Damn! I thought I had "translated" all the non-americanisms -- bumper, hood trunk et al. It never even crossed my mind that the term "saloon car" wouldn't be reocognised over there, but doing a google shows that the term turns up frequently on UK, NZ, AU, Singaporean, HonkKong(ese?), Indian web sites, and even Canadian, but very rarely (if at all) on US sites.

I apologise. I think the nearest equivalent would be a Sedan? Basically, a conventional, four doors, 5 seats, engine up front and separate lugguage compartment (boot/trunk) in the rear.

{sigh} So much for common languages:)

Gee, I just made an educated guess as to what you meant even though I'd never heard of a "saloon" car. Guess that's the newspaper editor/English major in me :-)
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"Ex libris un peut de tout"

Oh, I think I should clarify.

When I said I couldn't get past it, I meant that I was repeatedly thinking about it in an amused fashion. It's not that I didn't understand the reference. I kept picturing a car with the swinging doors typical of a saloon in "Wild West" movies. And of course, a guy in a bowtie playing the piano in the back...

I did look it up in an online dictionary, thinking that perhaps an alternate meaning would surface. But alas, the dictionary only has American English definitions. So in the end I figured it was a typo -- but it was still pretty clear what BrowserUK originally meant.

When I read "saloon car", I was thinking of a car with "suicide doors" like the old 1960's Lincoln Continental. For anyone who doesn't know, they had 4 doors... The front two opened like you would expect with the hinge in the front of the car. The rear doors were backwards, and had the hinge to the back of the car.

The way those cars were built, if you got into a collision, the doors get stuck shut. That is a Bad Thing(tm).

Anyway, that was the first thing that popped into my mind. Probably because I could easily picture the front driver side door and the rear passenger side door as being the same part.

Oknow