With production of the three-row Acura MDX joining the Acura RDX at American Honda’s East Liberty Auto Plant in East Liberty, Ohio, Acura has become a profoundly Buckeyed automobile brand.
Still stealing some production space at Honda’s Lincoln, Alabama assembly plant where the Honda Pilot, Honda Ridgeline, and 2018 Honda Odyssey are also built, production of the MDX has shifted to Ohio in order to free up capacity for both Honda’s and Acura’s top-selling model.
As a result of the MDX’s relocation, Acura now builds five of its six models in the state of Ohio.
And the one Acura that doesn’t hail from Ohio? That’d be the RLX, which forms less than 1 percent of the Acura brand’s volume.
Also assembled in the East Liberty plant is Acura’s second-best-selling model, the RDX two-row crossover. Combined, the two utility vehicles account for nearly two-thirds of Acura’s U.S. volume.
American Honda’s East Liberty factory is a utility vehicle haven. The Honda CR-V, America’s top-selling SUV/crossover in each of the last five years, is also produced in East Liberty, Ohio, albeit not exclusively.
Nine miles away at Honda’s Marysville assembly plant, Acura builds its two core sedans: the ILX and more popular TLX. Acura revamped the TLX for the 2018 model year. The ILX continues on the ninth-generation Civic’s platform, nearly two years into the tenth-generation Civic’s tenure.
Also in Marysville, Ohio, Acura builds the NSX at the Performance Manufacturing Center. Roughly 100 NSXs are assembled in Ohio each month.
The oft forgotten RLX sedan, the brand’s flagship in a sense, is the lone import in Acura’s U.S. lineup. Acura is barely managing to sell more than 100 RLXs per month in the United States.
Five-sixths of Acura’s U.S. lineup is thus Ohio-derived. But in one of Acura’s few other markets, China, the Honda HR-V-based Acura CDX is assembled in Guangzhou, China. There’s still no official announcement that would cause the CDX to make its way across the Pacific, but American Honda’s Acura vice president, Jon Ikeda, says, “We have our R&D guys looking into the possibility.”
That leaves Ohio-built nameplates as the foundation for 99 percent of Acura’s sales in the brand’s largest market.
Go Buckeyes.
Timothy Cain is a contributing analyst at The Truth About Cars and Autofocus.ca and the founder and former editor of GoodCarBadCar.net. Follow on Twitter @timcaincars.
I hear those ODM cars are legit.
+1
Jack B’s ODM Accord Coupe must be some collectors car. Those guys in the outskirts of Columbus sport “VTEC” tattoos. I’m sure JB has some to sport at events when he rolls up his sleeves.
You seem to think about Jack wherever you go.
Norm let’s be friendly and give these personal assertions a rest.
At least since they removed the chrome guillotine grill. Saw one of the beak’ed Acuras today, I imagined some midevil village square where that thing hangs ominously to detour crime.
O-H!
I-O!!
N-O
Which state is round on the ends and hi in the middle? O-HI-O
It’s a Buckeye thing. You wouldn’t understand.
I have never heard that before.
You need more Devo in your life.
I thought is was a bugs bunny thing.
I think Foghorn Leghorn did it too.
“It’s a joke, Son. Try to keep up.”
+10,000!
Go Blue!
Does Acura have a factory delivery experience? I always wanted to go to East Liberty, Ohio.
For me that would be awesome just for the 2000 mile drive home and trying to find the most entertaining route.
Unfortunately dear old Mom and Dad would expect me to come for a visit if I did that.
Go see them! Be a good son now, Danny.
I’d try it once if they’d cut you a break on the delivery charge.
Take it to the dealer ASAP when you get it home, then let them PDI it. (I’d ask that the protection wrapping be left on the car, in order to get paint-protection film applied on ding-less paint.)
Acura: Ohio Crafted Performance.
28cl, your so stuck in the past. Acura is just floating near-luxury brand for about a decade
Your (sic) so right.
Just like how Buick is floating on a wave of Opels and sales in China due to a misconception there that its an enviable brand of automobiles in its “home” (well, original anyway) market.
Said a, oh, way to go Ohio.
Happy to read this. Toyota and Honda’s footprint in the Midwest is pretty darn big, and I’d be happy to buy local next time I car-shop. Greensburg Indiana just got the new generation CRV added in addition to the Civic line already there. A good amount of suppliers (KYB, Keihin) have set up shop down there as well.
Wow that 2nd paragraph was confusing and tough to read.
Just curious, is Acura MDX a whole lot better than a Honda Pilot?