drivetofive

Odometer: 492,149

It’s a holiday weekend and I haven’t yet left town, but that will change when I head northbound to Utah later today.  I’m especially looking forward to this particular trip because I’ll be rocking out to some new tunes along the way!  My friend Amber (owner/operator of http://www.rabidrunner.com) mailed me a CD with 85 of the best car-related songs you could think of.  We’re talking some classics here, like “King of the Road” by Roger Miller and “Stick Shifts & Safety Belts” by Cake.  I’m stoked for the new additions to my road trip audio library.  Thanks Amber!

There seems to be “something” about these Acura Legends that makes them addicting to own.  In all, I’ve had 8 of them.  I have friends who’ve owned two or three times that number.  I think each of us enthusiasts secretly (or not-so-secretly) hopes to own a Legend of every year, color, and trim level ever produced.  Here are some of the stories on each of the Legends I’ve owned — in addition to the two that are currently in my garage.  I’ll list these in order by model year.

• 1986 Legend Base Sedan 5-speed:  This one (from the first model year of the Legend name) cost $300 and had around 225,000 miles on it.  My youngest brother drove it to high school and I took it over when he upgraded to a Nissan Maxima.  The Legend was a fun ride but was missing 2nd gear so that made driving it an adventure.  The ’86 Legends had a tilting moonroof – a feature that was discontinued on later years.

• 1988 Legend L Sedan 5-speed:  My uncle gave me this car when I was 17 years old or so.  I cleaned it up and sold it for something in the $3k range.  Pretty good rate of return!  It ran well.  The odometer was stuck at 144,000 or so but the car probably had well into the 200’s.

• 1991 Legend L Coupe 5-speed:  A rare example with cloth interior – this was a fun car.  I picked it up for a measly $700 from a friend with the intention of using it as my “winter beater” in 2004-05 in northern Utah.  As luck would have it, I blew out a radiator hose on a date one night, lost all my coolant, and overheated the motor.  The head gasket was blown and the car never ran the same after that.  On the plus side, I still sold it (fully disclosing the HG issue, of course) for $900 so I didn’t make out too badly.

• 1994 Legend GS Sedan Automatic:  This was a parts car that I went in on with a friend of mine for a few hundred bucks.  I didn’t even really end up doing anything with it besides saving a few parts before we sent it to the scrapyard.

• 1994 Legend GS Sedan 6-speed:  Gosh I miss this car.  Purchased from the original (female) owner in Orange County, CA for only $4,000.  It was in absolutely mint condition with around 211,000 miles on it.  It looked and drove like a new car even with all those miles.  When I had the chance to pick up my current Desert Mist sedan, I let this one go to a deserving enthusiast (and good friend) in the Houston area.

• 1994 Legend L Coupe Automatic:  This was a local Phoenix craigslist find for something in the sub-$1k range and a pretty good running/driving example minus a seeping headgasket at around 207,000 miles.  I kept it just a short time, though I invested a ton of time cleaning it up before selling it to a friend in Utah.

Will I own another Legend if my current two are ever retired?  Tough to say!  I received an email this week about a new version of the Acura TSX called the 2012 Special Edition that caught my eye. I already liked the TSX but this one just sweetened the pot a little more.  It’s got some sporty additions to the body, some handsome interior upgrades, and wheels unique to the SE model.  And… it looks hot in red.  Sign me up!

I’ll update later in the weekend with pics and stories from the upcoming Utah adventure.  Everyone have a safe and fun holiday!

This entry was posted on September 3, 2011 at 2:15 pm and is filed under Legend. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.