1947-1949:
A compound of US origin, hard + top.
Hard was from the Middle English hard, from the Old English heard, from the Proto-West Germanic hard(ī),
from the Proto-Germanic harduz, from
the primitive Indo-European kort-ús,
from kret- (strong, powerful). It was
cognate with the German hart, the
Swedish hård, the Ancient Greek
κρατύς (kratús), the Sanskrit क्रतु (krátu) and the Avestan xratu.
Top was from the Middle English top & toppe, from the
Old English top (top, highest part;
summit; crest; tassel, tuft; (spinning) top, ball; a tuft or ball at the
highest point of anything), from the Proto-Germanic tuppaz (braid, pigtail, end), from the primitive Indo-European
dumb- (tail, rod, staff, penis). It was
cognate with the Scots tap (top), the
North Frisian top, tap & tup (top), the Saterland Frisian Top (top), the West Frisian top
(top), the Dutch top (top,
summit, peak), the Low German Topp (top),
the German Zopf (braid, pigtail,
plait, top), the Swedish topp (top,
peak, summit, tip) and the Icelandic toppur
(top).
Although the origins of the body-style can
be traced to the early twentieth century, the hardtop, a two or four-door car
without a central (B-pillar) post, became a recognizable model type in the late
1940s and, although never the biggest seller, was popular in the United States
until the mid 1970s when down-sizing and safety legislation led to their
extinction, the last being the full sized Chrysler lines of 1978. European manufacturers too were drawn to the
style and produced many coupes but only Mercedes-Benz and Facel Vega made four-door
hardtops in any number, the former long maintaining several lines of hardtop
coupés.
1965
Lincoln Continental four-door sedan (with centre (B) pillar).The convention of
use is that the fixed roofed vehicles without the centre (B)-pillars are called
a hardtop
whereas a removable or retractable roof for a convertible is either a hard
top or, somewhat less commonly a hard-top. The folding fabric roof is either a soft
top or soft-top, both common forms; the word softtop probably doesn't exist although it has been used by manufacturers of this and that to describe various "tops" made of stuff not wholly solid. In the mid-1990s, the decades-old idea of the
folding metal roof was revived as an alternative to fabric. The engineering was sound but some
manufacturers have reverted to fabric, the advantages of solid materials
outweighed by the drawbacks of weight, cost and complexity. A solid, folding top is usually called a retractable roof or folding hardtop.
1957
Ford Fairlane Skyliner.Designers had toyed with the idea of the solid
retractable roof early in the twentieth century, and patents were applied for in the
1920s but the applications were allowed to lapse and it wouldn't be until
1932 one was granted in France, the first commercial release by Peugeot in
1934. Other limited-production cars
followed but it wasn't until 1957 one was sold in any volume, Ford's Fairlane
Skyliner, using a system Ford developed for the Continental Mark II (but never used) was an expensive top-of-the range model for two years. It was expensive for a reason: the complexity
of the electric system which raised and lowered the roof. A marvel of what was still substantially the
pre-electronic age, it used an array of motors, relays and switches, all
connected with literally hundreds of feet of electrical cables in nine different
colors. Despite that, the system was
reliable and could, if need be, be fixed by any competent auto-electrician who
had the wiring schematic. In its
two-year run, nearly fifty-thousand were built. The possibilities of nomenclature are interesting too. With the hard top in place, the Skyliner becomes also a hardtop because there's no B pillar so it's a "hardtop" with a "hard top", something only word-nerds note.
After 1960, the concept was neglected,
re-visited only by a handful of low-volume specialists or small production runs
for the Japanese domestic market. The
car which more than any other turned the retractable roof into a mainstream
product was the 1996 Mercedes-Benz SLK which began as a show car, the favorable
response encouraging production. Successful, over three generations, it was in the lineup for almost twenty-five years.
Roof-mounted hardtop hoist: Mercedes-Benz 560 SL (R107).The
Fairlane Skyliner's top was notable for another reason: size and weight. On small roadsters, even when made from
steel, taking off and putting on a hard top could usually be done by someone of
reasonable strength, the task made easier still if the thing instead was made
from aluminum or fibreglass. If large
and heavy, it became impossible for one and difficult even for two; some of even the smaller hard tops (such as the Triumph Stag and the R107 Mercedes SL roadster) were
famous heavyweights. Many owners used trolley
or ceiling-mounted hoists, some even electric but not all had the space, either for
the hardware or the detached roof.
1962 Pontiac Catalina with Riveria Series 300 hard top.No manufacturer attempted a removable hard top on the
scale of the big Skyliner but at least one aftermarket supplier thought there
might be demand for something large and detachable. Riveria Inc, based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, offered
them between 1963-1964 for the big (then called full or standard-size) General Motors
(GM) convertibles. Such was GM’s
production-line standardization, the entire range of models, spread over five
divisions and three years could be covered by just three variations of hard top. Made from fibreglass with an external texture which emulated leather, weight
was a reasonable 80 lb (30 kg) but the sheer size rendered them unmanageable for
many and not all had storage for such a bulky item, the growth of the American automobile
meaning garages accommodative only a few years early were now cramped.
1962
Chevrolet Impala Super Sport with Riveria Series 100 hard top.Riveria offered their basic (100 series) hardtop in black
or white, a more elaborately textured model (200 series) finished in gold or
silver while the top of the range (300 series) used the same finishes but with simulated
“landau” irons. No modification was
required to the car, the roof attaching to the standard convertible clamps, the soft top remaining retracted. Prices started at US$295 and the company seems
to have attempted to interest GM dealers in offering the hard tops as a
dealer-fitter accessory but corporate interest must have been as muted as buyer
response, Riveria ceasing operations in 1964.
1961 Lincoln
Continental four-door hardtop (pre-production or prototype).One of the
anomalies in the history of the four-door hardtops was that Lincoln, in its
classic 1960s Continental, offered a two-door hardtop, a four-door pillared
sedan and, by then uniquely, a four-door convertible but, no four-door hardtop. That seemed curious because the structural
engineering required to produce a four door hardtop already existed in the
convertible coachwork and both Ford & Mercury had several in their ranges,
as did all other comparable manufacturers.
A four-door hard top was planned, the factory’s records indicate a
handful were built (which were either prototypes or pre-productions vehicles) and
photographs survive, as does the odd reference to the model in some later
service bulletins but there’s no evidence any ever reached public hands. Collectors chase rarities like this but they’ve
not been seen in sixty years so it’s presumed they were scrapped once the
decision was taken not to enter production.
1966 Lincoln
Continental two-door hardtop.The consensus among Lincoln gurus is the rationale for decision being wholly because of cost. While the
Edsel failure of the late 1950s is well storied, it’s often forgotten that nor were the Lincolns
of that era a success and, with the Ford Motor
Company suddenly being run by the MBA-type “wizz kids”, the Lincoln brand too
was considered for the axe. It
did come close to that, Lincoln given one last chance at redemption, using
what was actually a prototype Ford Thunderbird; that was the car which emerged
as the memorable 1961 Lincoln. But there
was no certainty of success so it seems the decision was taken to restrict the
range to the pillared sedan and the four-door convertible, a breakdown on the
production costs of the prototype four-door hardtops proving they would be much
more expensive to produce, the added inputs both of labour and materials dooming
the project. To attract attention, Lincoln
anyway had something beyond the merely exclusive, they had the unique four-door
convertible.
It did work, sales volumes after a slow start
in 1961 growing to a level Lincoln had not enjoyed in years, comfortably
out-selling Imperial even if never a challenge to Cadillac. Never a big seller, achieving not even
four-thousand units in its best year, the four-door convertible was
discontinued after 1967, the two-door hardtop introduced the year before
out-selling it by five to one. The market had spoken; it would be the last convertible Lincoln ever
produced.
Deconstructing the oxymoronic "pillared hardtop"
1970 Ford LTD four-door hardtop (left) and Ford's press release announcing the 1974 "pillared hardtop", September 1973.
So
it would seem settled a hard-top is a convertible’s removable roof made with
rigid materials like metal or fibreglass while a hardtop is a car with no
central pillar between the forward and rear side glass. That would be fine except that in the 1970s, Ford
decided there were also “pillared hardtops”, introducing the description on a
four-door range built on their full-sized (a breed now extinct) corporate
platform shared between 1968-1978 by Ford and Mercury. The rationale for the name was that to differentiate
between the conventional sedan which used frames around the side windows and
the pillared hardtops which used the frameless assemblies familiar from their
use in the traditional hardtops. When
the pillared hardtops were released, as part of the effort to comply with
pending rollover standards, the two door hardtop switched to being a coupé with
thick B-pillars, behind which sat a tall “opera window”, another of those
motifs the US manufacturers for years found irresistible.
1976
Cadillac Eldorado convertible, at the time, “the last American convertible”. The aluminium wheels were a rarely ordered factory option. On paper, combining a 500 cubic inch (8.2
litre) V8 with front wheel drive (FWD) sounds daft but even in the early, more
powerful, versions GM managed remarkably well to tame the characteristics
inherent in such a configuration. The styling of the original FWD Eldorado (1967) was one of the US industry's finest (as long as buyers resisted ordering the disfiguring vinyl roof) which no subsequent version matched, descending first to the baroque before in the 1980s becoming an absurd caricature.
When ceasing production of the true four-door hardtops, Ford also dropped the convertible from the full-sized line, the industry orthodoxy at the time that a regulation outlawing the style
was imminent, and such was the importance of the US market that expectation that
accounted also for Mercedes-Benz not including a cabriolet when the S-Class
(W116) was released in 1972, leaving the SL (R107; 1971-1989) roadster as the
company’s only open car and it wasn’t until 1990 a four-seat cabriolet returned
with the debut of the A124. Any
suggestion of outlawing convertibles ended with the election in 1980 of Ronald
Reagan (1911-2004, US president 1981-1989).
A former governor of California with fond memories of drop-top motoring
and a world-view that government should intervene in markets as little as
possible, under his administration, convertibles returned (including Cadillacs) to US showrooms. In the even then litigious US, that prompted a
class action from disgruntled collectors who had stored 1976 Cadillac Eldorados
with the expectation of them increasing sharply in value, the suit filed
alleging a “breach of promise” on the basis of Cadillac advertising the things
as “the last American convertible”.
Historically, breach of promise actions were most associated with women seeking
redress against cads who promised marriage and then refused to fulfil the
pledge (an action still technically available in some US states) but the courts
quickly dismissed the claims of the Cadillac hoarders as “groundless”. Legal opinion at the time was that the suit might have had a chance had the words been "the last Cadillac convertible" and even then it would have had to withstand (1) the precedents which underpinned the notion of what in contract law was called "mere puffery" and (2) the then still prevalent sentiment that "what was good for General Motors was good for America", something which critics noted was still a detectable feeling among US judges.
1966 Lincoln Continental Sedan (left) and 1974 Buick Century Luxus Colonnade Hardtop Sedan (right). Luxus was from the Latin luxus (extravagance) and appeared in several Germanic languages where it conveyed the idea of "luxury".
It
was actually only the ostensibly oxymoronic nomenclature which was novel, Ford’s
Lincoln Continentals combining side windows with frames which lowered into the doors and a B pillar; Lincoln
called these a sedan, then the familiar appellation in the US for all four-door
models with a centre pillar. Curiously,
in the 1960s another descriptive layer appeared (though usually not used by the
manufacturers): “post”. Thus where a
range included two-door hardtops with no pillar a coupés with one, there was
among some to adopt “coupé” and “post coupé” as a means of differentiation and
this spread, the term “post sedan” also still seen today in the collector
markets. Other manufacturers in the
1970s also used the combination of frameless side glass and a B-pillar but Ford’s
adoption of “pillar hardtop was unique; All such models in General Motors’ (GM)
“Colonnade” lines were originally described variously as “colonnade hardtop
sedans” (Buick) or “colonnade hardtops” (Chevrolet, Oldsmobile & Pontiac) and
the nickname was borrowed from architecture where colonnade refers to “a series
of regularly spaced columns supporting an entablature and often one side of a
roof”. For whatever reasons, the advertising
copy changed over the years, Buick shifting to “hardtop sedan”, Chevrolet &
Oldsmobile to “sedan” and Pontiac “colonnade hardtop sedan”. Pontiac was the last to cling to the use of “colonnade”;
by the late 1970s the novelty has passed and the consumer is usually attracted
by something “new”. Because the GM range
of sedans had for uprights (A, B & C-pillars plus a divided rear glass),
the allusion was to these as “columns”.
Ford though, was a little tricky.
Their B-pillars were designed in such as way that the thick portion was recessed
and dark, the silver centrepiece thin and more obvious, so with the windows
raised, the cars could be mistaken for a classic hardtop. It was a cheap trick but it was also clever,
in etymological terms a “fake hardtop” but before long, there was a bit of a
vogue for “fake soft-tops” which seems indisputably worse.
1975 Imperial LeBaron (left) and 1978 Chrysler New Yorker. The big Chryslers were the last of the four-door hardtops to be produced in the US.
The
Americans didn’t actually invent the pillarless hardtop style but in the
post-war years they adopted it with gusto.
The other geo-centre of hardtops was the JDM (Japanese Domestic Market)
which refers to vehicles produced (almost) exclusively for sale within Japan
and rarely seen beyond except in diplomatic use, as private imports, or as part
of the odd batch exported to special markets.
As an ecosystem, it exerts a special fascination for those who study the
Japanese industry. The range of high performance versions and variations in coachwork available in the JDM was wide and for those with a fondness for Japanese cars, the subject of much envy. By the late 1970s,
the handful of US four-door hardtops still on sale were hangovers from designs
which dated from the late 1960s, behemoths anyway doomed by rising gas prices
and tightening emission controls; with the coming of 1979 (coincidently the
year of the “second oil shock”) all were gone.
In the JDM however, the interest remained and endured into the 1990s.
1965 Chevrolet Corvair Corsa (two-door hardtop, left) and 1969 Mazda Luce Coupé (right).
The
first Japanese cars to use the hardtop configuration were two-door coupés, the
Toyota Corona the first in 1965 and Nissan and Mitsubishi soon followed. One interesting thing during the era was the
elegant Izuzu 117 Coupé (1968-1980), styled by the Italian Giorgetto Giugiaro
(b 1938) which, with its slender B-pillar, anticipated Ford’s stylistic trick
although there’s nothing to suggest this was ever part of the design brief. Another of Giugiaro’s creations was the rare
Mazda Luce Coupé (1968), a true hardtop which has the quirk of being Mazda’s
only rotary-powered car to be configured with FWD. Giugiaro’s lines were hardly original because
essentially they duplicated (though few suggest "improved") those of the lovely second
generation Chevrolet Corvair (1965-1969) and does illustrate what an
outstanding compact the Corvair could have been if fitted with a conventional (front-engine
/ rear wheel drive (RWD)) drive-train.
1973 Nissan Cedric four-door Hardtop 2000 Custom Deluxe (KF230, left) and 1974 Toyota Crown Royal Saloon four-door Pillared Hardtop (2600 Series, right).
By
1972, Nissan released a version of the Laurel which was their first four-door although it was only the volume manufacturers for which the economics of scale
of such things were attractive, the smaller players such as Honda and Subaru
dabbling only with two-door models.
Toyota was the most smitten and by the late 1970s, there were hardtops
in all the passenger car lines except the smallest and the exclusive Century,
the company finding that for a relatively small investment, an increase in profit
margins of over 10% was possible. Toyota
in 1974 also followed Ford’s example in using a “pillared hardtop” style for
the up-market Crown, the exclusivity enhanced by a roofline lowered by 25 mm (1
inch); these days it’s be called a “four door coupé” (and etymologically that
is correct despite the objections of many) and Rover had actually planned their
3.5 (P5B; 1967-1973) to include a four-door coupé featuring both pillarless
construction and the lowered roof; as it was the former proved too difficult
within the budget so only the chop-top survived. In the JDM, the last true four-door hardtops
were built in the early 1990s but Subaru continued to offer the “pillared
hardtop” style until 2010 and the extinction of the breed was most attributable
to the shifting market preference for sports utility vehicles (SUV) and such. In Australia, Mitsubishi between between 1996-2005
used frameless side-windows and a slim B-pillar on their Magna so it fitted the
definition of a “pillar hardtop” although the term was never used in marketing,
the term “hardtop” something Australians associated only with two-door coupés (Ford
and Chrysler had actually the term as a model name in the 1960s &
1970s). When the Magna was replaced by
the doomed and dreary 380 (2005-2008), Mitsubishi reverted to window frames and
chunky pillars.
Standard and Spezial coachwork on the Mercedes-Benz 300d (W189, 1957-1962). The "standard" four-door hardtop was available throughout the run while the four-door Cabriolet D was offered (off and on) between 1958-1962 and the Spezials (landaulets, high-roofs et al), most of which were for state or diplomatic use, were made on a separate assembly line in 1960-1961. The standard "greenhouse" (or glasshouse) cars are to the left, those with the high roof-line to the right.
Few European manufacturers attempted four-door hardtops and one of the handful was the 300d (W189, 1957-1962), a revised version of the W186 (300, 300b & 300c; 1951-1957) which came to be referred to as the "Adenauer" because several were used as state cars by Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; chancellor of the FRG (West Germany) 1949-1963). Although the coachwork never exactly embraced the lines of mid-century modernism, the integration of the lines of the 1950s with the pre-war motifs appealed to the target market (commerce, diplomacy and the old & rich) and on the platform the factory built various Spezials including long wheelbase "pullmans", landaulets, high-roof limousines and four-door cabriolets (Cabriolet D in the Daimler-Benz system). The high roofline appeared sometimes on both the closed & open cars and even then, years before the assassination of John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; US president 1961-1963), the greenhouse sometimes featured “bullet-proof” glass. As well as Chancellor Adenauer, the 300d is remembered also as the Popemobile (although not then labelled as such) of John XXIII (1881-1963; pope 1958-1963).
Few European manufacturers attempted four-door hardtops. One of the few was the
Mercedes-Benz 300d (W189, 1957-1962), a revised version of the W186 (1951-1957)
which came to be referred to as the "Adenauer" because several were
used as state cars by Konrad
Adenauer (1876–1967; chancellor of the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany (the
old West Germany) 1949-1963). Although the
coachwork never embraced 1950s modernism, the W186 & W189 obviously an
evolution of pre-war practices, much of the engineering was advanced and the
factory used the chassis to produce spezials including long wheelbase "pullmans", landaulets,
high-roof limousines and four-door cabriolets (Cabriolet D in the Daimler-Benz
system). The W189 is remembered too as
the state car of the Holy See, used by popes in the days before fears of assassination. Most however were the "standard",
four-door hardtop.
Pillars, stunted pillars & "pillarless"
1959 Lancia Appia Series III
Actually,
although an accepted part of engineering jargon, to speak of the classic
four-door hardtops as “pillarless” is, in the narrow technical sense,
misleading because almost all used a truncated B-pillar, ending at the
belt-line where the greenhouse begins. The
stunted device was required to provide a secure anchor point for the rear door's hinges (or latches for both if suicide doors were used) and in the case of the latter, being of frameless
construction, without the upright, the doors would be able to be locked in
place only at the sill, the physics of which presents a challenge because even
in vehicles with high torsional rigidity, there will be movement. The true pillarless design was successfully executed
by some but those manufacturers used doors with sturdy window frames,
permitting latch points at both sill and roof, Lancia offering the
configuration on a number of sedans including the Ardea (1939-1953), Aurelia
(1950-1958) & Appia (1953-1963). The
approach demanded a more intricate locking mechanism but the engineering was
simple and on the Lancias it worked and was reliable, buyers enjoying the ease
of ingress & egress. It's sad the company's later attachment to front wheel drive (FWD) ultimately doomed Lancia because in every other aspect of engineering, few others were as adept at producing such fine small-displacement vehicles.
1961 Facel Vega II (a two door hardtop with the unusual "feature" of the rear side-glass being hinged from the C-pillar).
Less
successful with doors was the Facel Vega Excellence, built in two series between
1958-1964. Facel Vega was a French
company which was a pioneer in what proved for almost two decades the
interesting and lucrative business of the trans-Atlantic hybrid, the combination
of stylish European coachwork with cheap, refined, powerful and reliable American engine-transmission
combinations. Like most in the genre,
the bulk of Facel Vega’s production was big (by European standards) coupés (and
the odd cabriolet) and they enjoyed much success, the company doomed only when
it augmented the range with the Facellia, a smaller car. Conceptually, adding the smaller coupés &
cabriolets was a good idea because it was obvious the gap in the market existed
but the mistake was to pander to the feelings of politicians and use a French
designed & built engine which proved not only fragile but so fundamentally
flawed rectification was impossible. By
the time the car had been re-engineered to use the famously durable Volvo B18
engine, the combination of the cost of the warranty claims and the reputational
damage meant the bankruptcy was impending and in 1964 the company ceased operation. The surviving “big” Facel Vegas, powered by a
variety of big-block Chrysler V8s, are now highly collectable and priced
accordingly.
1960 Facel Vega Excellence EX1
Compared
with that debacle, the problem besetting the Excellence
was less serious but was embarrassing and, like the Facellia's unreliable engine, couldn’t be fixed. The Excellence was a
four-door sedan, a configuration also offered by a handful of other
trans-Atlantic players (including Iso, DeTomaso & Monterverdi) and although volumes were low, because the platforms were elongations of those used on
their coupés, production & development costs were modest so with high prices,
profits were good. Facel Vega however
attempted what no others dared: combine eye-catching suicide doors, frameless side glass and coachwork which was truly pillarless, necessitating latching &
locking mechanisms in the sills. With the
doors open, it was a dramatic scene of lush leather and highly polished burl
walnut (which was actually painted metal) and the intricate lock mechanism was
precisely machined and worked well… on a test bench. Unfortunately, on the road, the
pillarless centre section was inclined slightly to flex when subject to lateral
forces (such as those imposed when turning corners) and this could release the
locks, springing the doors open. Owners reported
this happening while turning corners and it should be remembered (1) lateral
force increases as speed rises and (2) this was the pre-seatbelt era. There appear to be no confirmed reports of
unfortunate souls being ejected by centrifugal force through an suddenly open door (Albert Camus (1913–1960) was killed when the Facel Vega HK500 two-door coupé in which he was a passenger hit a tree, an accident unrelated to doors) but clearly the risk was there.
Revisions to the mechanism improved the security but the problem was
never completely solved; despite that the factory did offer a revised second
series Excellence in 1961, abandoning the dog-leg style windscreen and toning
down the fins, both of which had become passé but in three years only a handful
were sold. By the time the factory was
shuttered in 1964, total Excellence production stood at 148 EX1s (Series One; 1958-1961)
& 8 EX2s (Series Two; 1961-1964).
The Mercedes-Benz R230 SL: Lindsay Lohan going topless (in an automotive sense) in
2005 SL 65 AMG with top lowered (left), 2006 SL 65 AMG with top erected (centre)
& 2009 SL 65 AMG Black Series with fixed-roof.
At the time uniquely in the SL line, the R230 (2001-2011) was available with both a retractable hard top and
with a fixed roof but no soft top was ever offered (the configuration continued in the R231 (2012-2020) while the R232 (since 2021) reverted to fabric). Having no B pillar, most of the R230s were
thus a hardtop with a hard top but the SL 65 AMG Black Series (2008–2011) used
a fixed roof fabricated using a carbon fibre composite, something which
contributed to the Black Series is weighing some 250 kilograms (550 lb) less
than the standard SL 65 AMG. Of the
road-going SLs built since 1954, the Black Series R230 was one of only three
models sold without a retractable roof of some kind, the others being the
original 300 SL Gullwing (W198, 1954-1957) and the “California coupé” option offered
between 1967-1971 for the W113 (1963-1971) roadster (and thus available only
for the 250 SL (1966-1968) & 280 SL (1967-1971)). The California coupé was simply an SL supplied
with only the removable hard top and no soft top, a folding bench seat included
which was really suitable only for small children. The name California was chosen presumably because
of the association of the place with sunshine and hence a place where one could
be confident it was safe to go for a drive without the fear of unexpected rain. Despite the name, the California coupé
was available outside the US (a few even built in right-hand drive form) although
the North American market absorbed most of the production.
1969
Chevrolet Corvette L88 convertible with hard top (or hard-top) attached.
1969 Chevrolet Corvette L88 convertible, topless. 
