The ten best cars with suicide doors

For Ferrari’s first ever SUV, the Maranello engineers have taken a leaf out of other leading premium sector marques with the Purosangue, including fitting ingenious rear hinged clamshell (a.k.a. ‘suicide’) doors, once a commonplace automotive feature pre-war, but more recently cunningly re-introduced as a real USP by Rolls-Royce Motor Cars when the prestigious British marque announced its important first modern-era Goodwood-built model in 2003. The imposing new 2003 Phantom’s ‘clap hands’ doors became a genuine talking point. This initially unique feature soon became signature of the renewed marque, as amplified by all subsequent Rolls-Royce models for both four-door motor cars (Ghost, Culllinan, Phantom II), plus all two-door models (Phantom DHC, Convertible, Wraith, Dawn).

The roots of back-hinged rear doors pre-dates the motor car by centuries, back to horse-drawn carriages, with this fashion naturally transitioning into automobiles at the dawn of motoring. Right up to the Second World War, coachbuilt car bodies with this rear passenger access/egress system were commonplace, particularly for more formal and expensive chauffeur-driven luxury limousines. They were occasionally in more attainable cars, such as the delightful early 1930s four-door MG K1 (and later KN) Magnette, with its distinctive half-length handle-less suicide rear door in a sporting pillarless saloon body. Here in an idle moment is a selection of the ten best post-war cars that also feature rear-hinged clap hands doors, as just revisited again in the new Ferrari Purosangue. 

Spyker D12 Peking-to-Paris (2006-10)

Conceptually, the closest thing to Ferrari’s new Purosangue; the short-lived Spyker Peking-to-Paris was presented at the 2006 Geneva Salon with only a handful being made. Arguably the first prestige SUV, far ahead of later rivals such as the Lamborghini Urus and Bentley Bentayga, this pioneering machine featured all-wheel-drive, 12-cylinders, a raised ride height and practical five-door coachwork with rear suicide doors, just like the new Ferrari, albeit 16 years earlier.

Launched as a tribute to Spyker’s historic victory in the arduous 1907 endurance race from what is now modern-day Beijing, the pioneering Spyker featured four-wheel-drive as something of a first in motorsport. The resultant D12 Peking-to-Paris of 2006 was a proud reminder of Spyker’s past legacy and achievements when it was the leading Dutch prestige car maker in the early 20^th Century, before the company went bust for the first of many times in the mid-1920s.

In 1999 the long-forgotten Spyker name was revived by a consortium of wealthy Dutch TV entrepreneurs, with some unusually stylish supercars being made in Coventry using Audi power units. The revived Spyker proved to be too ambitious, however, trying to run before it could walk. It went bust again in 2014, even trying to save Saab from the incompetents at General Motors for a while. Predictably, Spyker’s lack of funds saw the inspired Peking-to-Paris SUV fail before it had really had chance to make its mark on the growing prestige SUV sector.

Ahead of its time, the Spyker SUV not only included suicide rear doors, but also an exposed gear linkage (a modern Spyker ‘signature’ feature), plus a W12-bi-turbo Volkswagen-derived engine, destined to deliver around 500PS (368kW).  Weighing over 1,850kg, the Peking-to-Paris claimed a 0-60mph time of 5.0 seconds. At its Geneva Motor Show debut in 2006, Spyker reportedly chalked up over 100 orders for its luxurious SUV, but building it proved to be quite problematic. Replacing the complex and costly VW W12 motor with a more ‘humble’ and lighter Audi V8 was suggested, but by 2010 the Peking-to-Paris production trail had gone cold. Spyker went bust again, only to re-emerge in 2016 before going under once more in 2021.

Lancia Appia (1953-63)

Introduced in 1953 as the successor to the advanced unitary constructed Aprilia of 1937, the delightful and equally forward-thinking new Appia shared the robust pillarless construction of its predecessor. It had aluminium panels, a compact 1,100cc V4 engine and advanced all rounded independent suspension, plus, naturally, the clap hand doors inherited from its Appia father and larger Aurelia B10 Berlina cousin of 1950.

By 1955 an improved Series 2 Appia Berlina had been launched, retaining the modern three-box profile of the Series 1 model, but with further refinements. For the updated Series 3 Appia Berlinas of 1959-63, Lancia made some substantial changes to the model’s body style, adding a wider front grille and a more conventional three-box profile to improve luggage space and make the model conform with its contemporary domestic Italian Fiat and Alfa Romeo rivals. Significantly though, the Appia’s rear suicide door opening mechanism was retained. 

Lincoln Continental IV (1960-69)

At its 1960 Model Year launch, the clean and simply-styled (by Detroit standards of the time) fourth-generation Lincoln Continental was offered solely as a four-door, in either a sedan or convertible form. For the first time on a Lincoln since 1951, the rear doors were rear-hinged, and to alert the driver of open doors, Lincoln considerately fitted the dashboard with a ‘door ajar’ warning light, as seen on many other cars some years later.

The Lincoln’s rear door was latched at the B-pillar with a vacuum-operated central locking system The Continental convertibles used an abbreviated pillar while sedan models were pillarless hardtops. In the configuration, a thin B-pillar supported the roof structure while all four doors utilised frameless door glass in the style of a hardtop or convertible. Like the long-lived 1960-69 Continental, this unusual four-door 1967-70 Ford Thunderbird derivative featured clap hands doors, along with fake Landau-style roof ornamentation.

As an aside, due to an overlap of the front- and rear-door window weatherstripping on the four-door Continental convertibles, to open the suicide rear doors when the front door was closed required that the rear-door window be slightly lowered first. This was accomplished automatically using sensors and relay-controlled logic decades before BMW had claimed to have pioneered this system. When the outside door latch button or inside handle was first pressed, the power-operated window lowered a few inches, then raised when the door was closed.

Following the Mark IV Continental’s exceptionally-long production run, the replacement 1970 Lincoln returned to more conventional forward-opening rear doors and remained that way.

Mazda RX-8 (2002-12)

The last fully-rotary-engined car to be built and sold anywhere in the world, the unique Mazda RX-8 offered genuine four-seater coupe style and exceptional dynamics in a good-looking sporting four-door body that resembled more a two-door coupe. The RX-8 featured clever ‘hidden’ back doors, rear-hinged to ease access into the surprisingly roomy rear passenger seats. A savage thirst for both fuel and oil proved to be the Achilles of this desirable Mazda coupe, but unlike the new Ferrari Purosangue, used RX-8s are now widely available and surprisingly affordable. With the RX-8 long out of production, Mazda has recently taken inspiration from its iconic coupe for its capable new all-electric MX-30 crossover, with also uses RX-8-style counter-hinged freestyle rear suicide doors.

Sunbeam-Talbot 90 (1948-57)

Launched in 1948 as handsome updates of the just-pre-war 1939/40 Sunbeam-Talbot (ST) Ten and 2.0-litre four-door sports saloon models, the Sunbeam-Talbot 90 (plus its underpowered 80 sibling) reintroduced ST’s trademark frameless rear windows mounted within rear-hinged back doors. The stylish sporting ST saloons (later to become just plain Sunbeam MK IIIs from 1955), enjoyed huge competition success in period, proving especially adept in international rallying, along with their slicker Alpine two-seater roadster model, in which the likes of Stirling Moss and others took multiple notable rosette finishes in contemporary Rallye de Monte Carlo.

BMW i3 (2013-21)

Given the might and success of BMW today, it’s difficult to believe that immediately post-war, this Bavarian vehicle producer almost went bust, saved only by the awful ISO cast-off Isetta bubble car in the mid-1950s. BMW’s first post-war production car was the bulbous and ungainly 501, an oversized blob based on the pleasant pre-war 326. BMW soon rectified the 501’s lack of power and performance by installing a V8 OHV motor into the model’s baroque saloon four-door bodyshell, with suicide doors to accommodate rear seat passengers. Despite obese styling and dynamics, amazingly the arthritic 501 lived on until 1963. 

Half a century after BMW last built a car with rear-hinged rear doors, in 2013 it revived the concept for its state-of-the-art electric i3 city car, the polar opposite of the traditional and lame 501. The BMW i3’s funky interior and modern urban style reflected the new electric vehicle age perfectly, helping to make EVs more acceptable and useable with a longer battery range and the useful option of a range extender; a far-sighted future classic in the making.

Facel Vega Excellence (1958-64)

With the sad post-war demise of the famous French Grande Routier due to punitive taxes applied by the French government to large-capacity engined cars, Jean Daninos took the bold step of introducing a new luxury French car brand in 1954, fitting powerful American V8 engines into elegant European-style coachbuilt coupe bodies. Examples include the sharp Face Vega FVS and famous HK500. In 1958 Daninos took an even braver step of extending a Facel FVS’s separate chassis to create a new 5.8-litre luxury saloon/limousine.

Named Excellence, this strikingly low and long automatic four-door saloon included Facel’s signature quad staked headlamps and Lancia-type pillarless clap hand doors, but it lacked the Italian’s unitary strength. Rumours at the time suggested that one shouldn’t open all four Excellence doors at once, as the body would bend and sag, making it difficult to re-close the rear hinged doors again. A handful of later models lost the American-inspired tail fins and gained a more potent 6.3-litre V8.

Saturn Ion Quad Coupe (2005-08)

Having been eaten alive by more affordable, reliable and better-quality Japanese rivals for decades in its vital home North American market, General Motors (GM) could take no more. It introduced the all-new import-bashing domestic Saturn brand to take on the Japanese with a ‘new concept’ in customer care, quality and value-for-money. The result was reasonable sales and consistently high J.D Power customer satisfaction ratings during throughout the 1990s for GM. Initially only sold with a single range of worthy but dull composite-bodied S-Series sedans and wagons, joined by an unusual coupe version in with a small rear-hinged third passenger door.

In 2000, the Saturn S-Series was replaced by the better GM Epsilon platform-based (Vauxhall Vector, etc.) L-Series. The L-Series range included the Ion Quad from 2004, a coupe derivative complete with a pair of tiny rear-hinged rear doors. The Ion was powered by the Opel-Vauxhall-sourced 2.2-litre EcoTech 140PS (103kW) four-cylinder engine mated to a standard five-speed manual gearbox, with the unconventional option of a five-speed continuously variable transmission (CVT) automatic transmission. Aiming to be unconventionally conventional, Saturn added a hotter performance Ion Quad Red Line coupe, with a supercharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder producing 205PS (151kW) offered only with manual shift – unusual for an American car.

Rover P4 (1950-64)

The last mass-production British car to feature clap hand doors as standard, the ‘Auntie’ Rover P4 was produced as late as 1964. This prim and proper ‘bank manager’s’ special retained the suicide rear door layout of the even more respectable Rover P3 series – the car replaced by the first of the long-lived P4 Rover 75 in 1950. This upright, slab-sided and ‘terribly British’ four-door saloon provided the engine for the original Land Rover and with well over 125,00 examples built. It proved to be a winner with the respectable British upper-middle classes for many years with its dignified appeal and ‘gentleman’s club’ wood and leather interior.    

1950s British Limousines

If there is one thing that Britain historically has done better than any other vehicle producing nation, it is in making large, stately and formal limousines. Take the imposing black Rolls-Royce and Daimler limousines used by the British royalty and for mayoral duties for decades.

Some of these more familiar ‘limos,’ such the commonplace Daimler DS420 Limousine of 1968-92, featured more conventional forward-hinged rear doors. Others like the long-wheelbase Austin A135 Princess (later renamed as the Vanden Plas 4-Litre), with seating for nine and familiar to many as the menacing ‘’formal’ limousine used in the opening credits sequence of The Prisoner, made a styling feature of its suicide rear doors, with an elegant elongated joint front/rear door chrome door handle(s) visually adding to the huge length of the long wheelbase touring limousine.

The Rootes Group’s prestige Humber marque was once another favourite with British royal and dignitary, its giant post-war Pullman (and plusher Imperial) 1948-52 Super Snipe saloon-based limos also utilising rear-hinged back doors.

Its dearer contemporary Daimler rival, the coachbuilt DK400 Regina was the last of the old long-stroke straight-six engines that had been traditional on Daimler's smaller cars since 1910. Although production of the smaller 3.8-litre engine did continue until 1962. Two DK400 Reginas with striking Hooper coachwork and royal livery, were supplied as Royal Stock in the mid-1950s. One of these suicide rear door limousines was built as landaulette was used by the Queen Mother. Another four-door all-weather tourer by Hooper was specially designed and constructed for Shah Of Afghanistan. By the mid-1990s, with the country in political turmoil once again, sadly that Hooper Daimler (part of the Afghan national museum collection) was used as target practice by soldiers and was in a dilapidated state with other vehicles before being taken away and scrapped.