Honda Life: the kei car that made Honda’s small cars civilised

The Honda Life is an automobile nameplate used on various kei cars and city cars: passenger cars, microvans and kei trucks. The first series was built between 1971 and 1974, and the name was revived in 1997 and used until 2014. The Japanese-market Life has rarely been marketed outside Japan.

Honda Life at a glance

Based on one source, the English Wikipedia article on the Life.

History of the Honda Life

A more comfortable kei car

The original Life was offered as a two-door or four-door sedan and a three-door wagon, also sold as a commercial van, replacing the Honda NIII360. Compared with earlier Honda minicars, passenger comfort was improved to make it a better family car: Honda’s target was a kei as habitable as a period one-litre car, and the wheelbase grew to 2,080 mm, eight centimetres longer than the predecessor.

Water-cooled engine

The whole Life range used a water-cooled Honda EA 356 cc engine, usually producing 30 PS at 8,000 rpm. It began as the air-cooled engine borrowed from the Honda CB450 motorcycle. The engine had a balance shaft to reduce vibration and was called refined in period tests, considered as quiet and smooth as some four-cylinder engines. The change to water cooling also removed the smell in the heating system that air-cooled cars produced, and the gearbox was separate from the engine rather than sharing the sump as in the N series.

Step Van and later life

In September 1972 the tall, curiously shaped Life Step Van was introduced with three or five doors, and a pickup version followed with little market impact. The sedan’s top speed was 105 km/h and a period test recorded 34.9 seconds to 100 km/h. The name returned in 1997 for a new kei car line and stayed until 2014. In 2020 Dongfeng Honda revived the Life in China as a rebadged variant of the Fit.

Design and features

• Water-cooled 356 cc engine: smoother and quieter than Honda’s earlier air-cooled units.
• Longer wheelbase: 2,080 mm for more interior space.
• Balance shaft: fitted to reduce vibration.
• Separate gearbox: unlike the N-series layout.

Honda Life versions

• First generation (1971–1974): sedan, wagon and van.
• Life Step Van (1972): the tall three- or five-door model.
• Life pickup: a short-lived commercial version.
• Revived Life (1997–2014): the modern kei car.
• China Life (2020): a rebadged Fit.

The Life followed the Honda N360 and shares kei-car duties with the Acty and Beat. More Hondas are in the Honda collection.

Sources

• Honda Life, English Wikipedia: generations, engine, bodies, revival