8 Cars with Great Nicknames

Matt Tierney

The stronger your feelings for someone, the higher the probability that you call them something other than their real name. This is also true, especially so, for pets. The principle holds for objects as well, and certain vehicles, with their rich histories and distinct personas, are obvious candidates.

Our staff got talking around the digital watercooler and stumbled into a discussion of our favorite nicknames for various classics (and one oddball). If you only looked at the list of names, you’d think we just hit refresh on a random word generator, but for the most part, there’s a story behind the nickname given to each vehicle below.

Sometimes, the nickname is a reference to a valiant feat. Perhaps someone, once upon a time, came up with a memorable answer to “You know what that car reminds me of?” and the whole world picked up the word and ran with it. Whatever the case, we hope you enjoy our selections, and we encourage you to add your own candidates in the comments—preferably, with an explanation of how that vehicle got that name.

Pizza Butt

2001 Corbin Sparrow EV electric motorcycle
eBay/wmcs11

I’ll always have a soft spot for odd, obscure, and sometimes ugly cars. It doesn’t get much more odd or obscure or ugly or funny than the Corbin Sparrow EV and its “pizza butt” body style, designed for use by Domino’s. — Andrew Newton

Tin Lizzy

Courtesy El Pomar Foundation Archives

The greatest nicknames come from brave or interesting feats, which is why my nomination for interesting nicknames goes to “Tin Lizzie.” The moniker has been stuck to Model T Fords for over a century at this point and came after Noel Bullock entered a ragged, stripped down ‘T in the 1922 Pikes Peak Hill Climb. That car was called “Old Liz,” but the tin can appearance caused people to shift the name to Tin Lizzie. The rest is history. — Kyle Smith

Clown Shoe

2001 BMW Z3M Coupe clownshoe S54 manual
BMW | yourfriendsyd

As a Z3 dork, I’d be remiss if I neglected the Clown Shoe, aka M Coupe (and its lesser-known Z3 Coupe sibling). The Clown Shoe a goofy-looking car with a goofy name but a serious-business straight-six engine. BMW’s board approved the project on the condition that engineers retain as much of the existing Z3 roadster hardware as possible, which resulted in the car’s oddball roofline and cartoonish width. You either love it or hate it, but that’s part of the car’s appeal. For better or worse it looks like nothing else on the road. — Eric Weiner

Cobra Killer 

bill thomas cheetah rear three-quarter
Brandan Gillogly

My pick is the Bill Thomas Cheetah, Cobra Killer for short. But because I take pictures and can’t really put words together to save my life, I’ll let Aaron Robinson, who wrote about the car in 2023, spit it:

Cheetahs are certainly a weird and wild footnote of 1960s racing Americana. Anaheim, California, Corvette racer Bill Thomas created the tube-framed racing machine with backing from Chevrolet as a street and racing answer to the Ford-powered Shelby Cobra. However, in 1964 the FIA sports car homologation rules were changed from 100 cars to 1000 and General Motors, also facing congressional scrutiny over vehicle safety following the 1964 publishing of Ralph Nader’s Unsafe at Any Speed, lost interest and yanked the cord on the program. The Cheetah was left high and dry.

Cameron Neveu

Turbo Brick

Volvo ad 740 turbo wagon lamborghini trailer
Volvo

If you’ve heard the phrase “Turbo Brick” used around Volvos, you’ll immediately get the reference. Purists will say this nickname only applies to the square-as-could-be 240s, but even the more aerodynamically-inclined 740, 960, 850, and early V/S70 are still pretty much slab-sided rectangles. This covers the turbo versions of most Volvos from the late ’70s till around 2000, and I’d say it fits about as well as any nickname could. — Eddy Eckart

Iron Pig

1977 Land Cruiser 55 front three-quarter
Toyota

I’ve always liked the Toyota Land Cruiser FJ55’s “Iron Pig” moniker. Not counting the rare FJ45, which was based on the stubby FJ40, the 50-series was the first true Land Cruiser wagon Toyota made. They are handsome, go-anywhere trucks with a distinctive front end, which is where the nickname comes from: some people see a pig’s face in the round headlights and compact grille. I don’t, but as nicknames go, Iron Pig is a great one. — Stefan Lombard

Goat

1966 Pontiac GTO front three-quarter
Matt Tierney

I think Pontiac’s GTO deserves a spot on this list, since it had a couple. Goat is the one I remember, though—supposedly just an affectionate play on its letters, as G.O.A.T. wasn’t yet the acronym it is today. As a kid, I thought it sounded tough, but I never quite understood it, as the ones I saw at car shows were often adorned not with goats but stuffed tigers, a reference to the ad campaign for the car. — Eddy Eckart

Catfish

Mecum

The refreshed fourth-gen Camaro was nicknamed “Catfish” because the new fascia, styled with a hint of 1970–73 Camaro, did sort of look like the bottom-feeding fish. — Brandan Gillogly

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Comments

    Triumph TR7 and TR8: Marketing called it “The Shape of Things to Come”. To those that didn’t feel so kindly it was Doorstop

    Loved that car. Admired it when in college. Wanted to buy one so bad when I graduated. But, not a family car. I remember “The Shape of Things to Come” so well. And “Doorstop” is funny and appropriate.

    Loved that car. Admired it when in college. Wanter to buy one when I graduated but, not a family car. I remember “The Shape of Things to Come” so well. “Doorstop” is funny and appropriate.

    I had a 1984 Ford Escort station wagon. I called it “The Piece”. Short for “Piece of You Know What”. 😖🤮

    of the article’s list, i’m only familiar with ‘goat’.

    these aren’t nicknames in the business, only personal ones…i went 50/50 with my brother on our very 1st car – a ’61 corvair lakewood. after rebuilding the engine, we drove it everywhere: northern cali, to the desert numerous times…it just wouldn’t die from all the abuse. we nicknamed it the ‘brass ball’.

    i somewhat recently bought a custom bodied ’60 corvair sedan. it was shortened by removing the mid section (rear doors). it looks like something you’d see in a circus act. while haggling with the seller, i referred to it as the ‘clown car’. the seller said “that’s funny. the guy i got it from called it the same thing”.

    nicknames of some of my other cars: ’04 slk = stubby, ’97 sentra = the roach, ’22 challenger = the brute, ’72 datsun truck = the purple truck

    I once had a ‘61 Rambler American convertible that my friends affectionately called “ the Bathtub”. Because when we went out cruising and partying in it in on the weekends with the top down, it looked like we were all sitting in….a big bathtub.

    49-51 Nash was nicknamed “the Upside-Down Bathtub”. We referred to Pontiacs as “Pontoons”.

    One I miss in this list (from a European point of view) is the Citroen DS (DS being a clever play of words Déesse… goddess” but we nickname it here the Snoek (northern pike)…. for obvious reasons

    A friend had a new, at the time, Z8 BMW, Dark Blue color. The first time I saw it, I thought the front of it resembled a shark.
    Do not know if they might have been referred to as “Shark” later?

    The GM kappa platform (Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky, and across Ocean variants) is called the *poorvette*.

    I had a friend with an orange BMW 2002 named Nesbit.
    Then later, I bought my wife a 2002 Land Rover “Freeloader”

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