Definitions of Cars

Before reading all these definitions keep in mind your specific vehicle may fall into one or more than one of these groups, types or classes of vehicle.

A Vintage car is commonly defined as a car built between the start of 1919 and the end of 1930. There is little debate about the start date of the Vintage period - the end of World War I. The end date is a matter of a little more debate. The British definition is strict about 1930 being the cut-off, while some American sources prefer 1925 since it is the pre-Classic car period as defined by the Classic Car Club of America. Others see the Classic period as overlapping the Vintage period, especially since the Vintage designation covers all vehicles produced in the period while the official Classic definition does not, only including high-end vehicles of the period. Some consider the start of World War II to be the end date of the Vintage period.

An antique car is generally defined as a car over 25 years of age. This is the definition used by the Antique Automobile Club of America and many other organizations worldwide.

At no time in history have Americans been as interested in specialty automobiles as they are today. Be it a rebuilt old car or a newly constructed, limited production, special interest vehicle, this is the era of the unique to anyone interested in automobiles.

Hot rods are older, often historical, cars. Originally the term was used to the practice of taking an old, cheap car, removing weight (usually by removing roof, hood, bumpers, windscreen and fenders), lower it, change or tune the engine to give more power, add fat wheels and paint it to make it stand out. The term may have originated from "hot roadster" and the term was used in the 1950s and 1960s as a derogatory term for any car that did not fit into the mainstream. Other sources indicate that the term was derived from replacement of connecting rods in engines to allow higher RPMs to be reached without parts failure. In the 1970s hot rodders tried to clean up their reputation and thus they started to use the term "street rod" instead.

The Hot Rod era extended from 1945 to the beginning of the muscle car era (about 1965), reaching its height in about 1955. During this time, there was an adequate supply of what hot rodders called "vintage tin" -- junk cars manufactured prior to 1942 that could be had cheaply. Many of these had sound bodies and frames and had been junked for mechanical reasons, since the running gear of early cars was not durable.

Nowdays people who own hot rods keep them clean and try to make them noticeable. Those who work according to the original idea of cheap, fast and no frills are often called rat rods. There are many magazines that you can look at to see hot rods like Hot Rodder Magazine, Street Rodder, and Popular Hot Rodding. There are also television shows like My Classic Car, and Horse Power TV. Hot rods are important to American culture.

A classic car is one where: the age of the car at the end of the year of assessment is 15 years or more. More common usage fundamentally equates Classic car with the definition of antique car as used by the Antique Automobile Club of America, who define an Antique car as one over 25 years old. Thus, popular usage is that any car over 25 years old can be called a 'classic car'.

25 years is generally considered a good cut-off age for such terms because it's extremely rare for a vehicle that old to still be owned or used without special consideration for its classic status - by 25 years old, a car will have exceeded its design life by some considerable margin, 10-15 years being the norm barring accidental loss. It will probably need significant maintenance to keep running, and many parts will be hard to obtain through the usual channels. Thus, a non-enthusiast will sensibly conclude that it is not feasible to continue using a car that old for regular driving.

The theory of modifying an automobiles engine & body in a quest for improved performance and appearance was nothing new to the gearheads of the 60's & 70's however. The concept of hot-rodding pre-dated the dawn of the muscle car era and it's a philosophy that has remained widely popular to the present day, having evolved over the past half-century, inspiring numerous variations of the original dogma. Today's landscape of modified motorworks include not only the Hot Rod way of thinking, but other principles that include such categories as Street Rod, Street Machine, Resto-Mod, Pro Street and - coined in the 90's by Chevy Hi-Performance magazine - Pro Touring.

Of these familiar yet different automotive styles, the one that has been gaining significant momentum over the past 10 years is the doctrine of Pro Touring. According to Chevy Hi-Performance, the general definition of a Pro Touring car, also referred to as a G-Machine, is one that charges from 0-60mph like a drag racer, sticks to the curves like a Trans-Am road racer, has brakes big enough to stop a speeding train, and is yet sophisticated enough to comfortably manage bumper-to-bumper traffic in 100-plus-degree temperatures with the A/C and stereo blaring. In essence, a Pro Touring car is a machine that can truly do it all, and do it well.

What is a Super Car?

To an automotive enthusiast, the supercar is first the stuff of fantasy. Supercars reside at life's uppermost edge, the stratosphere in a rarified world of passion, measured by beauty, power, performance and wealth. You can also say that the supercar is the "brass ring" of automobiles, just beyond everyone's reach. Supercars are sexy and powerful. Supercars are generally uncomfortable, loud, fast, and violent. Supercars are adrenaline-pumping thrill rides. Ownership of a supercar—or supercars—is considered transitory; those who possess them are merely their stewards, pampering them to keep them in original condition. Owners buy and trade their supercars for other supercars as they become available.

What is a Custom Car?

An automobile that has been restyled, or an all-new body fitted on an existing chassis.

What is a Full Size Muscle Car?

What is a SPECIAL INTEREST CAR?
This category generally includes all eras of collector cars. Special Interest autos are identified as automobiles which have appeal for various reasons of engineering and/or style. Many automobile factory show cars and celebrity cars of all eras fit in this category. No typical styling features can be assigned to this group, but all unique and unusual autos can generally be categorized as "Special Interest."

What is a COLLECTOR CAR?
Generally speaking the term collector car refers to any of the above categories. As the collector car market expands, so does the definition of what constitutes a collector car. Today, vehicles from the 1970's that would have been abandoned are now being rescued and restored. Collectibility (as beauty) is in the eye of the beholder.

What is a Kit Car?

A kit-car is an automobile that is available in kit form, i.e. you buy it in parts that you have to assemble yourself. Usually you take many of the parts from one or more donor vehicles. A common type of kit car is the dune buggy dune buggy is a recreational vehicle having big wheels and tires designed for use on sand dunes or beaches, especially a light vehicle with a modified engine mounted on an open chassis. Also called beach buggy or a sand rail.

Many kit cars are made to look like historic or current cars (the AC Cobra AC Cobra was a powerful Anglo-American sports car built in the 1960s. It was far from the first car to combine a lightweight European chassis and aluminum body with a big American V8 engine, but it is possibly the most famous. The later, larger-engined cars are still among the highest-performing road vehicles ever sold.