Nessie3 wrote:
I see "minicar" sometimes defined as a subcompact and other times as smaller than a subcompact. ...makes me wonder whether the term is standard English.
It's a generalist construction that says a little to everybody but nothing specific to anybody. A casual reader would take the meaning of "very small" or "smaller than most others" but the term lacks solid definition.
If you have the time, you should attempt to find the correct class or category that the car in question fits.
National governments and their dept's of transportation establish defined classes of vehicles for their own purposes such as taxation, emission requirements, etc.
The terms they use are their own choice. In the U.S, you'll find compact, sub-compact, full size, mid size, etc. Other countries use class 1, class 2, and so on. India uses A1, A2... and supports the classes with words as well: A4 is Executive class, A6 is Luxury.
There are no international standards, either. A U.S. sub compact might be classed as something larger in another country.
The whole issue is further clouded by how the classifications are determined. Some use only engine size (600-1000cc), others use weight only (1000-1500kg), still others use dimesions only (India: A3 = 4001-4500mm overall length) and many use some combination of these. (Engine smaller than X cc
and under Y kg.)
I know Japan has a very strict and well defined classification system, but my reference materials seem to have vanished.
Car Copy, if you're still out there, can you shed any additional light on this?
Hope this helps.
Regards,
JT
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