(upbeat music) - You probably know the
difference between a station wagon and a hatchback, right? Well how about a Landaulet
and a Brougham, hmm? Yeah, didn't think so. In today's episode we're taking a look at all the different car styles out there: Big boys, small boys, pointed
boys, everything in between. We're gonna give you tools to identify different body styles, examine how they've evolved over time, and get to the bottom
of why they're called what they're called. We're gonna keep this video
to passenger vehicles, okay? Because commercial vehicles, motorcycles, vans and trucks could be
their own episodes entirely. But today it's all about cars. I wanna give a huge thanks to Keeps for sponsoring this
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wheelhouse and the number 50. Thank you Keeps, support the
companies that support Donut, and take care of your hair. Now back to the show. Okay, so let's dive in with
the car style most people are familiar with, the sedan. The main features of
the conventional sedan are four doors, a three box configuration, a closed body, meaning a fixed roof, and the ability to comfortably seat four or five passengers between two rows. Sedans get their name
from this cool-ass way to roll into a party. Wheel-less human-powered contraptions have been around forever,
and they're called something different all over the world. But in Britain in the 1630s, a sophisticated version
emerged called a sedan chair or just a sedan. Some people think sedans were named after the French town of sedan. But most of my etymologist
homies think it simply derives from the Italian verb,
sedere, meaning to sit. There are different opinions about who first used the word sedan in reference to a car body. Some credit it to the
Studebaker four and six models which were marketed as sedans in 1912. Others attribute it to Speedwell, short-lived auto manufacturer
based in Dayton, Ohio, who in 1911 used sedan to describe their new
closed-body two-door car. Sedans are some of the
most recognizable cars of the modern age. Sedans are so ubiquitous
that before Australia and New Zealand adopted the term, they simply called sedans cars. This brings me to our next
car style, the coo. (laughs) Coo. Or the coupe. Or the coupé, depending
on how you pronounce it. I say coupe, because I'm
a red-blooded American and say words like tutor.
(eagle screaming) And because coupé sounds
like a toupee for your car, and that just makes me,
that makes me itchy. It gives me hives just thinking about it. Like sedans, coupes have a fixed roof and a three box configuration, but are sportier and more compact with two doors and a sloping
or truncated rear roof line. Like a lot of car terms, the word coupe comes from our horse-drawn
carriage predecessors, stemming from the french
verb coupé, meaning to cut. The coupé was type of clipped carriage that seated two instead of four. With its rear facing
seats essentially cut off, hence the name. The coupe body style has also given way to many variations as it's evolved. The sportiest of the already sporty coupes is the Berlinetta, introduced in the 1930s and popularized by Ferrari in the 1950s. On the other end of the
spectrum is the business coupe, which had massive trunk
space in lieu of a back seat. They became super popular
with traveling salesmen. Everyone knows the deuce coupe, and who could forget the cozy coupe? Sedans and coupes may seen very different, so how has the line between
them gotten so blurred? Well, you can thank car makers for getting willy-freaking-nilly with their naming conventions
in the second half of the 20th century. The confusion started once
manufacturers released coupes with the two and two body style. That is two proper seats up front, with two tiny little seats in the back. Then in the early 2000s,
car makers were like, oh, this whole two and two thing not confusing enough for you? Well, check out these new four-door cars that we're gonna call coupes. Because we love chaos and nothing matters. Mercedes had their CLS
class, Mazda had their RX8 with the suicide doors in the back. These quad coupes are at the
heart of an age-old debate: can you have a four-door
coupe and a two-door sedan? Or does it defeat the purpose
of terms all together? You know what I'm gonna say,
I'm gonna say yeah, it does. Why use words if you're gonna
take away their meaning? That's messed up. I'm looking at you, BMW. Let's take a look at
the four-doored BMW X6. With its sleek roof line,
you can see why it's marketed as a sports activity coupe. But that car's as much of a coupe as Dr. Phil is a real doctor. Yeah, he's not a doctor. Let's move on to the station wagon, also known as an estate car. Unlike the three-box design
of the sedan and the coupe, station wagons have a long-bodied
two-box configuration. This means its passengers and cargo areas are in one joined cabin with
the real tailgate hinged to allow for easy access to
all that junk in the trunk. The names station wagon
and estate car harken back to these vehicles' original
uses in the early 1900s, which was to transport
travelers and their luggage between railway stations
and country estates. So station wagons actually
began as commercial vehicles before making their
way into suburban life. Fancy that. These first-generation station
wagons are a great example of early custom work. Because it's not like you could just purchase one off the lot in 1910. Cab drivers with Ford Model Ts
looking for more cargo space would have independent coach builders produce custom wooden bodies
for their existing chassis. These converted wood-bodied Model Ts were known as Woodies. Eventually, car makers got wise and started making their
own station wagons. The first one assembled on a
manufacturer's production line was the 1923 Star Four
Model C station wagon. Pretty dang cute, right? As time went on, manufacturers
improved upon wooden bodies and replaced them with steel. The 1935 Chevy Suburban was the first all-steel
station wagon body. And by the early '50s,
most other companies turning out station
wagons had followed suit. Station wagon and estate models sold well in the '60s and '70s, but
were eventually eclipsed by other family-style
cars in the '80s and '90s like the minivan and the crossover SUV. Related to the station wagon is one of my personal favorites,
the shooting brake. Now all my carriage heads out there will know that a shooting brake was originally a horse-drawn wagon used to cart around shooting parties along with all their guns and ammo
and, I imagine, alcohol. This was back in the 1890s, but shooting brakes eventually came to mean a body style that
combines the station wagon and the coupe. This was especially prevalent
in the '60s and '70s. Companies offered these kind of two-door elongated sport coupes like a '65 Aston Martin
DB5 shooting brake. Other companies offered
the same body style, but didn't call it a shooting break like the Reliant Scimitar GTE, which sounds like a car from GTA. This style of car kind of
disappeared for a while, but made a comeback in the 2000s. One of the coolest and
weirdest looking of the bunch was nicknamed the clown shoe. It was the BMW's Z3 M
Couple, and you can see why. Challenging the conventional definition, the later 2012 Mercedes Benz
CLS class shooting brake had four doors instead of two, ugh. And the more recently shooting break, the 2018 Porsche Panamera Sport Turismo and Ferrari's first production four-wheel drive model, the FF. People go ape (beep) for
the FF, myself included. Also the Panamera Turismo
and that Mercedes, just call them wagons, guys, come on. It's nearly impossible to
talk about station wagons without bringing up the hatchback, named for its hatch-type
rear door that opens upwards. Lots of early hatchbacks
were actually marketed as small station wagons like
BMC's 1959 Countryman version of the Austin A40 Farina, predecessor to one of the most iconic
hot hatches in history, the Renault 5 Turbo. The hatchback design actually
dates back to the 1930s with the Citroen 11 CV Commerciale. But the term hatchback
didn't appear until the '70s when the cars really took off as popular small utilitarian
vehicles, especially in Europe. Maybe the most well-known hatchback is the Volkswagen Golf, designed by the juggernaut genius
Giorgetto Giugiaro. Who, in 1999, was named car
designer of the century. The MK1 Golf hit the scene in 1974 as VW's next big thing since the Beetle. Before long, it became
standard for car companies to release hatchback versions
of their most popular models. The hatch-door style has even made its way into luxury vehicles like
the BMW 5 series Gran Turismo and the Audi A7. If you've ever heard of
hatchback referred to as a three-door or a five-door, it's because the hatch is
considered its own door in addition to the two or
four existing passenger doors. Makes sense. That being said, what we see nowadays are more often the five-door version, especially in the US. We just don't like small
cars for some reason. Even though, our cities are quite packed and parking's a nightmare. Okay, big stretch now. (back cracking) Because we're about to talk limos. A luxurious, lengthy limousine
is popular with presidents, celebrities, and horny
teenagers going to prom. It's driven by a chauffer with a partition between the driver and the
passenger compartments. Limos and stretch limos are
made by converting the bodies of existing models. In the US, the most
common versions are cars like the Town Car, the
Navigator, the Cadillac XTS, and the Escalade, the Chrysler
300, and the Hummer H2. Entrepreneurial car nuts
have even converted semis into the biggest functional
limos in the world. But the longest limo of all time would have to be the 100 foot long, 26-wheeled American Dream. Just look at this honker! Now look again, and this time, notice that there's a freakin'
helicopter on the back of it. It was created in 1992
by this dude Jay Ohrberg who was known for building movie cars like the De Lorean in
"Back to the Future." And the American Dream
was both awe-inspiring and completely impractical. It was virtually un-drivable and eventually fell into disrepair, but not before garnering the Guinness Book of World Record's title
of world's longest car. Well done, Jay. Like coupe, the word
limousine is all wrapped up in carriage culture. It originally comes from the name of the French region Limousine, where the Shepherds
wore a distinctive type of cloak with the raised hood. The roof that extended
over the driver's seat on early limousines resembled that hood which is how it got its name. Originally, limos without
a hood over the driver were called broughams. Cadillac was the first to make
a motorized brougham in 1916. But like most cars in this video, the meaning of brougham has
changed since the early days. Take the classic Cadillac
Brougham land boat from the 1970s. A perfect example of
brougham being used on a car that doesn't actually feature
this driver exposed passenger and closed body style that
brougham actually means. In the 1970s, '80s,
and '90s, car companies would use brougham to
specify an upper trim level of a particular model. Chrysler did it with its New Yorker, Ford did it with its Ford Torino. So when it comes to car styles, the name brougham can be a little tricky. But here's one that couldn't
be any more straight forward: The Micro car. It's a car that's micro! These tiny vehicles have
little baby engines, generally 700 cubic
centimeters or smaller. Many of which were originally
designed for motorcycles. And for that reason that
many early micro cars didn't even have the
capability to go backwards. Micro cars can either be four wheeled, like a BMW Isetta or three
wheeled like the micro-est of the micro, the Peel P50. - [Man Off Camera] Oh, oh my god. - Micro cars cropped up after World War II initially in Germany and
the UK as an alternative to the motorcycle with
better weather protection. One of the first to appear
was the 1949 Bond Minicar. This looks like something
you'd buy your rich-ass kid. It only weighed about 300
pounds, used a mere 50cc engine. One of the rarest micro cars is the 1950's egg-shaped Brutsch Mopetta. Mopetta baby! Only 14 of these things were ever produced and just five of them remain today. But when the Mini busted
on the scene in 1959, micro car customers traded
in their one-seaters for these roomier, more powerful vehicles that were still small and affordable. In the '90s, however, micro
cars made a little bit of a comeback with the
itty bitty Smart Fortwo. Another style and variation that can dramatically affect the overall look of a car is the fastback. A fastback has a single, unbroken slope from the roof to the rear
bumper that makes the car more sleek and aerodynamic. The precursor to modern day fastbacks are the teardrop shaped cars of the 1930s. And by the early '40s, you
can get a fastback body style from nearly every domestic manufacturer. Fastbacks are usually
coupes, but can be sedans like the old VW Bugs. An early fastback example is this stunning Bugatti Type 57 Atlantic, extremely rare car. There's only a few of them in the world. One of them changed hands
in 2010 for $40 million. Later fastbacks include
the classic '67 Mustang, like the Bullet Mustang,
the MK1 Plymouth Barracuda, the Kia Stinger is a fastback, and of course the Porsche 911, which has continuously maintained
its fastback appearance from its debut in 1963 to
today, very impressive. Fastbacks can get
confused with notchbacks, but the term notchback actually implies a horizontal trunk lid. It's usually reserved for distinguishing from fastback models of the same car. Like in the 1970s, there was a Chevy Vega which came in both. Then there's the Kammback also known as the Kamm tail or K-tail. This automotive styling feature
evolved out of an early need for aerodynamic improvement on cars. A Kammback slopes
downward like a fastback, but then abruptly cuts vertically down. It's like, it's like a
fastback with the butt cut off. Most common Kammback out there
has to be the Toyota Prius. But the coolest is probably
the Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe, the design developed and named after German aerodynamicist Wunibald Kamm in the 1930s was found to minimize drag, reduce fuel consumption and provide more vehicle stability at higher speeds. It was adding Kammback to the race car that finally allowed Ford to
surpass Ferrari at Le Mans. Notable Kammbacks since then
include the Ferrari 250 GTO, the '60s, the Datsun 240Z, and technically Tesla's latest Model Y. You know that car body
that's narrow at the center with a rounded front end
and a voluptuous back end? I'm not talking about the peanut mobile, I'm talking about what you'd wash that big rock-hard peanut down with. A refreshing bottle of Coke. Coke-bottle styling can
either be accomplished by pinching the waist of a car, or adding more pronounced curves over the front and back wheel arches. Unlike other styles based
on horse-drawn carriages, the Coke-bottle design was
inspired by aeronautics and the pinch-waisted
fuselage of super sonic jets. The styling was named for its resemblance to a classic contoured
Coke-bottle laying on its side. It's not a far stretch, actually, seeing as both the
bottle and the car style were developed by industrial
design legend Raymond Lowey. Like I knew it was similar,
but I didn't realize it was the same guy. The man designed everything
from cars, to toasters, to stamps, to juke boxes, to coffee shops, to airplane interiors. That's called range, people. He introduced the stylish
new Coke-bottle body in 1962 on the Studebaker
Avante Gran Turismo. Chevy followed a year later
with a '63 Corvette Stingray, and dramaticised the styling
in their '68 Corvette. It got even more widespread
in the '70s as Nissan, Mitsubishi and Toyota
offered Coke-bottle styling on multiple models. A more recent example
is the Dodge Challenger, which was also one of the
first Coke-bottle style cars back in the '70s, and frankly my favorite. I'm so glad they kept
it for the current one. A whole different class
of cars are convertibles. If I've learned one
thing about convertibles it's that you've got to keep
the sunscreen in the glove box. If I've learned two
things about convertibles, it's that there are so
many different names for convertibles. First, let's get the basics down, okay? A convertible is a car with a roof that can be folded down or removed. Most are two-door models, although four-door convertibles do exist. You can get a hard-top
convertible whose retractable roof is made of steel, aluminum, or plastic. Or a soft-top made of
materials like vinyl or canvas. The age-old question is though, what's the difference between
a convertible and a cabriolet? And honestly, it's not much. Cabriolet is essentially just a European term for convertible. It comes from the name of, you guessed it, an old carriage which had a
top that could be pulled up or left down depending on the weather. But both terms can be
used interchangeably, and only nerds will get made about it. (man screaming) You know what, to settle
on once and for all, let's just call them
convert-briolets, okay? Rolls right off the tongue. Then you have the roadster,
also known as a spider, or spyder, with a Y, which
is pretty much the same thing as a convertible/cabriolet,
just fancier sounding. Technically, a true roadster has two seats and no weather protection whatsoever. The terms roadster and spyder
can be used interchangeably, but they have very
different origins, okay? Roadster comes from an old-American term for a good traveling horse, partner. Spyder, with a Y, on the other hand, gets it's name from,
don't worry, it's not a, yes, it actually is a
carriage, from the 1800s. And it looked very spider-y. This two-door carriage perched high on some abnormally large wheels
was also called a phaeton. It was faster and more dangerous
than others at the time, and therefore, used more for
sport than actual travel. Modern-day roadsters have
kept alive this emphasis on sportiness and style over
safety and functionality. Many original roadsters and
spyders eventually evolved to have a roof and window options, which led to the terms roadster, spyder, convertible and cabriolet
all kind of meshing together. And then the fact that
spyder is spelled with an I and a Y just adds to the confusion. A good rule of thumb
to keep those straight is that if a car's Italian,
it's almost always spelled with an I. And that's because Italians
don't have the letter Y in their alphabet. (gun cocking) Cool. Another class of open-top
two-seat sport cars is the Barchetta. See how it kind of looks
like a skiff or a speed boat? Unsurprising, since a Barchetta
is Italian for little boat. A Barchetta is like a
roadster in that it's compact and truly topless. But instead of a full windshield, it has a short,
transparent wind deflector. Which, I know, sounds like the
same thing as a windshield, but it's not. There's already a lot
of convertible-ass cars, and we haven't even gotten
to the semi-convertibles yet, like the Landaulet. With a name like that, you best believe it used to be a carriage, okay? Opposite from the Brougham though, where the driver was exposed
and the passengers covered, a Landaulet has a fixed roof
over the driver's portion, but an adjustable
convertible top over the back for the passengers. They often have a partition
that separates the driver from the passengers,
similar to limousines, but these guys really never became popular as a daily vehicle. There were the kind of
cars that political figures would use at political processions. But that didn't really last
due to security concerns. A way cooler and more
prevalent semi-convertible is the Targa top. It's sort of like a convertible coupe. The back portion of the roof is fixed, but there's a removable
or collapsible panel over the front seats. Even though is wasn't the first car to have removable roof panels, the 1966 Porsche 911 Targa
popularized the style. It was named for the Targa Florio, a Sicilian road road the Porsche had recently done very well at. All Types of cars can have Targa Tops, but because Porsche trademarked the name, manufacturers just can't call it that. The ND Miata RFs had a Targa style roof as well as a C4 Corvette. Some people think that
you can interchange T-top and Targa Top, but there's
actually a bit of a difference, because T-tops have a
rigid non-removable bar running from the front to
the back called a T-bar. Arguably the shapiest of
car shapes is the Wedge car. (upbeat music) Some of the most iconic pointy boys like the De Lorean DMC-12,
the Lancia Stratos, and the Lamborghini Countach
emerged in the '70s and '80s. True wedge cars were more
futuristic concept cars or experimental racing cars
that weren't really practical. Though a few of them did
make it to production. The grandfather of the wedge car is the same guy who designed the MK1 Golf. The man of many Gs, Giorgetto Giugiaro. My back hurts. Now, it seems insane to
go from something as cool as a wedge car to something
as aggressively normal as an SUV, but that's what we're gonna do. An SUV's defining features
are raised ground clearance, a higher ride height, four-wheel drive and offroading capabilities beyond its function as a passenger car. They sometimes have two
doors like the old Bronco or Blazer, or four doors
like most SUVs today. There was a time when SUVs were produced with a body-on-frame style, where the separate body
was mounted on a chassis of a light truck. This method differentiates
SUVs from crossovers, which are smaller but similar vehicles with less off road capabilities
and get better fuel economy. Which use unibody construction
and a car-base platform. A perfect crossover example
is the mid-90s Toyota RAV4. Which really opened
this type of vehicle up to the market segment. But now the SUVs are
frequently being produced with unibody construction, the
delineation is kind of moot. And SUV has basically
become a catch-all term that includes crossover. All right, so that's it. Those are the different kinds of car bodies I've got for you today. Let me know in the comments if there's one that I didn't really cover and that you'd like to hear
more about, like trucks. Guys, make sure you subscribe to Donut. We put out a show every
day, it's pretty crazy. We're all going a little
insane because of it, that's fine. We do it for you. Follow Donut at donutmedia,
follow me at @nolanjsykes on Instagram and Twitter. Be kind, see you next time.
