The Honda Motocompo is one of the coolest scooters I know. It’s basically a briefcase on wheels and it folds up to take little more space than one. At 46,65 inches long, it was the world’s most compact folding scooter when it was launched in 1981, a category I wouldn’t think to be hotly contested, but there have been others. Think of it as a brilliant last-mile solution when you have to park your car but you’d prefer not to walk the rest of the way, and … well, that sounds like a Tokyo sort of situation.
The original Motocompo was designed to help with Japanese urban traffic situations, where office workers would have to park farther and farther, but didn’t feel like taking the cramped subway either. With a Motocompo, you could make it to work without creasing your suit.
A City Companion
Way back in the early 1980s, when they were produced, you couldn’t just walk into a Honda store in Japan and buy a single Motocompo. No, they were bundled together with the Honda City subcompact car: the 50cc Motocompo was an option for the City, and you’d need to order the car to get the scooter.
Honda sold 53,369 of the tiny bikes while the City sold some 310,000 units in Japan, meaning not as many customers opted for the Motocompo as Honda hoped. It wasn’t overpriced as it cost around a thousand bucks in today’s money, but Honda’s forecast of 10,000 units per month never materialized.
City! In city! The Honda City, for which the Motocompo was tailored, was a tiny, upright hatchback with round headlights softening its blocky design. Despite its diminutive dimensions, it was one of the bigger-engined city cars made in ‘80s Japan, with a relatively large 1231cc engine designed specifically for it.
It was also exported to Europe under the Honda Jazz name, making it a forebearer for today’s Honda Fit cars, as those have also been sold with Jazz badges in Europe. Here, the 1984 Jazz Futura was priced close to bigger competitors from European manufacturers, such as the Fiat Uno and Peugeot 205, while the first generation Suzuki Swift (originally sold as the SA310) cost the same while offering more space. A base Ford Fiesta was far cheaper. European Cities/Jazzes made do with 45 or 56 horsepower editions of the ER engine, but the home-market Turbo produced a hundred horsepower, or an extra 10hp as the Bulldog model.
The Madness ska band, advertising the City/Jazz and the Motocompo in the above Japan-market ad, recorded for their own Zarjazz label, so you got your Jazz in there as well.
There was also a fascinating, Pininfarina-engineered Cabriolet version – if the Motocompo fits in the truncated trunk of the Cabriolet, it’s not going to slide in easily, as the trunklid doesn’t open downwards like in a classic Mini or some tiny convertibles, but the hinges are up top. Thus, the lid is in the way if you’re maneuvering a folded scooter in there, especially one that weighs 92 lbs wet. The Motocompo does fold up very neatly, with the handlebars and the seat disappearing inside the body.
It’s also difficult to imagine a car that looks more like a shopping basket. Many convertibles do, thanks to the rollover bar, but the City Cabriolet especially so.
Perfect Fit For The NSX
Want to know which car also fits the Motocompo inside its trunk? That’s right, the mid-engined Honda/Acura NSX. While the scooter was already long out of production by the time the NSX hit the market, the trunk behind the engine is just the right size to comfortably swallow a folded Motocompo.
We know this thanks to a British NSX enthusiast, Chris Scott, whose family also owns a Motocompo (and a Jazz in the garage). Like Scott says: “I always wanted to know if I could (fit a Motocompo in the NSX). The answer is yes. A comfortable yes.” He didn’t even have to remove the wheels, and while the Motocompo is usually stowed in an upright position, it will not leak fluids if positioned lying down.
In a given scenario, this even makes the NSX the perfect one-car garage: drive it wherever you want, park it somewhere safe, and hop on the scooter for the rest of the journey.
It even comes in matching red, and I could definitely see NSX driver Ayrton Senna riding around the paddocks in a Motocompo instead of a Honda Elite.
What Can You Get Today?
Honda now makes the Motocompacto, a similarly folding electric scooter that’s the spiritual successor to the Motocompo. It costs $995 from Honda and Acura dealers, so around the same as the original scooter cost 45 years ago (typing that made me feel old), and it should also be a smooth fit into an NSX as it’s smaller and lighter: just 41 lbs.
Interestingly, the Motocompacto isn’t sold in Japan, while the City’s EV equivalent of today, the freshly launched Honda Super-One will only be sold in right-hand-drive markets such as Japan and the UK.
This means combining the electric, 2026 versions of the City and Motocompo is as difficult to set up as having a polar bear and a penguin in the same photo. It’s easier to get the original City to pose with the Super-One:
The Super-One even looks just like the Honda City, despite offering rear doors that the City never got. It has almost-round headlights and chunky fenders, both mimicking the original, and the vertical taillights also borrow from the City.
It will cost less than £20,000/$27,000 in the UK (where it will be sold as the Honda Super-N due to naming rights issues, see photo above), or over ten grand less than Honda’s previous urban EV, the Honda E.
The E, whose concept version looked a lot more like an early Civic than the eventual production version did, was a genuine flop with just 12,500 cars built in three years. That does make it a rarity and a potential future classic, but it’s likely the Super-One will sell better thanks to its sensible price.
It’s also a third lighter than the E, and while it has a lot less power (63 to 93 horsepower depending on whether you engage the boost mode), losing a thousand pounds certainly makes up for that. In city use, it should go as far as 199 miles on a charge or 128 miles in mixed use, which is around the same as the E.
Honda’s press release for the Super-One makes it sound just like a PlayStation on wheels:
“Moreover, by synchronizing the simulated 7-speed transmission that reproduces the gearshift feel of a traditional multi-gear transmission and the Active Sound Control system that produces and plays a powerful, “virtual” engine sound inside the cabin in accordance with driver input through the accelerator, the Super-ONE enables the driver to enjoy the feeling as if driving an engine-powered sporty vehicle, while offering the advantage of an EV. In addition to enhanced output and sound effects, visual excitement is also created through LED instrument panel line illumination on the front passenger side and a triple-meter display that changes from blue to purple when BOOST Mode is activated.”
Unlike Motocompactos, the Motocompo wasn’t available in the States when new. Plenty have been imported in the decades after, however, and a Texas specialist called Mr. Motocompo stocks several. If you happen to have a NSX at home, feel free to source yourself a Motocompo. The yellow ones would suit a yellow NSX especially well.
All images: Honda
The post Honda’s Tiny Motocompo Scooter Fits In The NSX So Perfectly It Feels Like That Was The Plan All Along appeared first on The Autopian.
