Originally Posted by
nota
Did this Volvo feature a rear seat that folded down flat a-la modern hatchbacks to create unfettered access from the luggage area to the cabin?
If not, then they are definately not 'just an earlier version' of Slopers.
Henk do you consider the Commerciale to be a hatchback, as is the common boast? Personally I don't, its just a disfunctional wagon with a see-through bootlid. And I'm far less hung up on whether or not the rear glass swings up with the luggage lid, than of having to unbolt the fixed rear seat and drag it out of the car and then leave it behind in the garage, when trying to achieve an extended luggage area of the kind which made Hatchbacks so popular.
The Slopers precede the shape of the Volvo 444, not the other way around.
So we have three option seat
A folding rear seat, with no way to open the rear window (hatch)
A opening rear window with no way to fold the seats
A opening rear window AND folding seats.
The latter two I would call a hatchback,
The first one not,but it might be more practical than the second option.
The Kaiser is an example of the third option.
The Renault 16 is generally considered as the first fast back hatchback with a magnitude of options concerning the rear seating arrangement. (Although the earlier R4 also had quite a lot of those, but possibly looked too much like a van.
"I find the whole business of religion profoundly interesting, but it does mystify me that otherwise intelligent people take it seriously." Douglas Adams