EK9: Civic EK9 TypeRx special edition, specification & details

After owning my EK9 for so many years now, i just found out today that my EK9 is actually not a standard TypeR, but a TypeRx special edition! I’m quite excited and shocked i didn’t know this all the time!
Naturally, i had to investigate the topic, and i’d like to share my findings with you. Wherever possible i tried to use official documents and sources for this post.
Let’s look deep into the differences between the regular TypeR and the Rx version and how i figured this out.

Honda made two special Editions of the EK9:
One is the N1 or Race-base “lightweight” edition, which is an EK9 inteneded to be modified for racing (HiFi and many other comfort features got removed, and it came with standard (non-recaro) seats, as it was thought they’re going to be rplaced anyway with full bucket seats of the drivers choice.
The second one was the Type Rx (or Type R-X, is it is sometimes written in the official Honda documentation):

The Rx was only introduced in November 1999 and for the facelift “kouki” model only, when Honda realized that many EK9 buyers wanted to have a bit more comfort features. So they factory installed:
– Keyless Entry
– Pioneer Audio system with 4 uprated Speakers and CD-player
– Aluminum pedals
– Red stitched shifter boot
– Electrically retracting door mirors
– A center console in glossy carbon fiber look (vs the matte carbon fiber look in the standard EK9).
– A different wiring harness for the above features.

Here’s one of the official Honda released Rx Interieur photos With the blueish center console, red stitched shift boot, Aluminum Pedals and single-DIN Pioneer CD-player all nicely visible.

This is an official closeup shot of the Rx-exlusive riveted-on Aluminum Pedals:

Here’s a little comparison between the regular (flat) and the slightly “blueish” glossy Rx Center console (ignore the additional gimmicks installed on the right side):

The engine, suspension, drivetrain and outside appearance are exactly the same as the standard EK9.
So the differences are really minor, but make a little change in comfort and style. I never looked closer onto it, so i thought an EK9 Rx would be more obvious to distinguish from the regular ones and that’s why i never actually went deeper into the topic, always assuming that my EK9 is just a standard Facelift Car. There is no special badging, vin-number or anything else except the mentioned feature that lets you know if it’s an Rx or not.
Well, what can i say? I’m more than happy to find out my Car is even rarer than i thought 🙂 I don’t know any production numbers, but one can assume that only a fraction of all EK9s are Rx’s. first of all because they were inly introduced for the late facelift model, and second because it was most probably quite a bit more expensive.

Information is sparse and even in the official year 2000 EK9 sales brochure, t here is only one small part showing the Rx special features:

In the same brochure there’s also a little model comparison between the Standard EK9, the Rx and the “Racing” version:

It seems there was a special leaflet brochure, showing the Rx’s features a bit more detailed. I foun this one in an EK9 Facebook group and i’ll try to obtain an original one of those, so i can get better scans and to have my car’s documentation complete.Front and Rear pages:

Inside pages:

Luckily i also own an original Honda special Rx Car parts manual (Parts list News), issued on the 7th December 1999, which was an add-on to the regular spare parts catalogue und shows all the special parts of the Rx in detail.
You can also see here that the Rx was avialble in all standard EK9 colours (Black, white, silver and yellow), and production started with Chassis No GF-EK9-1201361,
The below info also states that the part list was created in 20. November 1999, but some state that the actual production dates for the Rx dats from August 1999 to August 2000, when Production of the EK-series stopped alltogether.

See  the following gallery (Click to enlarge) with all the special features and part numbers, highlighted in yellow. On the first page, a different wiring harness is shown, which was required for the keyless entry and the retracting door mirrors.

Update: After digging a bit deeper into my collection of various EK9 documents, i even found an official Honda sales Info on the RX Model.
It got a special order Code (for a specific model) “5HR5R” and the Price info from 16.12. 1999 was 2’198’000 JPY (excluding aqcuisition tax 98’500 JPY and Weight tax 59’800 JPY)
Note that the Standard EK9 (5HR51) without options was priced 1’998’000 JPY in July 1999. So the price difference was quite low, hence many opted for the RX model after it became available.

Note that the following options for the RX were listed:
– Floor mat Carpets (21’500 JPY)
– Black Mudguards (4’500 JPY)
– Door visors (HOP) (11’000 JPY)
– Air clean Filter S (7’250 JPY)
for a total 44’250 JPY for all of the options

So how did i find out? I wanted to install the Mugen EK9 pedals, which are said to fit the EK9 facelift model. When i wanted to install them, i figured out that there are already some metal pedals which would make it impossible to install those. They seemed factory installed too, and not some cheap aftermarket items. After investigating a bit, somebody told me those are Type Rx pedals. I was quite surprized and started to investigate a bit more, and then i slowly realized that my Car has all the Rx exclusive features – and here we are. My TypeR is actually an even rarer TypeRx!

As yo can see, my Pedals are a bit dirty but still in good shape. The fact that those are so special made me realize that i might give them a bit of TLC to have them fresh and shiny again.

Update: How many RX’s were actually produced?
Let’s give it a try: I found those unverified numbers in the EK9 Forum, which seem to fit with other information i’ve found:
Of all variants of the EK9 ever produced, there were:
7’007 EK9-100 (1998 models),
4’009 EK9-110 (1999 models) and
5’225 EK9-120 (2000 models)
So there were 16’241 EK9 Civic Type R manufactured in total. A Japanese dealer network information states a sold quantity of 15’910 pieces.
I assume the difference of 331 were either race-base cars that never got registered for public road usage (racing usage only), or cars that were used by Honda for testing, homologation, exhibitions, etc.

Back to the Rx Topic:
Only 5’225 EK9 of the -120 Series (2000 model year lot) were ever built. The Rx started with chassis no 1361 (See parts info above). If we remove those 1’360 non-Rx spec cars then 3’865 cars remain from the -120 production lot.
That would make an absolute maxiumum of 3’865 possble RX’s ever built.
However, i think that still plenty of non-rx cars were built during this last production lot from Chassis no 1361 uppwards, as the Race-base, Standard type-R and RX were all sold in parallel, according to above 2000 sales brochure shown above.
I guess that somewhere be tween 2’000 and 3’000 RX spec cars were actually built and sold in Japan.
If we consider quite a few of those cars crashed meanwhile and / or broken down, my guess is that maybe between 1’000 to 3’000 RX models still exist around the globe, since many have been exported from Japan over the years.
Take this with a huge pinch of Salt however, as it is only a guesstimation, based on the (unverified) numbers i found online. I will try to find some verified data and update here, whenever i find something.