Good day all, a brief intro before I launch myself into the unknown ( to me) world of Hondas. My name is Craig, I live in a little "village" of Calahoo outside Edmonton Alberta. Married, hence the question, two dogs, and a garage that I am almost finished.
My budget only allows me to look at the older Preludes, and from the Autotrader and Bargain finder puts me in the 86-88 maybe 89 Model. I just found out on the web the visual differences between the generations...that is about all I know at this point. I took an 88 si ( what does that stand for? ) for a test drive the other day....shifted hard and leaked so am avoiding that one. Am going to look at an 87 which I see is the next older generation...can someone provide me with some pointers between the models in that year and any considerations when checking out a used Prelude?
Thanks in advance.

 

1979 - 1982 1st gen
1983 - 1987 2nd gen
1988 - 1991 3rd gen
1992 - 1996 4th gen
1997 - 2001 5th gen

88-91 had 3 models....a S, which was carburated, a Si which was fuel Injected, and a Si 4ws...All were 2.0 except the 4ws (4wheel steering) which was a 2.1 (in reality a 2.05 engine)
I would go for a 1989 Si, I own a 88 2.0s and shes on her last leg thats being supported by 3 crutches.

the way to tell yeas is when they split....the 88 and 89 has 2.0S and 2.0Si on the trunk. The 90 and 91 had just Si written on the trunk.
Si came with Cruise control, lumbar support and a better choice of colors, but that brown interior sucks (IMO)

Cant really speak of 2nd gens, but bst of luck in your search

 

Si - Sport Inspired

this thread will help some. it is mostly 4th and 5th gen lude stuff but there is some stuff in there about the other generations.

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=549372

in the top right hand corner of all pages you will see a link called search. honestly searching the archives you should be able to find all answers you are looking for. if you dont find them by all means please ask. that is what we are all here for!

welcome to H-T and good luck on the lude

 

Si stands for sports injected

my b16 is an SiR, sports injected Racing


I would look for an 88 model, the 87 and older models had weaker motors

Good luck

 

Thanks all for the replies, we had a look at the 87, out of courtesy we talked to the guy, but it was just about a drive buy, body was rougher than we wanted to deal with. The little woman couldn't get comfortable in it either, the 88 was better in that dept. He did have the sheet metal around the gas cap replaced under "recall", is that an outstanding recall for all years?..I noticed the 88 was rusting away at that spot too.
We'll keep looking!