On the market for a new vehicle, I decided to give the 2009 Acura RDX with the Technology Package a look over. As luck would have it, I had a buddy who owns an 08 RDX drive me to an Acura dealer in town. Having the ability to compare the two side-by-side was great. Looking at both of them, there is not much difference between the 08 and 09 RDXs. In fact you could say that they’re practically identical save for a few things that I doubt anyone would notice. Curb weight is lower by 40 lbs, rear legroom is 0.10 inches longer than the 08 and exterior length for the 09 is 0.30 inches shorter than its predecessor (duh!).
The RDX isn’t much of a head turner. Not exactly boring but it just doesn’t seem to make a statement. Some say that its 18 inch tires are a saving grace. Looking at the inside though is a different story and you must appreciate Acura’s attention to detail. Leather trim and breathable perforated leather on both front and rear seats, user friendly controls, the huge center console, that big interface dial for the navigation system You still see the same user friendly controls.
Looking at the interior The 09 now comes with a Passenger Multi-Adjustable Power Seat. It still doesn’t have the front side airbag that provides head protection. But what it does have though is the same efficient turbocharged, 16 valve, DOHC, IVTEC inline 4 engine that still produces 240 horsepower. This coupled with Acura’s Super Handling All-Wheel Drive (SH-AWD) technology makes the RDX a very nimble beast. Though not really meant to go off road (no skid plates to rock strikes), it’s agility on the pavement and perhaps gravel roads are a statement in itself.

I had a couple of weeks of vacation time and decided to go abroad. My first week was in Hong Kong and now I’m in the Philippines. The weather here is great-the total opposite of the winter temperatures we have back home.

Cars here are the same. You have your Suburbans, Expeditions and Beamers. Then again some that we don’t have: AUVs or Asian Utility Vehicles. To me they seem like the offspring of a marriage between a 80’s minivan and a mini SUV. The one thing I didn’t see here were Acuras.

Acuras in other parts of the world are actually Hondas.

The Acura brand is sold only in Japan and North America. The reason for the rebranding was Hondas answer to their fear of being regarded as a line of “economy” vehicles, even for the Accords and to some extent Civics which are their higher end products. This concern was shared by the other top Japanese car makers-Toyota and Nissan. Hence we have the Lexus (Toyota) and Infiniti (Nissan).

Back home we have the RL, TL, TSX, MDX and RDX models. Here they have the Accord, Civic, Jazz, City, CR-V and Pilot. Acuras are actually based on the Accord and Civic platforms. The Jazz by the way is the “Fit” back home. The “City” is something I don’t think we have. It comes with either a 1.3 or 1.5 iVTEC engine and cranks out 100hp for the 1.3 and 120hp for the 1.5.