at least not for those who drive them

I'm sure that that's where the distinction lies. That's often the case for technical terms in general. It drives my husband crazy, for example, that many people call the part of the computer which houses its brains "the CPU" when he says "It's the case, or the tower, and the CPU's inside!!!!!" and then pouts in frustration. But most people are happy to refer to that whole thing as the CPU, even though there's all sorts of other junk in there.