Stephanie recently found a non-native Racoon in town. Thanks to the 25 year import exemption, all sorts of exotic species from the Far East are finding their way here; but this is the first Honda Street kei van to wash up in Eugene. I’m not sure of the exact year, but I’m guessing about 1994 or so, as to its date of birth. Apparently (and obviously) the Racoon version has 4WD. Can it climb trees?
It’s got a 656cc triple rated at 38 hp. Plenty for scooting around our bucolic little city. But not so much for zipping along with traffic on the freeway.
This shot came out fuzzy, but then most of these kei vans don’t really look a whole lot different. A box is a box.
I was a bit intrigued by that “Top Speed 65” sticker on the back. Turns out the top speed of the Street 4WD is 65 mph. But why the sticker? Presumably to let impatient folks on the freeway know why you’re dawdling. But stickers in that vein were a common thing to put on the back of VW buses. Like “I’m Pedaling As Fast As I Can”. In this case, that might be believable.
I fail to see the merit in having 4WD on a vehicle such as this.
So he can drive it off road – like in his front yard, duh!
Here in the north east they are sometimes bought to be used as over grown golfcarts/ATVS doing maintenance on large corporate campuses and sometimes even doing some utility work ( a local company has one along side there fleet of mud tire and winch equipped rangers and colorados to work on utilities in remote areas). With that tiny wheelbase it would probably work well off road but a bit tippy on a side hill.
Are your knees the crumple zone?
Short answer: Yes, and the rest of your body too.
These words from someone who regularly drove the streets of CA. in an ’81 Subaru Sambar kei van (Jet Industries electric conversion) for 15 years. The only thing between you and oblivion is the front sheet metal.
Behind the wheel of such a vehicle, you really get in tune with how careless and inattentive many drivers are.
My kids would call this, the Honda “Trash Panda”. Putting one on the road risks it from getting squashed on a dark night.
Slow vehicle?
I had a namesake uncle who had a VW van and drove it in the Rockies. To this day, I cannot imagine a slower vehicle. It jogged up inclines. Conestoga Wagons, loaded with cannon shot, pulled by team of emaciated oxen, suffering from dysentery – faster than that VW van trying to make it up the Continental Divide with our family in it.
It was nerve racking road chaos. My mom pouring nervous sweat from every pour as she looked over the drop on the passenger side. We’d inch along like the Donner Party, waiting to drop into a snow bank. I remember my uncle cheerfully oblivious to what seemed to me to be a 20 mile long involuntary funeral procession behind us, inching along and cursing at him.
As the air grew thinner, our parched dry lips, posed in agonizing grimace at our slug-trip, would crack and bleed as Uncle Floyd would excitedly point to the historical marker which memorialized where families in earlier VW vans had leaped to their deaths, to end their suffering. “Would you like to stop and take a picture of it?”, Uncle Floyd would ask. “No – that’s OK”, my dad would respond. Twenty minutes later, we’d finally pass the marker.
There was dead silence in the van. Our dog, like all dogs, saw with his black and white vision, what must have looked like the dive bomber scene from the movie, “Twelve O’Clock High”. Our faces were frozen in terror, as we heard the VW engine screech like field mouse being torn asunder by a barn owl. I remember asking Uncle Floyd if the van would go faster if I got out and walked alongside.
As a kid, I would actually lie down under the windows to avoid the furious looks of the motorists behind us. If we pulled off for a road stop, I would look towards the parked cars and hoped none of them would remember us. Or if they were carrying torches, axes and pitchforks. Until Uncle Floyd had his van t-boned at an intersection, and replaced it with a Chevy van – we tried avoiding using his VW van to take us out on day trips. Or short trips. Or walks.
I remember those “I’m peddling as fast as I can” bumper stickers, and I immediately suffer from a bout of PT-VW-SD.
Thanks for that. Still giggling.
Haha, I feel your pain. When I drive my Westy on the highway, I just sort of throw myself into traffic and pray during the 25 seconds it takes to hit 65 that no one smashes into me.
I recently found a Mazda microvan like this in my neighborhood, and I’m pretty sure it’s less than 25 years old. Took lots of pics, haven’t had a chance to upload them yet. Didn’t even know Honda had one of these too.
Don’t feed it!
First time I have seen or heard of a Honda Raccoon Street kei car. Honda should mate the Raccoon with a Rumpler-Tropfenwagen for a new EV. Just make the size (waistline) appropriate for the American market. I think people would love it.
I think 1994 is a good guess, cos 25 year rule. From what I can gather from JDM online catalogue sites and Japanese used car sites, the G Racoon option for the Honda Street was a special edition model offered seasonally (or maybe consistently) from October 1994 to early 1996.
Subaru made a van like this too: the Sambar. Now in its 7th generation (8th as a pickup), the Sambar has been produced by Daihatsu as the Hijet/Atrai since 2012. However, the version I am most familiar with is the 5th-generation retro-themed “Dias Classic” if only from reading Ken Akamatsu’s “Love Hina” manga series & watching the respective anime adaptation. The van in the story plays a major role in the plot as it’s driven by one of the supporting characters and is apparently indestructible as it crashes several times but is still drive-able–in a way comparable to the red Toyota Hilux torture-tested on Top Gear. It may have had 4WD as well.
2 fun facts about the Sambar in “Love Hina”:
1) It was based on an actual van (roof rack included) parked outside the author’s studio apartment.
2) The license plates (front & rear) read “R2-D2”, the name of the famous blue android from Star Wars.
You got it the wrong way round, if I’ve read you correctly (apologies if I have misunderstood). Subaru ended production of their own kei vehicles by 2012, and has since just rebadged existing Daihatsu models.
Current models in this class (tall van/wagon) are the Daihatsu Hijet/Atrai (and its rebadged siblings, the Subaru Sambar and Toyota Pixis Van), Honda N-Van, Mitsubishi Minicab MiEV (still using the old body) and the Suzuki Every (and its siblings, the Mazda Scrum, Mitsubishi Minicab/Town Box, and Nissan NV100 Clipper/NV100 Clipper Rio). These same relationships exist for the kei trucks too (Hijet/Sambar/Pixis, Acty, Carry/Scrum/Minicab/NT100 Clipper).
You may be correct as I otherwise don’t know much about all the different Japanese vans beyond the Toyota Previa. If I did the correct research, Subaru ended all production of its kei-class vehicles in 2012 after Toyota’s investment in its parent company, Fuji Heavy Industries, and from then onward the Sambar was a badge-engineered Hijet built by Daihatsu (itself now owned by Toyota).
Vans & pickups this size would be perfect for in-town commuting & business use in small US cities where parking space is at a premium, hence why they’re still so popular–and necessary–in the Japanese market. Extremely good on gas mileage too I would imagine.
Thanks for featuring our van! We bought it for our adventurous lifestyle & don’t mind living the slow life (literally.) It’s a 1995 btw! My favorite vehicle I’ve ever owned.