A hardtop is a term for a rigid, rather than canvas, automobile roof. It has been used in several contexts: detachable hardtops, retractable hardtop roofs, and the so-called convertible hardtop body style. An automobile is a wheeled vehicle that carries its own motor. ... A Retractable Hardtop is a movable top for a convertible It is made of plastic or metal. ...

Detachable hardtops

Before the mid-1920s 90% of automobiles had open tops, with rudimentary (if any) weather protection provided by a convertible-type canvas top and celluloid or isinglass side curtains. Some automobile bodies had roofs that could be removed during the summer and reattached during the winter, although it was a cumbersome and laborious job. By the time of World War One some automakers offered a lift-off roof, typically with a wood frame, canvas or leather covering, and glass windows. These removable roofs, sometimes called a California top, were the forerunners of the detachable hardtop, offering security and weather protection comparable to a fixed-roof model when installed. It has been suggested that Roaring Twenties be merged into this article or section. ... Saab 900 Convertible Convertible can also refer to a convertible (security) A convertible is a car body style with a folding or retracting roof. ... Celluloid is the name of a class of compounds created from nitrocellulose and camphor, plus dyes and other agents, generally regarded to be the first thermoplastic. ... Isinglass is a substance obtained from the swimbladders of fish (especially sturgeon), used for the clarification of wine and beer. ... Ypres, 1917, in the vicinity of the Battle of Passchendaele. ... Modern leather-working tools Leather is a material created through the tanning of hides, pelts and skins of animals, primarily cows. ...

Following the ascendancy of steel tops for closed bodies in the 1930s, detachable hardtops with metal roofs began to appear. After World War Two, the availability of new types of plastic and fiberglass allowed lighter, easier to handle hardtops with much of the strength of a metal top. // Events and trends A public speech by Benito Mussolini, founder of the Fascist movement The 1930s were described as an abrupt shift to more radical lifestyles, as countries were struggling to find a solution to the global depression. ... German soldiers at the Battle of Stalingrad World War II was the most extensive and costly armed conflict in the history of the world, involving the great majority of the worlds nations, being fought simultaneously in several major theatres, and costing tens of millions of lives. ... Plastic is a term that covers a range of synthetic or semisynthetic polymerization products. ... Fiberglass or fibreglass is material made from extremely fine fibers of glass. ...

In the 1950s and 1960s detachable hardtops were offered for various convertible sports cars and roadsters, including the 1955-1957 Ford Thunderbird and the Chevrolet Corvette. Because the convertible top mechanism is itself expensive, the hardtop is customarily offered as an additional, extra-cost option. On early Thunderbirds (and Corvettes through 1967), buyers could choose between a detachable hardtop and a folding canvas top at no additional cost, but paid extra for both. // Events and No. ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969, inclusive. ... Saab 900 Convertible Convertible can also refer to a convertible (security) A convertible is a car body style with a folding or retracting roof. ... Honda NSX sports car A sports car is a type of automobile designed for sporting performance. ... 1923 Ford Model T roadster 1950 Jaguar XK120 roadster This article is about the roadster car body style. ... 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1957 (MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ford Thunderbird The Ford Thunderbird is a car manufactured in the USA by the Ford Motor Company. ... The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car first manufactured by Chevrolet in 1953 and is built today exclusively at a General Motors assembly plant in Bowling Green, Kentucky. ... 1967 (MCMLXVII) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar (the link is to a full 1967 calendar). ...

Improvements in canvas tops have rendered the detachable hardtop less common in recent years, in part because the top cannot be stored in the vehicle when not in use, requiring a garage or other storage facility. Nonetheless, some open cars continue to offer it as an option.

Retractable hardtop

Since the 1930s the appeal of a solid roof that can be lowered or retracted at will has been obvious. Perhaps the first such "retrac" was the 1934 Peugeot Cabriolet 301 Eclipse, which had a one-piece metal roof that could be stowed beneath the clamshell rear deck. The operation was manual, not automatic; while the designers had originally intended the roof to be electrically operated, period motors and wiring proved inadequate for the task. A Retractable Hardtop is a movable top for a convertible It is made of plastic or metal. ... 1934 (MCMXXXIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... Peugeot is a major French car brand which is today part of PSA Peugeot Citroën. ...

The first production car with a power-operated retractable hardtop was the 1957 Ford Skyliner. Its top merchanism used seven electric motors, 10 power relays, eight circuit breakers, and more than 600 feet (183 meters) of wiring to raise the decklid and lower the top beneath it. The process took about 40 seconds if everything was working properly. The "Retrac" was an impressive showpiece, but the top mechanism and its stowage space eliminated most luggage space with the top down, the system was heavy and quite complex, and the price was some US $437 above a conventional convertible and nearly twice that of a baseline Ford sedan. It was eliminated after 1959, although elements of its design were used in several later convertibles. A Retractable Hardtop is a movable top for a convertible It is made of plastic or metal. ... 1957 (MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Electric motors of various sizes. ... A Ford Taurus, a recognizable sedan. ... 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Mitsubishi revived the retractable hardtop in 1995 with the Mitsubishi 3000GT Spyder. Impressively engineered, the Spyder nevertheless cost nearly twice the price of comparable fixed-roof models, and only 1,618 were sold. The Mitsubishi companies, or the Mitsubishi Group of Companies or the Mitsubishi Group is a large group (keiretsu) of independently operated Japanese companies which share the Mitsubishi brand name. ... A Retractable Hardtop is a movable top for a convertible It is made of plastic or metal. ... 1995 (MCMXCV) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Mitsubishi GTO. (Discuss) To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

In recent years, however, European manufacturers have increasingly turned to the retractable hardtop, including Ford Focus, Mercedes SLK & new SL, Nissan Micra, Peugeot 206 cc and 307 cc, Renault Megane cc and Volkswagen Eos. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Mercedes may refer to: Things Mercedes-Benz, a German brand of automobiles and trucks Mercedes-Benz (song), by Janis Joplin Mercedes (calculator), an early 20th-century computing device Mercedes College, South Australia Places Mercedes, Buenos Aires, Argentina Mercedes, Paraná, Brazil Mercedes, Camarines Norte, Philippines Mercedes, Eastern Samar, Philippines Mercedes, Texas... SLK may stand for the Mercedes-Benz SLK. Spear, Leeds & Kellogg Specialists LLC. SLK, an LL(k) parser generator for C, C++, Java, and C#. This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... SL or sl may stand for: The complexity class SL; see SL (complexity) Sierra Leone, ISO country code Slovenian language (ISO 639) The Mercedes-Benz SL an automobile sea level sine loco, used in bibliographies to indicate that the place of publication of a document is unknown special linear group... Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nissan Micra The Nissan Micra is an automobile produced by Nissan. ... Peugeot is a major French car brand which is today part of PSA Peugeot Citroën. ... Renault S.A. is a French vehicle manufacturer producing small to upper-midsize cars, vans, buses and trucks. ... Volkswagen, pronounced folksvagen meaning: peoples car (also known as VW) is an automobile manufacturer based in Wolfsburg, Germany in the State of Lower Saxony. ... Eos, by Evelyn de Morgan (1850 - 1919), 1895 (Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, SC): for a Pre-Raphaelite painter, Eos was still the classical pagan equivalent of an angel Eos (dawn) was, in Greek mythology, the Titan Goddess of the dawn, who rose from her home at the edge of...

Pillarless hardtops

Hardtop (on a Pontiac Catalina) showing simulated convertible features.

The other automotive usage of the term "hardtop" is a body style known as the hardtop convertible. A hardtop convertible is a fixed-roof model designed to look like a convertible with the top raised. While some early models retained side window frames and B-pillars, by the 1950s most were pillarless hardtops, omitting the B-pillar (the roof support behind the front doors) and configuring the window frames, if any, to retract with the glass when lowered. Some hardtops took the convertible look even further, including such details as simulating a convertible-top framework in the interior headliner and shaping the roof to resemble a raised canvas top. By the late 1960s such modifications were often superseded by a simple vinyl roof. Hardtop roof style, showing simulated-convertible features. ... Hardtop roof style, showing simulated-convertible features. ... 1964 Pontiac Catalina 2-door hardtop The Pontiac Catalina was part of Pontiacs full-sized automobile line. ... // Events and No. ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969, inclusive. ... Vinyl roof refers to a vinyl covering for an automobiles top. ...

A pillarless hardtop is inherently less rigid than a pillared body, requiring extra underbody strength to prevent shake. Production hardtops commonly shared the frame or reinforced body structure of the contemporary convertible model, which was already reinforced to compensate for the lack of a fixed roof. With such a reinforced frame, a hardtop was stronger and stiffer than a convertible, but both weaker and (because of the reinforcements) heavier than a pillared body. A frame or framework is a structural skeleton, which supports the other components of the object. ...

There were a variety of hardtop-like body styles dating back to at least the 1920s, but the trend-setter for mass-production hardtops was General Motors, which launched two-door, pillarless hardtops in 1949 as the Buick Riviera, Oldsmobile Holiday, and Cadillac Coupe de Ville. They were purportedly inspired by the wife of a Buick executive who always drove convertibles, but never lowered the top. The hardtop became extremely popular in the 1950s, and by 1956 automakers offered hardtop coupés, four-door hardtop sedans, and even station wagons. It has been suggested that Roaring Twenties be merged into this article or section. ... General Motors Corporation (NYSE: GM), also known as GM, is a United States-based automobile maker with worldwide operations and brands including Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, GMC, Holden, Hummer, Opel, Pontiac, Saturn, Saab and Vauxhall. ... 1949 (MCMXLIX) is a common year starting on Saturday. ... The Buick Riviera was an automobile produced by Buick in the United States between the 1963 and 1999 model years. ... 1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille. ... // Events and No. ... 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1995 Buick Riviera coupé A coupé (from the French for cut) or coupe is a car body style with a close-coupled interior offering either two seats or 2+2 seating (space for two passengers up front and for two occasional passengers in the rear). ... A Ford Taurus, a recognizable sedan. ... Estate car body style (Saab 95) A station wagon (United States usage), wagon (Australian usage, though station wagon is widely used) or estate car (United Kingdom usage) is a car body style similar to a sedan car but with an extended rear cargo area. ...

Throughout the 1960s the two-door pillarless hardtop was by far the most popular body style in most lines where such a model was offered. Even on family vehicles like the Chevrolet Impala, the two-door hardtop regularly outsold four-door sedans. The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969, inclusive. ... The neutrality of this article is disputed. ...

The hardtop began to disappear along with convertibles in the mid-1970s, partly out of a concern that U.S. federal safety regulations would be difficult for pillarless models to pass. The ascendancy of monocoque construction also made the pillarless design less practical. Some models adopted modified roof styling, placing the B pillars behind tinted side window glass and painting or molding the outer side of each pillar in black to make them less visible, creating a hardtop look without actually omitting the pillar. Some mid to late 1970s models continued their previous two-door hardtop bodies, but with fixed rear windows or a variety of vinyl roof and opera window treatments. The U.S. industry's last true two-door and four-door hardtops were in the 1978 Chrysler Newport line. The 1970s decade refers to the years from 1970 to 1979, inclusive. ... Monocoque (French for single shell) or unibody is a construction technique that uses the external skin of an object to support some or most of the load on the structure. ... 1971 Chrysler Newport The Newport was a name used by the Chrysler division of the Chrysler Corporation used as both a hardtop body designation and for its entry level model between 1961 and 1981. ...

Since then, no U.S. manufacturer has offfered a true hardtop in regular production, although some German manufacturers, including BMW and Mercedes have offered upscale pillarless hardtops. The body style may be due to return, however, as concept versions of the Dodge Challenger and Chevrolet Camaro shown in 2006 were both two-door hardtops. BMW AG (an abbreviation of Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, or in English, Bavarian Motor Works), is a German company and manufacturer of automobiles and motorcycles. ... Mercedes may refer to: Things Mercedes-Benz, a German brand of automobiles and trucks Mercedes-Benz (song), by Janis Joplin Mercedes (calculator), an early 20th-century computing device Mercedes College, South Australia Places Mercedes, Buenos Aires, Argentina Mercedes, Paraná, Brazil Mercedes, Camarines Norte, Philippines Mercedes, Eastern Samar, Philippines Mercedes, Texas... 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T 1974 Dodge Challenger 2006 Dodge Challenger concept Dodge Challenger was the name of two different automobile models marketed by the Dodge division of the Chrysler Corporation in the 1970s. ... Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Chevrolet Camaro The Chevrolet Camaro was introduced in North America by the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors at the start of the 1967 model year as competition for the Ford Mustang. ...

See also

• Car body styles