A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport freight, carry specialized payloads, or perform other utilitarian work. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, but the vast majority feature body-on-frame construction, with a cabin that is independent of the payload portion of the vehicle. Smaller varieties may be mechanically similar to some automobiles. Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators. In American English, a commercial vehicle without a trailer or other articulation is formally a "straight truck" while one designed specifically to pull a trailer is not a truck but a "tractor".
A sport utility vehicle (SUV) is a car classification that combines elements of road-going passenger cars with features from off-road vehicles, such as raised ground clearance and four-wheel drive.
A pickup truck or pickup is a light or medium duty truck that has an enclosed cabin, and a back end made up of a cargo bed that is enclosed by three low walls with no roof. In Australia and New Zealand, both pickups and coupé utilities are called utes, short for utility vehicle. In South Africa, people of all language groups use the term bakkie; a diminutive of Afrikaans: bak, meaning bowl or container.
Since the start of the twentieth century, the role of cars has become highly important, though controversial. They are used throughout the world and have become the most popular mode of transport in many of the more developed countries. In developing countries cars are fewer and the effects of the car on society are less visible, however they are nonetheless significant. The spread of cars built upon earlier changes in transport brought by railways and bicycles. They introduced sweeping changes in employment patterns, social interactions, infrastructure and the distribution of goods.
Automotive safety is the study and practice of automotive design, construction, equipment and regulation to minimize the occurrence and consequences of traffic collisions involving motor vehicles. Road traffic safety more broadly includes roadway design.
Governments and private organizations have developed car classification schemes that are used for various purposes including regulation, description, and categorization of cars.
Corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards are regulations in the United States, first enacted by the United States Congress in 1975, after the 1973–74 Arab Oil Embargo, to improve the average fuel economy of cars and light trucks produced for sale in the United States. More recently, efficiency standards were developed and implemented for heavy-duty pickup trucks and commercial medium-duty and heavy-duty vehicles.
Light truck or light-duty truck is a US classification for vehicles with a gross vehicle weight up to 8,500 pounds (3,860 kg) and a payload capacity up to 4,000 pounds (1,814 kg). Similar goods vehicle classes in the European Union, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand are termed light commercial vehicles and are limited to a gross vehicle weight of up to 3,500 kg.
Crash incompatibility, crash compatibility, vehicle incompatibility, and vehicle compatibility are terms in the automobile crash testing industry. They refer to the tendency of some vehicles to inflict more damage on another vehicle in two-car crashes. Vehicle incompatibility is said to lead to more dangerous, fatal crashes, while compatibility can prevent injury in otherwise comparable crashes.
A bumper is a structure attached to or integrated with the front and rear ends of a motor vehicle, to absorb impact in a minor collision, ideally minimizing repair costs. Stiff metal bumpers appeared on automobiles as early as 1904 that had a mainly ornamental function. Numerous developments, improvements in materials and technologies, as well as greater focus on functionality for protecting vehicle components and improving safety have changed bumpers over the years. Bumpers ideally minimize height mismatches between vehicles and protect pedestrians from injury. Regulatory measures have been enacted to reduce vehicle repair costs and, more recently, impact on pedestrians.
A crossover, crossover SUV, or crossover utility vehicle (CUV) is a type of automobile with an increased ride height that is built on unibody chassis construction shared with passenger cars, as opposed to traditional sport utility vehicles (SUV), which are built on a body-on-frame chassis construction similar to pickup trucks.
The Volvo XC90 is a mid-size luxury SUV manufactured and marketed by Volvo Cars since 2002 and now in its second generation.
A rollover or overturn is a type of vehicle crash in which a vehicle tips over onto its side or roof. Rollovers have a higher fatality rate than other types of vehicle collisions.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and Highway Loss Data Institute (IIHS-HLDI) is an American nonprofit organization. It was established in 1959, and it is noted for its safety reviews of vehicles in various simulated traffic situations, including the effectiveness of a vehicle's structural integrity and safety systems during a collision, in addition to examining improvement on such elements.
A tow hitch is a device attached to the chassis of a vehicle for towing, or a towbar to an aircraft nose gear. It can take the form of a tow ball to allow swiveling and articulation of a trailer, or a tow pin, or a tow hook with a trailer loop, often used for large or agricultural vehicles where slack in the pivot pin allows similar movements. Another category is the towing pintle used on military vehicles worldwide.
A bullbar or push bumper is a device installed on the front of a vehicle to protect its front from collisions, whether an accidental collision with a large animal in rural roads, or an intentional collision by police with another vehicle. They vary considerably in size and form, and are normally composed of welded steel or aluminium tubing, or, more recently, moulded polycarbonate and polyethylene materials. The "bull" in the name refers to cattle, which in rural areas sometimes roam onto rural roads and highways.
Transportation safety in the United States encompasses safety of transportation in the United States, including automobile crashes, airplane crashes, rail crashes, and other mass transit incidents, although the most fatalities are generated by road incidents annually killing 32,479 people in 2011 to over 42,000 people in 2022. The number of deaths per passenger-mile on commercial airlines in the United States between 2000 and 2010 was about 0.2 deaths per 10 billion passenger-miles. For driving, the rate was 150 per 10 billion vehicle-miles: 750 times higher per mile than for flying in a commercial airplane. For a person who drives a million miles in a lifetime this amounts to a 1.5% chance of death.
Sport utility vehicles (SUVs) have been criticized for a variety of environmental and automotive safety reasons. The rise in production and marketing of SUVs in the 2010s and 2020s by auto manufacturers has resulted in over 80% of all new car sales in the United States being SUVs or light trucks by October 2021. This rise in SUV sales has also spilled over into the United Kingdom and the European Union. It has generated calls from car safety advocates to downsize in favor of models such as sedans, wagons, and compacts.
Road safety in Europe encompasses transportation safety among road users in Europe, including automobile accidents, pedestrian or cycling accidents, motor-coach accidents, and other incidents occurring within the European Union or within the European region of the World Health Organization. Road traffic safety refers to the methods and measures used to prevent road users from being killed or seriously injured.
The GMC Hummer EV is a line of battery electric heavy-duty vehicles produced by General Motors since 2021, and sold under the GMC marque. The Hummer EV is offered in two variants: a pickup truck and a sport utility vehicle (SUV), unveiled in October 2020 and April 2021 respectively.
