History of the Motor Vehicle
The majority of the Earths population have come to rely on motor vehicles as their main method of transport and as they are such a common modern convenience, it is difficult to imagine life without them. The motor vehicle came to prominence in the 20th century but its origins came about before that, so who was the very first to take the horses off the carriage and make a self-propelled vehicle?
Ferdinand Verbiest is said to have made the very first construct that could reasonably be named an automobile in around 1672. It was a very small vehicle, incapable of carrying a driver or passenger, however it did move on its own through the power of steam. Verbiest built the small toy-like vehicle as a present for the Chinese Emperor of the time.
After this there were several attempts at a self-propelled carriage, the first of which can be accredited to Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot in 1769, however there was doubt surrounding his invention as to whether or not it actually worked.
The first internal combustion engine was invented in 1806 by Franois Isaac de Rivaz, an inventor from Switzerland. It was powered using a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen, but was not all that successful. Strictly speaking it worked but it was not very efficient and provided nothing like the comfortable ride that modern engines do.
The man who is usually accredited with the invention of the modern automobile is Karl Benz, although there were others working on it at around the same time such as Gottlieb Daimler, Wilhelm Maybach, and Siegfried Marcus. Benz completed his first Motorwagen in 1885 and was granted a patent for it in early 1886. He then began promoting the vehicles in order to try and sell them to the wealthy and between 1888 and 1893 he had sold 25 vehicles.
Daimler and Maybach founded DMG (Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft / Daimler Motor Company) in 1890 under the brand name Daimler. Their first vehicle was a horse drawn carriage with one of their engines in it. By 1895 they had made around 30 automobiles, but they and Benz seemed unaware of each others early work.
Right towards the end of the 1900s the crankshaft and piston engine came about and throughout the 20th century developed into the sophisticated piece of technology we know it as today. Mergers between DMG and Benz in later years bore the Daimler-Benz company and the Mercedes-Benz automobile range.
Ferdinand Verbiest is said to have made the very first construct that could reasonably be named an automobile in around 1672. It was a very small vehicle, incapable of carrying a driver or passenger, however it did move on its own through the power of steam. Verbiest built the small toy-like vehicle as a present for the Chinese Emperor of the time.
After this there were several attempts at a self-propelled carriage, the first of which can be accredited to Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot in 1769, however there was doubt surrounding his invention as to whether or not it actually worked.
The first internal combustion engine was invented in 1806 by Franois Isaac de Rivaz, an inventor from Switzerland. It was powered using a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen, but was not all that successful. Strictly speaking it worked but it was not very efficient and provided nothing like the comfortable ride that modern engines do.
The man who is usually accredited with the invention of the modern automobile is Karl Benz, although there were others working on it at around the same time such as Gottlieb Daimler, Wilhelm Maybach, and Siegfried Marcus. Benz completed his first Motorwagen in 1885 and was granted a patent for it in early 1886. He then began promoting the vehicles in order to try and sell them to the wealthy and between 1888 and 1893 he had sold 25 vehicles.
Daimler and Maybach founded DMG (Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft / Daimler Motor Company) in 1890 under the brand name Daimler. Their first vehicle was a horse drawn carriage with one of their engines in it. By 1895 they had made around 30 automobiles, but they and Benz seemed unaware of each others early work.
Right towards the end of the 1900s the crankshaft and piston engine came about and throughout the 20th century developed into the sophisticated piece of technology we know it as today. Mergers between DMG and Benz in later years bore the Daimler-Benz company and the Mercedes-Benz automobile range.
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