 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |
Some of the car's history is a little grey but it all started a long time ago. First amongst the early pioneers must be the French engineer Nicolas Cugnot who in 1769 invented and built the first steam powered contraption, a military tractor. Twenty years passed before the first ever patent was applied for by Oliver Evans in 1789. He designed and built a steam powered land vehicle which didn't really catch on. The first Brittish design was a steam powered road carriage built by Richard Trevithick in 1801.
Steam continued to be the main means of motivating power but a new concept was soon to emerge, that of the internal combustion engine. Francois Rivas, a Swiss inventor designed and built the first internal combustion engine using a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen for fuel in 1887. It is interesting to note that some years earlier a Scottish inventor called Robert Anderson invented the first electric powered vehicle in the mid 1830's.
The first petrol engine was developed in 1870 by Julius Hock a design which was later improved by Nicholaus Otto who's design of a four stroke engine formed the basis for the modern engine we use today.
The first patent for an automoblie using a combustion engine was filed by a US engineer called George Baldwin in 1879. Soon after, developments in the motoring world began to develop rapidly. The first petrol pump appeared in 1885, the first Benz three wheeled car, Henry Ford's first car and the first Daimler all within the following three years.
Car production first began in France in 1889, Panhard and Levassor built cars to order using parts supplied by various sources. Next came Peugot in 1891. The man credited with bringing mass production to the motor car was Henry Ford. In 1913 he installed his new production system and by 1927 he had built and sold more than 5 million cars.
Today there are more than 240 million passanger cars in use on European roads, and dozens of great motoring magazines for those of us who are fascinated by all things fuel powered.
 |
Mini
Grid
List