When they first started advertising that relatively unknown marque in The US, their TV and radio commercials all pronounced the name as HON-dye. I think it was obvious that they were either trying to make an association with the well-reputed Honda brand, or they were just trying to confuse everyone into buying their cars–which were essentially disposable items back in those days. Somehow, they overcame the stigma of their Excel model…
According to a Korean friend of mine, the pronunciation is Hoon-dye, but because he was born in The US, he could just as well be wrong.
Well, the Bolt is far better than the first electric concept car they presented in 1990 named Impact.
Everybody wants to be in an Impact while driving…
Maybe we should just go to numbers instead, like Ford #1, #2, etc. Oh wait, that wouldn’t do. You’d have to start with #3 at least then we might end up with 3a and 3b or fourbee which is similar to the superbee. I dunno. Its just too confusing.
I always liked Boeing’s strategy: 707, 727, 737, etc…which leaves you to wonder:
Where did the impetus come from to name the “707” in the first place?
Why did they skip “717?” (Yes, I know that, eventually, they made a DC-9 derivative the 717, but for a long time, there was none.)
Also, Ford’s truck strategy was 1,2,3… and then they switched that logical progression up into 100, 200, 300. (I think it was around the time the “F-100 Super Sabre” was all the rage as the USAF began its “century series” fighters, but don’t hold me to that!)
Wasn’t Jurassic Park, with it’s B.A. “velociraptors” in the limelight at the time? I always thought it was a good name…made you think you were driving around like a velociraptor: fast and deadly, in spite of (or even because of) being smaller and more nimble than the lumbering behemoths.
That would make sense, but JP debuted in 1993. The Veloster came along in 2012.
Had they called it the Velociraptor, it would have been a much cooler name!
BTW, trivia: The “Velociraptor” in JP was inaccurate. Velociraptors were only about the size of a turkey. The movie’s Velociraptor was physically more analogous to Deinonychus. Thus endeth your nerd esoterica for today.
The Plymouth Prowler sounds like a petty thief (car prowler). I guess Growler wouldn’t work so well with the V6. The Dodge Stealth failed to perform as advertised. It showed up just fine on police RADAR.
A “growler” is also a gadget used to diagnose alternator winding problems. You’d use a growler to fix a Growler. Then drink from a growler to celebrate
