“Rat rod.” It’s a polarizing term. Members of the general public, uninitiated in the nuances of the hobby, will use rat rod to describe any car with more than one of the following attributes: whitewall tires, bias-ply tires, paint that isn’t perfect and/or shiny, pin striping, multiple Stromberg 97s or Holley 94s, or any vibe that is neither “restored stock” nor “street rod.”

Car folk use the term to mean a kind of art car that drew its base inspiration from the hot rods of the 1940s, ’50s and early ’60s, but that has left behind history and improved performance in favor of whimsy and spectacle.

At this point, it’s only a tangentially related segment of the car hobby to what is usually billed as “traditional hot rodding”—an equally debatable term that for purposes of this discussion means attempting to recreate, with various levels of historical accuracy, the aesthetic and technology of pre-muscle-car hot rodding.

So be careful who you use the R word around, sensitive auto enthusiasts are listening.