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The first road vehicles were powered by steam and this one built in Paris by
Nicholas Joseph Cugnot (1723-1804) would only run for 15 minutes at a speed
of 6
mph.The drive was through the front wheel and the weight of all the mechanism
made it difficult to steer so it was very unsafe. Big coal-fired steam
coaches ran surprisingly well in Britain around 1830 but steam engines were
generally too heavy and too complicated to operate successfully in private
cars.Serpollet in France and White Stanley Doble in the USA
built practical liquid fired cars - the latter two as late as the 1920's.
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Siegfried Marcus (1831-1898) an Austrian inventor built three
petrol driven cars between 1873 and 1875 that ran at under 5 mph but he never
developed them or influenced later designs. The true fathers of the
automobile were the Germans Gottlieb Daimler (1834-1900) and Karl Benz
(1944-1929). Both built experimental cars in 1885 but Benz was the first to
manufacture them for sale to the general public in 1888. The early 3 and
4-wheeled Benz cars had a single cylinder horizontal engine in the rear of a
tubular frame built on bicycle principles a 2 speed transmission by belts and
chains and a maximum speed of 12 mph.
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In 1887 the wood-working machinery firm of Panhard et Levassor started making
Gottlieb Daimler's engines under license in France. In 1891 they built a car
incorporating the now famous 'systeme Panhard' with the V-twin cylinder
Daimler engine at the front of a wooden chassis.The car had solid rubber
tyres a friction clutch, a sliding pinion 3 speed gearbox, tiller steering
and chain
drive to the rear wheels thus setting basic design pattern for most cars that
followed. In 1895 Emile Levassor drove a similar car single-handed for
48¾ hours to win the 1932 Paris-Bordeaux-Paris race at an average speed
of 15 mph.
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In the 1890's the
initiative in motor manufacture passed from Germany to France with Panhard
the premier make. In 1898 a Frenchman called Louis Renault (1877-1944) mounted a
single cylinder engine from his De Dion tricycle at the front of a tiny
tubular chassis and gave his first car a shaft drive transmission (no chains)
and a gearbox with direct drive in top gear - setting another design trend. A
big 13:4 litre 4 cylinder Renault won the first French Grand Prix at Le Mans
in 1906 and today Renault is France's largest car manufacturer.
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One of the first electric cars was built At Acheres
in France in 1899 by a Belgian called Camille Jenatzy (1868-1913) known as the Red
Devil because of his red beard. He became the first driver officially to exceed
60 ph when he reached 65.7 mph and set up an early land speed record in this
electric car of his own design. He used pnuematic tyres the design of which
was first used on a
competition car in the 1895 Paris-Bordeaux-Paris race by the Michelin
brothers on their Peugeot.
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The first Mercedes built by the German Daimler firm at Cannstatt was designed
by Wilhelm Maybach (1846-1929) with the help of Gottlieb Daimler's son Paul
and was named after the daughter of a rich Austraian called Emile Jellinek
who financed it. Often called the first modern car it has a pressed steel
frame - a smooth 4 cylinder engine - a honeycomb radiator - gate gear change
- mechanical inlet values and a jet carburettor. Later models were called
Mercedes-Benz after Daimler's amalgamation with the Benz firm in 1924.
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In the early years of the 20th century the Napier was the premier British make and
produced the first successful 6 cylinder car engine in 1903. Their first
designer was Montague Napier (1870-1931) grandson of the founder of David
Napier And Sons of Lambeth - London - originally makers of coin weighing
machinery. The Australian driver S F Edge won the 1902 Gordon Bennett
International race from Paris to Innsbruck in this 4 cylinder Napier after
his French rivals in faster cars had fallen by the wayside. This was the
first international racing victory by a British Car. |
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Dr Frederick W Lanchester (1868-1946) designed and built the first practical
British 4-wheeled petrol vehicle in 1895. His production cars were
scientifically designed and owed little to their competitors who had hardly
any influence on a genius like Lanchester. This 1903 car had a balanced
'vibrationless' 2 cylinder horizontal engine set amidships in the chassis
with two counter-rotating crankshafts - electric ignition - 3 speed epicyclic
gearbox with pre-selector control - tiller steering and a worm drive back
axle. A rigid chassis and soft suspension gave excellent and comfortable road
holding. |
