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Introduction

The Automobile S can be classified according to various criteria:

their size, the weight, the type of use
the form of their Body
the motorization
the type of transmission
their level of equipment
their level of personalization or transformation.

Obviously, each model of car has a particular commercial name to distinguish it from the others.

Size of the car or segment

The size and the weight of the vehicle are dominating criteria for the choice, the design and the classification of a car.

The cars of the various marks marketed on the European market can be classified by group called also segment.

Each segment gathers the cars having similar sizes and one can say:

With each segment corresponds a type of use;
the cars of the same segment have relatively close selling prices.

The minivoitures (minibuss) will not be described in this article.

Click here to reach the classification of the vehicles of tourism by Segment.

For the vehicles of leisure (to be finished):

Roadster S: BMW Z4, Mazda Mx5;
half-compartments/convertible: Peugeot 206 DC, Mercedes-Benz SLK, Renault Mégane DC;
Super-sporting S: whole range of Ferrari and Lamborghini, Mercedes-Benz CLK-GTR; BMW m3 GTR
All-way (SUV or commercial vehicle sport): BMW X5, Toyota Rav4, Mercedes-Benz ml, Porsche Cayenne, Volkswagen Tuareg;
Cross-country Toyota Land Cruiser, Land Rover Dicovery.
crossover (mixture of truck of station-wagon and SUV) (opel will antara, nissan qashquai)

For the light commercial vehicles (authorized Total weight charges with it lower than 3,5 T) classification by segment is the following one:

Plate (rack (Record player))
(see to make specific article on the Automobile utility S)
(to be finished)

Note: the automobile contructeurs proposing with their catalog at least one vehicles of the segments has or B, M1, m2, H are called contructeurs general practitioners (for example: Peugeot, Citroen, Renault, FIAT, Ford, Volkswagen, etc). Contructeurs of cars not proposing that a limited number of segments are called Constructeurs Specialists (Ferrari, Land Rover, Smart etc).

types of body

In addition to its size, a car can be distinguished by its form from body and the number of opening (doors and trunk with luggage). Today, one can almost find in each segment of vehicle several of the forms of body described hereafter.

Currently, the various forms of body are:

Monocorps
Twin spool
Tricorps
Small boat (opened sport scar, generally without doors and with central engine)
Truck
Truck without amounts (not of central amounts between the doors)
Berlinette (closed central engine sport scar)
station-wagon (called " sometimes; commerciale")
Cut
Convertible (flexible retractable roof)
Cut convertible (rigid retractable roof)
Cut without amounts (not of amounts between the panes of doors and the rear windows)
Cut 4 doors (example: Mazda RX8)
Roadster (convertible 2 places, with or without glazing of the doors)
Monospace
Limousine
Record player

According to the number of beating doors, to which one adds possible the Hayon:

Two doors: compact, crossed;
Four doors: family, road, limousine;
Five doors: family, road;
Three doors: compact, crossed;

Couvercle of trunk
Backdoor “commits suicide”
Hayon (or shutter postpones)

Particularités:

without door (Mini Buggy, Moke, Jeep, small boats and roadsters without doors)
only one door (Isetta)
doors butterfly (Mercedes 300SL)
doors élytres (Lamborghini Countach, tunées cars)
Sliding door: Peugeot 1007…

Motorization

Spark-ignition Engine (with combustion interns)

one-cylinder
twin-cylinder
3,4,5,6,8,10,12,16 Cylindre S
cylinders in line
opposite cylinders (or flat)
cylinders out of V
cylinders out of W
rotary piston engine (Rotary engine)
driving 2 driving times
4 times

Gonflette type

The gonflette type is the translation of “ Muscle because ”, that one finds with the the United States. They are cars with an engine of big-engined car with a strong couple for startings but a very random handling like the Ford Mustang.

Fuel or type of energy necessary to the displacement of the motor vehicle

Gas oil
Gasoline
Petroleum gas liquefied
GNV (natural gas of city)
Gas-generating (during the Second world war in France for example)
Electric
Hybrid (gasoline + electrical motor) http://www.toyota.com/prius/
Combustible battery (prototype)

Transmission - Gear box

Gear box

manual Gear box (or with hand drive operation)
electromagnetic Gear box (Cotal)
Gear box with preselection (Wilson)
automatic Gear box
controlled “manual” Gear box
gear box with variator
variable speed transmission
sequential gear box

Transmission

Traction before
Propulsion (by the aft wheels)
Four driving wheels

temporary integral Traction
permanent integral Traction

The equipment of comfort and safety

Today the equipment of comfort and safety is important criteria in the choice of a car.

There does not exist system of grading of the levels of equipment transposable of a mark of car to another.

Each manufacturer determines his strategy according to the customers concerned.

But overall one can say that to distinguish the level from equipment for a given model, a manufacturer creates a certain number of levels of equipment with which it associates a certain number of characteristics.

The number of level of completion is variable, from one manufacturer to another, a model to the other, generally each level of equipment has a specific commercial name.

For example:

Niveau a: sits fabrics, airbag S (inflatable cushions) frontal
Niveau b: seats velvets, airbags frontal and side, air-conditioning without temperature control
Niveau C: seats velvets, airbags frontal and side, air-conditioning with temperature control
Level D: seats velvets, airbag frontal and side, air-conditioning with temperature control, audio system with 6 loudspeakers.

There exists a close relationship between the type of motorization and the levels of completion/equipment available.

It is generally not possible to buy a car with a bottom-of-the-range motorization and to have a level of top-of-the-range completion (and conversely).

To allow the personalization of the vehicle, between the levels of completion, the manufacturer proposes options which make it possible to obtain additional equipment without having to use the level of higher equipment.

In the language running and taking into account the multiplicity of the levels of equipment for the whole of the cars, we use a terminology vaguer than that of the manufacturers to indicate the levels of equipment, one often speaks the “bottom-of-the-range one”, “midrange”, “high-end”.

Personalization and transformation of the cars

The cars are manufactured goods in great series and in spite of the various possibilities of personalization offered by the manufacturer, a growing number of our contemporaries wish a car more personalized even. It is necessary to distinguish the transformations with " use; pratique" transformations with " use; plastique" :

On a side there exist professionals independent of the manufacturers who propose starting from a car of series (of tourism or utility) of the transformations to adapt it to a particular use. Very often, the wide one of this transformation downgrades the aforementioned vehicle of its category:

medical vehicle
vehicle Driving school
vehicle Ambulance
cooled vans (for example: Company Hulled grain)
undertaking
installation of a kit 4x4 (for example: Dangel company)
transformation of the type of energy (transformer LPG: example Borel Company)
shielding of vehicle
limousine
etc

Other side, the preparers, affiliated or not with a car manufacturer, propose preparation of cars (generally high-of-range): it is a question of carrying out modifications on the car with an aim of giving him a more sporting look and of increasing its performances. These practices can be comparable with a kind of “Tuning of luxury” carried out by professionals who remain vigilant with the reliability of the vehicle and the image of the manufacturer.

detailed Article: automobile Preparer

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