Ask Lemmy

TIL: people name their cars. Honest question, unless you have several identical cars, why?

I don't own a car, but my bicycle is named Aneth. It's French for "dill", pronounced the same as the name "Annette".

I like dill and "Aneth la bicyclette" rhymes.

In our house we have Cedric the Civic, Minnie the Mini, and Pedro the Polo.

Meet: Blooregard "Bloo" Q. Kazoo (from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends).

I even have Bloo stickers.

collapsed inline media

I just use the name they were given at the factory to avoid confusing them.

I don’t, but others do. Mine is 35 years old and has 1.3 millions kms. It’s a beautiful silver coupé - with 101 defects and constantly on the verge of collapse, but already been taking me places for over 10 years now. Sometimes even for 1K Kms/day. I’m the 8th owner. Somebody called it “Gattone” (Italian for “big cat”). I wanted to “recycle” those 2 Tons of iron that already ferried tons of people probably, and keep it on the road for ever. Friends love it, average girls here don’t :/ they just call it “il rottame” (“the wreck”)

collapsed inline media

My cousin had a 1988 Dodge minivan with plastic covered seats and no AC. She called it "Big Ralf"

Blue 2025 Subaru Forester = Beast

White 2015 Hyundai Sonata = Stormtrooper (also has a stormtrooper ornament hanging from the rear view mirror)

James. No particular reason.

My other cars never had names, but I love this one to pieces and it goes like the clappers.

My ebike is Gusteau (Gusto), or Gus.

I kinda wanna name my car, but nothing has inspired yet.

"car"

which inevitably becomes "piece of shit"

My first car was a white 2013 Honda Fit named Scott. He was previously owned by the proprietor of a defunct kickboxing gym in my area, and acted like it. That car had chops, and legs for days. Manual 5-speed, not the sport model but still had surprisingly good clearance and a shocking ability to climb up logging roads well further than most SUV’s dared or bothered to go. Loved that guy, but he sadly met his end late last year in an altercation with a Dodge Ram. A rather one-sided argument, and a total write off.

After that I fell into a situationship with Joe. Joe was/is a 2015 manual 6 speed Chevy Trax with a bad attitude, a lean to the right, misfiring cylinders, and a steering wheel that shakes at highway speeds. I don’t like Joe, and I strongly suspect Joe doesn’t like me, so I traded him in before he had a chance to fulfill his yearning to explore the ditch.

Nowadays I’m quite happily involved with Geoff - a 2019 Toyota Corolla hatchback. Again, not the sport model, but a 6-speed manual nonetheless and a truly fun ride, with significantly better acceleration that either of my previous two vehicles. We’ve agreed that how to spell his name is for him to know, and for me to speculate. Jeff is confident, self-assured, kind & forgiving, overall a balanced and well-adjusted partner - kind of hard to get used to, to be honest.

My wife named her first SUV - a dinky Equinox - “pebbles”, purely because it was a light stone grey.

Her next SUV - a more beefy 4Runner that can actually hold the Gunner dog crate comfortably - is “snowflake”, purely because it was a pristine snow white.

I think I’m seeing a pattern here with my wife.

I had a murdered G37s named Stella. Was a fun time in life. Happy not to have a car at all now.

No real naming scheme, mostly just stupid names because they're funny, though a couple names have been roughly related to the car to which they belonged.

• Pobjoy
• Probably Jessie (yes, "probably" is part of the name)
• Probably Jenny
• My Boy Blue
• Winona
• Jules

I didn't name all of them, but here are the ones:

• My small everyday car: Titine (see other comment about that)
• My camper van: Léon (In french "Léon le fourgon")
• My '78 spitfire: Rosie

frog car!!

collapsed inline media

Normally no. However, I do own a 1968 Chrysler station wagon that I've taken to calling "the Duchess of Rustess". No, it doesn't even rhyme, but it does makes me smile.

xev yoyo in lime green.

I call her tinkerbell

My first car, my lovely Mazda 2. It was tiny but perfect for me. My friends called it a jellybean and that stuck until Bean just started being used. I loved that Bean so much.

But I just got a new car and a friend of mine said it looks like a shoe. So now I have Shoe! Which I think is funny

My cars are usually named after old women, because I subconsciously relate older women with comfort and kindness. Gertie, and Mathilde.

My 1992 Dodge Spirit with the 3L V6 was called "The Behemoth". It got it's name partially from the license plate starting with BEHE, and partially from the fact that car was a tank. It got me through a lot of driving through all kinds of weather conditions, including driving through over a metre of snow, through a raging blizzard. I would have kept driving that car for years if the brine solution the used on the road one winter didn't eat all the metal, plastic, and rubber, on the bottom of the car.

It was replaced by my 2015 Chrysler 200 3.6L V6 named Barbra (during the day), and Oracle (by night). Barbra//Oracle got their name from being much more modern and technologically integrated, and surprising people with it's capability.

I didn't have enough time with my first car to give it a name other than "the '95".

My first car was named Sora Aoi which means sky blue. Don’t mind that it’s also the name of a popular Japanese porn star.

I also had a white Kia Soul that looked like a stormtrooper helmet so I was trying to pick a good reference name, but couldn’t decide on one.

My subaru is called “Subarashii”, because it’s excellent.

I name them based on their personalities.

59 beetle - Zippy 79 Bronco - bog 07 wrangler - Lt Dan

LeBronze

Back in the day a friend of mine had a blue shit box I don't even remember the make or model of now. Let's call it a vauxhall (Opel/Buick in the rest of the world) Cavalier with constant issues. It was close to Tardis Blue, and due to its problems and unreliable nature, and it being a different time where insensitive names were the norm, he called it the re-tardis. Not proud, but it is a memory.

I have had two Sonatas, despite being musically inclined I have never called them a musically inspired name. The first one was lied to me by the stealership (used inventory from trade in, off-brand) that it was a limited edition, an L.E; so we called her Ellie.

I have a brown Kangoo (a gift, 0 options), it's the Kangoo-mobile, Scoobidoobidouuu!

The kids think it's the ugluest crap but man can you fill it up with stuff!

I had a Chevy Caliber named Ex.

...my cars are named mehve, pejitei gunship, teto, and ohmu after aircraft and creatures from nausicäa of the valley of wind...

97 v8 ford explorer, has over 300000 miles on it still runs great, replaced full exhaust and both manifolds that cracked, ac unit broke like a decade ago, frame is severely rusted but ive been spraying it with fluid film with a paint sprayer and that halted the rust also like a decade ago. Has a permanent coolant leak. Said I was gonna drive it till it died.

Even though it should've broken down it just keeps running

I call him Frank Gallagher

• Darth Versa
• K2S0
• Red Five

I don't think we ever named my Chevy Metro. 3 cylinders by the end of its run. Dent in every panel. Spray painted numbers like a demolition car. Man, of all my cars that one definitely deserved a name.

Volvo (V60CC) -> Swedish -> Viking

So it is called "Ragnar"