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 It’s easy for old car enthusiasts to dismiss today’s cars as bland, undifferentiated transportation modules, just as it’s easy for new car enthusiasts to dismiss old car enthusiasts as cranks who simply aren’t willing to get with the times. However, as we take stock of the current automotive cohort, at least one criticism of new cars that old car enthusiasts frequently make holds true – it’s mighty hard to identify a car’s model year by looks alone anymore.
All too often, when you hear or read a story about somebody who works with cars for a living, they establish credibility by claiming they could rattle off car names at an early age or at night just by the configuration and shape of their headlamps or taillamps. Indeed, they were able to do so because annual model year changes once went far beyond tweaks to the car’s software and options package. Almost as a rule, lighting and trim often changed from year to year, and sheetmetal occasionally went through mid-cycle revisions.
But along the way, body style became less indicative of model year.
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Re: Open Diff: When Were Car Model Years Last Identifiable by External Appearance Only?
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