We have been considering trading the 2005 Euro Luxury in on the top of the range Civic as it has all the bells as whistles too.
Finally went for a test drive yesterday and I can tell you I am still driving my Euro for a bit longer now!!!!
The engine is not real lively for a 1.5 turbo but you could live with the average performance and the little bit of turbo lag that is has, and the CVT tranny was not a problem at all despite all the naysayers.
But the deal breaker for us was the seats!
They are very narrow and I suppose you should expect a car designed in Japan and built in Thailand to not suit fat arsed Aussies, but the major issue was the headrests.
They are set so far forward to prevent whiplash that they are pushing your head forward so that your chin is resting on your chest.
After 10 minutes of driving both my wife and I had sore necks.
We got back to the dealer and they suggested we take the headrests out and turn them around, which we did but all that happened then was that we had no neck support at all.
They then admitted that other drivers had made the same comment.
How the hell could Honda have got this so wrong?
The only way to fix it would be to pay an upholstery $1,000+ to pull the headrests apart and rebuilt them with less padding or my redneck fix would have been to heat the shafts up with the Oxy/Acetylene and bend them back.
Another disappointment was the very plastic steering wheel. I have seen better steering wheels on arcade machines.
So a major disappointment for us and our Euro still drives better anyway.
