<< I know Honda builds fine cars. But if you torture them like most domestics are tortured then they'll show increased rates of failure (I've seen this exemplified by many of my friends who push their Hondas and Nissans with autos too hard >>
Not mine. I beat my '89 accord into the ground, I'd redline it like a dozen times, hit 100+ a couple times. All in one day, usually for the 50 mile roundtrip drive. Atleast 5 times a week. Oh yeah, break the tires loose once or twice a week. Man that car took a freaking lot of abuse.
Stuff did fail, such as the power steering, brake cylinder, water pump. But the engine and transmission didn't blink. The car had 150k miles on it, driven as listed above for the last 70k miles of it's life. And the drivetrain never gave me a single problem. I think the biggest testament in all this is the fact that I flipped/totalled the car before the drivetrain gave out. My driving ability gave out before the drivetrain did.
Now, obviously this isn't representative of all hondas, but I'm still damn impressed 😀