Talk:Touring car

Winton picture
The Winton is not a good example for a Touring car as these body styles usually placed at least 5 passengers (large up to seven). I don't know from where the designation for this Winton comes but to me it looks like a runbout or roadster. --Chief tin cloud (talk) 10:38, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Copied from Tourer
Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 02:09, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Possible new sources of information
Listed below are possible sources of information for this article, especially the vast uncited parts related to the Ford Model T:


 * Model T Ford Production
 * The Death of the Model T: Smooth Roads, Closed Cars, and Technological Maladaption;

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 04:15, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Partial merger proposal
As the terms are applied to car body styles, there is no real difference between a basic phaeton body and a touring car. The difference becomes notable when one refers to the dual cowl phaeton, which has a cowl or bulkhead separating the rear passengers from the driver and front passenger(s).

I propose that the parts of the "Phaeton body" article that apply to the simple phaeton be merged into the Touring car article and that the remaining parts of the "Phaeton body" article, which would apply to dual-cowl phaetons, be moved to the title Dual cowl phaeton.

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 01:13, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Briefly, no. The distinction is that the tourer is designed to carry luggage. The two different images conjured up are: Phaeton-racy, Tourer-sober with luggage included. Phaeton light cheap and economical to run—Tourer strongly built and comfortable for long distance travel with luggage. Hence so many cheap Ford "Phaeton"s.


 * So I'm afraid I don't agree with your suggested partial merger and strongly disagree with any split of phaeton and dual-cowl phaeton - an over-refinement.


 * In British English what you call a touring car is an Open touring car, you seem to think the word open can be dropped, I can't assess and make a judgement on US usage. The Oxford English Dictionary (2011) says "touring-car n. a motor car designed for touring purposes, with accommodation for passengers and luggage." I would suggest a better definition within this (Wikipedia Touring Car) article would be that it was a car designed for four or more passengers and their luggage - look at your illustrations - and usually open. In British English what in American English became called a convertible (because it converted to being fully enclosed without sidescreens etc using wind-up sidewindows) became called an all-weather tourer. All-weather for obvious reasons - the roof could be removed.


 * In any case the word tourer relates solely to cars doesn't it. Phaeton (for cars almost solely in US English) came from carriages. It would be more logical to merge Phaeton body with Phaeton (carriage). Not that I am particularly strongly in favour of that. Eddaido (talk) 03:18, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * The idea for proposing the merger came from the definition for "phaeton" I found from the dictionary where I found definitions for limousine, landaulet, and "touring car":

phaeton n. 1. a light, four-wheeled carriage having one or two seats facing forward, and made in various forms. 2. an automobile of the touring-car type.


 * I have never before heard the distinction you state. The only use of the term "phaeton" that I had substantially heard about was the "dual cowl phaeton", with a cowl or bulkhead separating the rear passengers from the driver and front passenger(s).


 * The distinction you make sounds reasonable, and similar to the distinction I know of between a roadster (open two-seater built for speed) and a runabout (open two-seater built for economy). It will be interesting to see what else turns up in this discussion.


 * By the way, do you have any documents that support your position on phaetons against touring cars? If so, it would be good to add the information to the article, as it is not addressed there.


 * Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 05:53, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Does this help? or maybe I mean - is this the distinction you refer to? Working on it, will be back. Eddaido (talk) 06:38, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * In the fine print for the Owen Magnetic they list five models which I will attempt to define:


 * Limousine - with division for chauffeur
 * Coupé - hmmmm a closed two-seater? I think I mean two-door sedan?
 * Touring Sedan - a closed Touring Car, a Sedan(!)
 * Touring Car - Open four-plus seater with provision for carrying luggage(?) but this is 1920 maybe they still sent it by train?
 * Sports Phaeton - a lightly-built racy touring car without provision for luggage


 * The OED on Phaeton (it has nothing in relation to cars) "3. A type of light four-wheeled open carriage, usually drawn by a pair of horses, and having one or two seats facing forward. Now chiefly hist. Sometimes with prefixed distinguishing word indicating a specific type of phaeton, as lady's, mail, pony, stanhope phaeton, etc.: see also the first element." My emphases it was Light and drawn by Two horses therefore racy and fast. Make sense? Regards, Eddaido (talk) 07:40, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Before I reply: I have converted your thumbnails into a gallery so that the thread indents can be seen and understood.  There are problems with recognising these as they were before in both Internet Explorer and in Firefox.
 * Sorry, didn't know that.
 * I begin my reply here: First of all, as I said below before I realized that this is made of several different entries and is not just one massive wall of media: library photographs with some handwriting on it are not a reliable source. Prove who wrote that and it might be more convincing.
 * OK but they are reliable - check me using Google (with common-sense) or even Google Books to get the right period.
 * Secondly, it is interesting to note that the Oxford English Dictionary does not have an automotive definition for "Phaeton". The 1968 Shorter Oxford English Dictionary at work does not have one either, and no definitions at all for "touring car", "town car", or "sedanca". The Webster's Third New International Dictionary at work, however, does have an automotive definition for "Phaeton": it redirects to "Touring car". My notes from Webster's definition of "Touring car" are not verbatim from the dictionary, but they indicate that the definition mentions it being an open automobile with two cross seats, usually with four doors and a folding top.  The definition ends with a statement that a touring car is also called a "phaeton" or a "tourer".  I can transcribe it verbatim tomorrow if needs be.
 * A very dusty librarian is emailing me scans of the phaeton and touring car entries in Websters New International Dictionary of the English Language . . . revised and published 1923 and the second edition of the New New published 1949/1950 (I think you checked with the third New New ed.) and you will be most interested in the (pleasing to me) results. Waiting for the scans so you can feel confident about quoting my exact transcriptions of them instead of my notes taken over the phone.
 * Thirdly, your attempted definitions of what Owen Magnetic means by their descriptions can be summed up in one word: "conjecture", which is even less welcome than "original research", since research at least requires observation while conjecture only requires imagination. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 01:16, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Mmmm, no offence taken, while I remember the 1930s I was maddest about cars in the 40s and early 50s and am on familiar ground. Eddaido (talk) 04:11, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * They say a bad workman blames his tools, but I will continue to work with the resources available to me. Here is the quote I had promised.

touring car n : an open automobile with two cross seats, usu. four doors, and a folding top &mdash; called also phaeton, tourer –


 * I shall try to arrange a visit to the local library this weekend for more suitable dictionaries and glossaries.


 * Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 21:03, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I suspect USA has always had a new immigrant population that does not have English as a first language and because of this those people sometimes not knowing the exactly correct word find an approximation that gets the idea across. The net result is a more casual approach to the precise meanings of words? Here is a classic example - of a Touring Car. Eddaido (talk) 08:28, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I notice the essential component of luggage carrying capacity is missing from the definition in this case too: Grand tourer Eddaido (talk) 08:28, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I will prepare a fuller response later, but for now I must say that some handwriting on the front of a picture in a library is not a particularly reliable source, especially from a library in a country that "has always had a new immigrant population that does not have English as a first language and because of this those people sometimes not knowing the exactly correct word find an approximation that gets the idea across." Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 15:39, 16 November 2011 (UTC)


 * It does not surprise me that the Environmental Protection Agency cannot tell a station wagon from a touring car. If I remember correctly, the only definitions they have for distinctions between cars regard size and are based on interior volume.
 * That's very good :)
 * I do find it interesting, though, that the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary from 1968 does not have a definition for a body style that became obsolete at around the start of the Second World War. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 01:16, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You are not aware of the old saw, two nations divided by one language? Americans probably read their local editions of British English books unaware of the fierce battles between American editor (translator) and the author over individual words and if necessary re-phrasings to get the right meanings across. Its not limited to spelling. Eddaido (talk) 04:11, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * One of the things that is good about the Town Car article is that you make it clear you are considering the historic sense rather than the current sense (which is clearly Whoa . . .  to be discussed later) and this is important with regard to your search for dictionary definitions, the chosen definitions must come from the period when the words were used - not a recent casual (as described above) definition by Websters. Eddaido (talk) 04:11, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * A new thought, perhaps the word European is included in the Cadillac description above because it is a closed car (the European idea of a touring car?). Eddaido (talk) 04:13, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Dictionaries
Harris Allen, (editors) Webster's New International Dictionary of the English Language, Merriam, Springfield Mass. 1923*phaeton (-ton), n. [F. phaeton a kind of carriage, fr. Phaéthon Phaethon, the son of Helios. See PHAETHON]
 * 1. [cap.] Var. of PHAETHON, 1b; —chiefly used allusively for a rash or venturesome charioteer, a charioteer in general, or something that sets the world on fire. Obs.
 * 2. A kind of light four-wheeled carriage (with or without a top) having no side pieces in front of the seat or (two) seats. There are various modifications of the ordinary form.

(The illustration within that text shows a very lightly constructed four wheeled carriage with two individual armchairs, one in front of the other. i.e. max. capacity two people, one in front of the other.)

There is no reference at all to the word being used for an automobile. See 1949 edition below


 * touring, p. pr, & vb. n, of TOUR. —touring car, an automobile for touring; specif., an open car with a tonneau and four doors, usually seating five or seven passengers.

printed and published 1934*phaeton That is to say phaeton as in 1923, touring car as in 1949/50.
 * 2. A kind of light four-wheeled carriage (with or without a top) having no side pieces in front of the seat or (two) seats. There are various modifications of the ordinary form.
 * touring car, an automobile for touring. specif., an open car similar to a phaeton except that the body is longer permitting the use of additional seats in the tonneau.

1949/1950 edition
 * phaeton
 * 2. A kind of light four-wheeled carriage (with or without a top) having no side pieces in front of the seat or (two) seats.
 * 3. an open automobile body with two cross seats.


 * touring car, an automobile for touring. specif., an open car similar to a phaeton except that the body is longer permitting the use of additional seats in the tonneau.
 * tonneau - an after-body with a single door at the rear, now at the side

Other dictionary definitions refer above.

I have two questions:
 * Is this new flivver lightly constructed?


 * Is this coachbuilder special intended to be racy?

What do you think? Best regards, Eddaido (talk) 04:04, 19 November 2011 (UTC)


 * 1: Seems quite sturdy to me.
 * Yep but just sturdy enough, remember how much 1 cent saved on each vehicle added to Ford's fortune


 * 2: Actually, it does look rather sporting, as if it would make a nice roadster if the top were where the second cowl is and a trunk or a dickey seat were where the back seats are.
 * USE roadster with (raised) rumble seat plus windscreen; BE open 2-seater with (raised) dickey seat plus windscreen. But - what a lovely car! Anyway I find I'm (strictly) wrong about Cadillac - see below.


 * However, these examples probably fit in with the revisions made in the 1966 edition, regarding the terms as interchangeable.
 * Hmmm!? Is this what sales people call an early close?! Well, if they were 100W lightbulbs I'd class phaetons as light duty and tourers as heavy duty — aside from the other differences. Have a glance at this 80 Mercury Phaetons FREE 1956. Sporty? iff not racy. Later . ..


 * Interestingly enough, this is also at odds with the "Phaeton body" article's assertion that phaetons were made with extended bodies, initially to accommodate three rows of seats, but ultimately to give more room to the rear passengers. I wonder where that came from, especially since the statement in the article is unsourced. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 13:27, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * That's right. I wonder if this might be what we called a service-car, built on a big American I suppose ambulance or hearse chassis with 3 or more rows of seats which was used to take passengers, mail and light freight to outlying areas or between small towns. Postwar replaced by 25-30 seater almost empty clumsy (cheap) buses. For some reason I particularly remember a heavily chromed late 30s Chrysler with Fargo replacing Chrysler labels. Fore-runner of the Stretch?


 * Will now move beyond my local library system to try to get hold of Webster's 1934 printing (first) of their second edition. Sincerely Eddaido (talk) 03:29, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * 1934 found and inserted above. Sorry I've been distracted. Don't the other body types belong in the other article? What on earth might possess anyone to let them buy a new car without any form of weather protection at all, like a farm tractor or motorcycle. It even rains in the Caribbean, I think. You mention convertibles when I think you just mean ummmm light weather protection? Canvas roof and sidescreens? what is your preference? Plainly convertible is wrong, it is for a vehicle that can be converted from open to fully enclosed - try driving about on wet days with (or without when they are needed) sidescreens and you will soon understand what an enclosed car is, not a car with sidescreens! I'm not sure I agree with all your latest changes, what's the best way to handle this? Sincerely Eddaido (talk) 11:04, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Missing edit summary
I accidentally saved this edit before writing an edit summary. Basically, I rearranged the article, adding data from Torpedo (car) and adding new thumbnails. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 16:52, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Merge proposal
What we have in Tourer and Touring car are two articles covering exactly the same topic: open cars up to about the 1930s with four or more seats that were popular as family cars until the advent of cheap and sturdy closed cars.

There should not be two articles about the same subject and the obvious solution is to merge them. I had already done this, but it has since been undone.

How do we proceed from here?

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 00:00, 19 June 2012 (UTC)


 * The article "Touring car" contains much more information than the article "Tourer". So I suggest that any extra information of the latter one which is not mentioned in the first one should be transferred. Then, a REDIRECT to "Touring car" should replace the article "Tourer". --MartinHansV (talk) 07:42, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I concur, merge to the first. Unless there is a singificant grounds in source materials to distinguish between the two, it would be best to merge until a further date, Sadads (talk) 13:01, 19 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I had already merged the articles, but the merge was reverted in this edit. The edit summary given said: (Undid revision 460539233 by SamBlob (talk)Merge undone. Various pages link to this with specific reference to an open tourer rather than to a "touring car").


 * I'm not sure whether the objection to the merge indicates that they want to keep the articles separate or that they want to have "Tourer" be the main article. I also do not know what rationale they have for "Tourer" to be the main article. The argument they give in the edit summary to keep "Tourer" separate applies just as much to Drophead or Cabriolet, both of which redirect to Convertible.


 * Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 17:50, 19 June 2012 (UTC)


 * That merge should never have been undone. I fully support the merging of these two articles with "Touring car" being the main article with "Tourer" remaining as a redirect.  B.Rossow ·  talk  03:41, 20 June 2012 (UTC)
 * And I too would support a merger of the articles (if there are any) on Pizza and Apple Pie (under Apple Pie because that's US) they are both baked concoctions of fruit and pastry aren't they. And in the same way I don't see any useful difference between the products of Holden, Nissan and Chrysler (all with five wheels and a seat, I think and as different and useful as underwear unless you have a car fetish) - they should be merged under Chrysler.
 * If you continue to toss every thing into one scrambled American melting pot you will find in the future you will be unable to make easy useful distinctions at all let alone provide any guidance to writers who will use these articles as a reference. As with marque shooting brake and many others you pick up the muddle of those writers, you don't clarify anything at all, you just increase the level of uncertainty.  An encyclopedia that simply says everything is the same—all made of atoms. Is that your ultimate aim and intention? Eddaido (talk) 05:37, 20 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The difference between apples and tomatoes is rather clearer than the difference between "an open car with four or five seats" ("Tourer", from the start to the most recent version at this time) and "an open car seating five or more" ("Touring car", from 13 November 2011 to 2 June 2012). Besides which, we already have an article that covers the nearly interchangeable products of Holden, Nissan, and Chrysler. The title of that article is Automobile. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 12:56, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * "Touring car" is an old American designation for an open car with 2 (sometimes 3) rows of seats (5-9 passengers). Very early examples have their engines under the front seat bench or at the rear; before ca. 1910, there were no front doors. When body styles became more flush in the 1920s, Touring cars became more similar to the sportier Phaeton (European: Torpedo) that typically seated 4-5. Around 1930, Phaeton was the designation normally used for this body style. This can be observated with makes like Ford, Packard, and many others. The Touring car is a closer relative to the (Double) Phaeton and the Side entrance Tonneau than to the British Tourer or the French Torpedo.
 * British "Tourer" is far less specific. A tourer could be a 2-passenger car like the Riley MPH or the Jaguar XK 120 OTS ("Open Tourer Sports"), a very sporty 4-seater like the Alvis Speed 25 or Bentley 4 1/2 Litre or even a large 7-passenger car like a big Humber or Rolls-Royce. So, "Tourer" covers sometimes Roadsters, Torpedoes, or a Phaeton.
 * I think, there are many similarities between the two designations, but there were also differences. Much work to keep a merged article comprehensive.
 * Not yet mentioned are special body styles that were derived from the Touring car like the "Tulip" body or Roi-des-Belges (Touring car with raised back seat), the Mountain Wagon (a Touring car with 4 or more rows of seats, and often no doors at all), the early Victoria, or the Toy Tonneau, to name a few.--Chief tin cloud (talk) 11:34, 20 June 2012 (UTC)
 * This is the first worthwhile argument I have heard for keeping the articles separate. This would be a useful addition to the Tourer article if it can be sourced. As it is, the articles describe their topics as being exactly the same thing.
 * I had not heard of the Mountain Wagon or the Toy Tonneau before; I have heard of the Victoria (there's a picture of one shown in the Phaeton body article), and there is an article on the Roi-des-Belges.
 * Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 12:56, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * As I mentioned above, there are many similarities between touring cars and tourers and there are good arguments for merging the corresponding articles. In fact, coachbuilt.com defines the Tourer as "the British equivalent of a Touring car or Phaeton". The reason why I don't support this is simply that there are differences, too.
 * One of them is that you can find a two-passenger tourer, but not a similar touring car. Far less specific, as I wrote. Another is the typical door cutout on many British tourers. You can find that feature also on some French torpedoes, too, but rarely on American production touring cars (or phaetons, at that). That's another story with coachbuilt cars as they were built to suit a customer's specific needs. If it is preferred to merge these articles, there is a lot of work explaining that while a simple reference to the other article is sufficient when we stay the way they are now.
 * You can find an early touring car without front doors f.e. on 1904 Lesley's Monthly; Booklet on available cars
 * My source for the American touring car is mainly:
 * Kimes, Beverly Rae (editor) and Clark, Henry Austin, jr.: The Standard Catalogue of American Cars 1805-1942, 2nd ed., Krause Publications, Iola WI 54990, USA (1985), ISBN 0-87341-111-0
 * and for the British term:
 * Georgano, G. N. (editor): Complete Encyclopedia of Motorcars, 1885 to the Present; Dutton Press, New York, 2nd ed. (Hardcover) 1973, ISBN 0-525-08351-0
 * We do have similar problems with many other body styles; f.e. the mentioned discussion about drop head coupe, convertible (coupe), and cabriolet, or the difference between a roadster, a runabout, a spider, and a barchetta. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chief tin cloud (talk • contribs) 13:14, 27 June 2012 (UTC)


 * The term "tourer" as it refers to automobiles is very difficult to find online when one has to filter out "sport tourer" or "adventure tourer" motorcycles. I did find online snippets of a more recent version of Georgano's Complete Encyclopedia of Motorcars, 1885 to the Present, including the glossary definition of a tourer:

Tourer. An open car with seats for four or more passengers. Early tourers had no weather protection at the sides, later ones being provided with detachable side-screens and curtains. Those with wind-up or fixed windows were more often called all-weather tourers. After about 1930 the mass produced closed car replaced the tourer as the most popular type, and the average manufacturer soon abandoned the production of tourers. &mdash;


 * I also found snippets of another Georgano book, titled Encyclopedia of American Automobiles. In this book, the definition of a touring car is given as:

Touring car. An open car with seats for four or more passengers. Early touring cars had no weather protection at the sides, later ones being provided with detachable side-screens and curtains. Those with wind-up or fixed windows were more often called all-weather touring cars. After about 1930 the mass produced closed car replaced the open car as the most popular type, and the average manufacturer soon abandoned the production of such cars. &mdash;


 * I see I am in fairly good company in thinking they're the same thing, and that it's not entirely a matter of apples and tomatoes. I will continue my search, though.


 * Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 23:56, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Two-seat tourer
I have found a source for the two-seat tourer. Unfortunately, I have found no reference to a year or an author, although it seems to be inter-war, which means it wouldn't have an ISBN, either:



I will keep looking.

Even so, the wider scope of the British term "tourer" is likely to be explained adequately in a section in this article, thereby not needing two articles to cover the concept.

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 10:23, 26 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Support merge - Pre-war body-style naming is complicated enough to understand, so this proposal appears to be a sensible merging of two similar names which will help the general reader understand the nanced differences rather easier than having to read several pages. The pizza analogy doesn't appear to help matters at all. Warren (talk) 09:10, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Courtesy Information
Reference the discussion above at Partial merger proposal.

The photo with the caption "from NY Public Library Cadillac European Touring..", is not a touring car. The car is actually a Cadillac 1925 Type V-63 Custom Suburban for Seven Passengers. See page 100 of the book 80 Years of Calillac LaSalle by Walter M.P. McCall for photos correctly identifying this car. The photos in the book were taken of this exact same car at the same location. To my knowledge, there was not a Cadillac model with the name "European Touring" in this time period.

Many of the photos that were posted from the NY Public Library collection are misidentified, and they are easily proven as such. In some cases an incorrect year has been written on the front of the photo, and other photos show incorrect model names, series, or other details. As I come across these incorrectly identified photos I update these photo names and their photo descriptions. While renaming the photo I saw this talk page linked to the photo, and I thought you would like to know the correct model for the vehicle.

The photo in the gallery above has been correctly renamed. Zcarstvnz (talk) 11:02, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

UK?
Why this change of usage of tourer? Eddaido (talk) 07:02, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
 * There was no intention to change the usage, apologies if this accidentally occurred during the copy editing. Thanks for adding the reference. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 11:18, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Question on the US definition
"Touring car and tourer are both terms for open cars (i.e. cars without a fixed roof)."

"The popularity of the touring car began to wane in the 1920s when cars with enclosed passenger compartments (i.e. fixed steel roofs) became more affordable, and began to consistently out-sell the open cars."

If true, what replaced the touring car (particularly with these fixed steel roofs)? What closed alternatives to an open touring car existed during their popular period? Rally Wonk (talk) 11:31, 27 May 2023 (UTC)


 * Further, "The touring car body style was popular in the early 20th century, being a larger alternative to the two-seat runabout and the roadster."
 * What was a touring car used for? This article does not say. The runabout and roadster articles have use-case etymologies, why shouldn't touring car? Rally Wonk (talk) 11:45, 27 May 2023 (UTC)