Are Gladiators “cars”? [ADMIN WARNING: NO POLITICS]

[ecidiego]

Dude it has a full frame. No unibody. It's a truck.

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[Remy_Dog]

Dude it has a full frame. No unibody. It's a truck.

Agreed!

 

[LostWoods]

A Jeep is made to go off road and occasionally drive on the street.

I think most of the company lineup would disagree and I'd argue even the JL doesn't meet this statement anymore. The last Jeep that met that description was the TJ and everything since has just been a lifestyle vehicle.

Yeah they're the best mass-produced off-roader, but that's not their primary purpose anymore.

 

[Rusty PW]

Dude it has a full frame. No unibody. It's a truck.

Do you call a Chevy Chevelle a truck?

Body on frame.

 

[Rusty PW]

Commonwealth of Pa. calls my JT a truck.

 

[Breadman]

Some people will only buy a "truck" so they can say they drive a "truck" and talk about their "truck" (that is definitely not a "car") so everyone knows they drive a "truck" and would never be seen in a "car". Don't really have that concern myself so I just go with the umbrella term...

 

[PDXsarge]

Whoa now!

 

[Tim. Y.]

Who gives a ... truck...

 

[Farmer Fran]

Neither are body on frame and not cars.

The mid-size Honda Ridgeline pickup truck is a pleasant midpoint between a useful work tool and weekend toy schlepper. It's powered by a 280-hp V-6 with all-wheel drive, and the key to the Ridgeline's smooth ride and carlike steering is its underpinnings—borrowed from the Odyssey minivan.

The Ford Maverick is a compact crew cab pickup truck1. The new Ford Maverick is a pickup truck with a unibody design and the first in the United States with a fully hybrid propulsion system2. The hybrid system is a four-cylinder, 2.5-liter Atkinson cycle engine that generates 191 horsepower when combined with the electric motor and 155 pound-feet of torque coupled to a continuously variable transmission that drives the front wheels2.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

Good grief. This was covered ad nauseam long ago.

Trokhos (sp) was the Greek for "wheel" and was used centuries before a train existed. Try the 1600s.
We can easily imagine the Greek word morphing to "truck" and then truck becoming that which has wheels, holds and hauls something.
Truck was used for the wheels under a ship's cannon, and "truck" or "trucks" was used for the cart with wheels that carried large engines from place to place. When I was deep into collecting and restoring hit and miss engines, and other "stationary engines", I bought TRUCKS for under those engines. So truck was something that hauled something else on top of it.
Farm engines were on trucks.
Possible that "truck" referred to the carriage of a train car that the wheels were running on - and that again would make sense because the truck had wheels, and the truck was carrying the load (the train "car")

Carrum and Carrus - Latin and Celtic, even karros - a chariot. It came to be the word for any horse drawn cart or carriage. So the terms Carrus, cassum and karros all have a sound similar to "car". They were used for a horse drawn cart, chariot, etc. so car naturally came into being since it was a "horseless carriage". If those three terms defined a horse drawn carriage or chariot, and later the horse was dropped, then it was natural for an "automobile" to be also called a "car".

So the two terms actually have different origins and originally different meaning -
Car (carrus) to define a horse drawn means of transport,
and truck - something with wheels that holds or carries something else (like a cannon, engine, or rail car)
All before trains on tracks existed.

The Jeep Gladiator is a truck.
Vehicles commonly called "SUV"s today are registered as wagons or station wagons in many states (oh, look up the origin of station wagon! )
The modern SUV is a logical progression of the "wagon" of the 1980s and 90s. Even some of the AMC design engineers decades ago drew what they thought the Eagle wagon would look like today - surprise - looks a lot like a modern "SUV".

For over 130 years, the "carts" under engines like this were called "trucks" -> (they support and haul things)

 

[Escape.idiocracy]

We consider ours to be a toy…. Not a truck, not really a “jeep”(wrangler), just a toy.

 

[azmojave]

Do you call a Chevy Chevelle a truck?

Body on frame.

Only when it comes in this flavor

 

[Free2roam]

Not a truck, not a truck and also not a truck.

 

[Rocksalt]

Gladiator is a TRUCK

 

[Rusty PW]

Only when it comes in this flavor

I was thinking about the El Camino when I posted.

Buddy of mine had one with a built 396 4 speed back in the early 80's. It was a clean ride.

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