A suicide door is an automobile door hinged at its rear rather than the front. [1] Such doors were originally used on horse-drawn carriages, [2] but are rarely found on modern vehicles, primarily because they are less safe than a front-hinged door. Being rear-hinged, if the vehicle were moving and the door opened, aerodynamic drag would force the door open, and the driver/passenger would have to lean forward and out of the vehicle to close it. As seat belts were not in common use at that time, the risk of falling out of the car and into traffic was high, hence the name "suicide door". [3] [4] Another reason could have been that while a door was open on a city street, a speeding car moving in the same direction as the parked car could rip a front-hinged door off the parked car but someone inside the adjacent seat, even if moving to leave the car, could not get scratched. However, with a suicide door, someone inside or partially outside the passenger compartment would get struck by the suicide door forcefully swinging back to a shut position due to the impact of the speeding car on the door.
Initially standard on many models, later they became popularized in the custom car trade. [5] Automobile manufacturers call the doors coach doors (Rolls-Royce), [4] flexdioors (Vauxhall), [6] freestyle doors (Mazda), [4] rear access doors (Saturn), [4] clamshell doors (BMW) simply describe them as back-hinged doors. [1]
Rear-hinged doors were common on cars manufactured in the first half of the 20th century, [1] including the iconic Citroën Traction Avant. In the era before seat belts, the accidental opening of such doors meant that there was a greater risk of falling out of the vehicle compared to front-hinged doors, where airflow pushed the doors closed rather than opening them further. [4]
Rear-hinged doors were especially popular with mobsters in the gangster era of the 1930s, supposedly owing to the ease of pushing passengers out of moving vehicles with the air around the moving car holding the door open, according to Dave Brownell, the former editor of Hemmings Motor News . [4]
After World War II, rear-hinged doors were mostly limited to rear doors of four-door sedans. The best-known use of rear-hinged doors on post-World War II American automobiles was the Lincoln Continental 4-door convertibles and sedans (1961–1969), Cadillac Eldorado Brougham (1956–1959) four-door sedans, and Ford Thunderbird (1967–1971) four-door sedans. [4] The British Rover P4 used rear-hinged doors at the rear. German Goggomobil saloons and coupes had two-door bodies with rear-hinged doors until 1964. [7] The French, hand-made Facel Vega Excellence offered a four-door hardtop with a Chrysler-sourced Hemi V8 beginning in 1954.
In 2003, the new Rolls-Royce Phantom car reintroduced independent rear-hinged doors in luxury vehicle applications. Other luxury models with rear-hinged doors include the Spyker D8 and the Rolls-Royce Phantom Drophead Coupe four-seat convertible. The most recent mass-produced model with such doors may be the Opel Meriva, [8] followed by the Rolls-Royce Cullinan in 2018, and a few Chinese electric vehicles including the Singulato iS6 in 2018 and HiPhi X in 2020. [9] [10] Lincoln announced that 80 limited-edition 2019 Continentals would be made with "coach" doors, marking the Continental's 80th anniversary. [11] The 2020 Citroen Ami electric vehicle is unusual in having a suicide door for the driver but a conventional door for the passenger, as the doors are identical units that are not differentiated by side.
In the early 2000s, rear-hinged rear doors that are held closed by the front doors, and cannot be opened until released by opening the front door on the same side (hinged at the front), have appeared on a number of vehicles. Such doors may be referred to as clamshell doors. Examples include extended-cab pickup trucks, the Saturn SC, Saturn Ion Quad Coupe, Honda Element, Toyota FJ Cruiser, BMW i3, Mini Cooper Clubman, Mazda RX-8, Mazda MX-30 [1] and Fiat 500 3+1. [12]
Rear passenger rear-hinged doors had long been used on Austin FX4 London taxis, discontinued on their successors the TX1, TXII and TX4, but reintroduced in the 2018 LEVC TX.
Several concept cars have featured rear-hinged doors, such as the Lincoln C, a hatchback with no B-pillar and rear-hinged doors at the rear, or the Carbon Motors Corporation E7, a police car with rear rear-hinged doors designed to aid officers getting handcuffed passengers in and out of the back seat. The Kia Naimo, an electric concept car, also has rear suicide doors. [13]
Other car manufacturers which have produced models with suicide doors include Citroën, Lancia, Opel, Panhard, Rover, Saab, Saturn, Škoda, Studebaker, Ferrari, Mazda and Volkswagen.
Rear-hinged doors make entering and exiting a vehicle easier, allowing a passenger to enter by turning to sit and exit by stepping forward and out. This is important for passengers who need to make a dignified entrance; the UK State Bentley has rear-opening passenger doors that are broader than usual and open very wide, allowing the monarch to exit the car in a dignified way. [14]
In combination with traditional front doors, rear-hinged doors allow chauffeurs easier access to the rear door. In Austin FX4 taxis, drivers were able to reach the rear exterior door handle through the driver's window without getting out of the vehicle. [15]
Rear-hinged doors also allow a better position for a person installing a child seat into the back seat of a vehicle than conventional doors, while being simpler and cheaper to build than the sliding doors commonly used on minivans. The Opel Meriva B compact MPV introduced in 2010 had such doors.[ citation needed ]
The combination of front-hinged front doors and rear-hinged rear doors allows for a design without the B-pillar, creating a large opening for entering and exiting the vehicle.
When front doors are directly adjacent to rear suicide doors, exiting and entering the vehicle can be awkward if people try to use the front and back doors at the same time.
There are also a number of safety hazards:
Car manufacturers mitigate these hazards with such safety features as seat belts, and locks requiring front-hinged doors be open before permitting rear-hinged doors to open. [5]
Minivan is a car classification for vehicles designed to transport passengers in the rear seating row(s), with reconfigurable seats in two or three rows. The equivalent classification in Europe is MPV or M-segment - and are taller than a sedan car, hatchback, SUV or station wagon.
A station wagon or estate car is an automotive body-style variant of a sedan with its roof extended rearward over a shared passenger/cargo volume with access at the back via a third or fifth door, instead of a trunk/boot lid. The body style transforms a standard three-box design into a two-box design—to include an A, B, and C-pillar, as well as a D-pillar. Station wagons can flexibly reconfigure their interior volume via fold-down rear seats to prioritize either passenger or cargo volume.
A convertible or cabriolet is a passenger car that can be driven with or without a roof in place. The methods of retracting and storing the roof vary across eras and manufacturers.
A hatchback is a car body configuration with a rear door that swings upward to provide access to the main interior of the car as a cargo area rather than just to a separated trunk. Hatchbacks may feature fold-down second-row seating, where the interior can be reconfigured to prioritize passenger or cargo volume.
A coupe or coupé is a passenger car with a sloping or truncated rear roofline and typically with two doors.
The Lincoln Town Car is a model line of full-size luxury sedans that was marketed by the Lincoln division of the American automaker Ford Motor Company. Deriving its name from a limousine body style, Lincoln marketed the Town Car from 1981 to 2011, with the nameplate previously serving as the flagship trim of the Lincoln Continental. Produced across three generations for thirty model years, the Town Car was marketed directly against luxury sedans from Cadillac and Chrysler.
Coupé de ville is a car body style produced from 1908 to 1939. It has an external or open-topped driver's position, as well as an enclosed compartment for passengers. Although the different terms may have once had specific meanings for certain car manufacturers or countries, the terms are often used interchangeably.
The Lincoln Continental is a series of mid-sized and full-sized luxury cars produced between 1939 and 2020 by Lincoln, a division of the American automaker Ford Motor Company. The model line was introduced following the construction of a personal vehicle for Edsel Ford, who commissioned a coachbuilt 1939 Lincoln-Zephyr convertible, developed as a vacation vehicle to attract potential Lincoln buyers. In what would give the model line its name, the exterior was given European "continental" styling elements, including a rear-mounted spare tire.
There are many types of car body styles. They vary depending on intended use, market position, location, and the era they were made.
Delta was a General Motors compact front-wheel drive automobile and crossover SUV platform, originally developed by Opel Group. Delta was a successor to the Opel T platform; it also replaced J platform and the Z platform used by the Saturn S-Series. The platform debuted in the 2003 Saturn Ion. Vehicles of this platform generally carry the letter "A" in the fourth character of their VINs.
The Toyota Century is a lineup of full-size luxury cars and limousines produced mainly for the Japanese market, serving as Toyota's flagship car within Japan; globally the unrelated Lexus LS series is Toyota's flagship luxury model. Production of the Century began in 1967, and the model received only minor changes until redesigns in 1997 and 2018.
The Geneva International Motor Show was an annual auto show held in March in the Swiss city of Geneva.
The Opel Meriva is a car manufactured and marketed by the German automaker Opel on its Corsa platform, from May 2003 until June 2017 across two generations. Described as a mini MPV, it was marketed as the Vauxhall Meriva in the United Kingdom, while in Latin America, the first generation model was marketed as the Chevrolet Meriva.
The International Motor Show Germany or International Mobility Show Germany, in German known as the Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung, is one of the world's largest mobility trade fairs. It consists of two separate fairs, that subdivided in 1991. While the IAA Mobility displays passenger vehicles, motorcycles and bikes, the IAA Transportation specializes in commercial vehicles. Before the separation, the show was held solely at the Messe Frankfurt.
The trunk or boot of a car is the vehicle's main storage or cargo compartment, often a hatch at the rear of the vehicle. It can also be called a tailgate.
A glossary of terms relating to automotive design.
A car door is a type of door opening, typically hinged on its front edge, but sometimes attached by other mechanisms such as tracks, for entering and exiting a vehicle. Doors most often integrate side windows for visibility from inside the car and can be locked to secure the vehicle.
Quarter glass on automobiles and closed carriages may be a side window in the front door or located on each side of the car just forward of the rear-facing rear window of the vehicle. Only some cars have them. In some cases, the fixed quarter glass may set in the corner or "C-pillar" of the vehicle. Quarter glass is also sometimes called a valence window.
The Citroën Ami is a two-door, battery-electric quadricycle marketed by the French marque Citroën since 2020. Designed by Pierre Leclercq and named after the model produced between 1961 and 1978, the production model was previewed by the "Ami One" concept car. Both the Ami and Ami One were developed simultaneously by Groupe PSA and Altran. The vehicle is manufactured at the facility in Kenitra, Morocco and is equipped with a compact electric motor located at the front, generating 6 kilowatts to drive the front wheels. The vehicle's diminutive size has been noted by car reviewers, with a journalist from The Telegraph describing being inside the Ami as "being inside a Lego brick".