klein@ucbcad.UUCP (Mike Klein) (06/06/85)
Looking at my Webster's New World Dictionary:
coupe: a closed, two-door automobile with a body smaller than
that of a sedan.
sedan: an enclosed automobile with two or four doors, and two
wide seats, front and rear.
What does this say? If it has four doors, it's a sedan. If it has two
doors, it will depend on the body size. Generally the coupes ("coupe'",
by the way, is the French word for "cut") will have body styles that
are stylishly "cut" from a sedan body style.
--
-Mike Klein
...!ucbvax!ucbmerlin:klein (UUCP)
klein%ucbmerlin@berkeley (ARPA)citrin@ucbvax.ARPA (Wayne Citrin) (06/06/85)
Here's the best response I received to my question. It gives an historical
perspective to the coupe/sedan distinction.
Wayne Citrin
(ucbvax!citrin)
---------
The word coupe has been badly corrupted by Detroit (along
with a lot of other automotive terms). A coupe was originally
a closed car with seating for only two people - i.e. no back
seat. Back in the twenties and thirties coupes were perceived
as more stylish and sporting. Coupes usually had more trunk
space and were popular with salesman, doctors, and the like
who usually travelled alone. By the forties many coupe
styles included a small "squeezed in" back seat often called
opera seats for occasional if somewhat cramped extra capacity.
These were also called club coupes and generally had the same basic
lines of the two passenger coupe. After this it was all down hill.
I've seen the word coupe used to describe a design where back
seat roominess was sacrificed for styling. "Boxy" type
4-passenger cars are usually called sedans by the manufacturers.
--------
/ \
-------- ---------
/ | original coupe shape
-----------------------------
\ / \ /
--- ---
---------------
/ \
/ ----------
/ | original sedan shape
/------------------------------
\ / \ /
--- ---
Also-- You may have seen the old Model A Fords with rumble seats.
Both roadsters (2 seat open cars) and coupes (2 seat closed cars)
had rumble seats for extra seating.chas@ihuxe.UUCP (Charles Lambert) (06/10/85)
The term coupe comes directly from the French coupe' (that's an acute accent), meaning "cut-off" or "(having been) cut", and was applied by them to the type of closed two-seater described in an earlier article. The explanation I heard, for which I can't vouch, is that it referred to the shortened roof-line, which did not extend to the rear of the body as in traditional sedan styling of the time. Charlie Lambert @ the Death Star, IL.