSX is expected to be the first diesel-powered Honda in the United States

(Credit: CNET Networks)

The new TSX is expected to get Honda's new 2.2-liter i-DTEC diesel engine when it goes on sale later this year, making it the first diesel-powered car from Honda Motor to reach the United States. There is currently no information available on Interior upgrades of the new model, but don't be surprised to see it equipped with Acura's version of XM NavWeather, which has already been announced for the 2009 RL.