Early Cars - Forerunners of the Modern Automobile

The following pages will show us how early cars were built. In this history of cars , we'll find out that experiments in Europe and in the United States were gaining ground. Building on the work of earlier scientists and engineers, French engineer Jean Joseph Etienne Lenoir completed a workable internal-combustion engine in 1860. This one-cylinder engine ran on coal gas ignited by an electric spark. The Lenoir engine was designed as a stationary power plant for factories but a small model was used experimentally in 1863 to power a road vehicle.

About 1865 and Austrian inventor, Siegfried Marcus, built and road tested a simple four-wheeled vehicle with an internal combustion engine that used liquid fuel. Ten years later he produced a second liquid-fueled vehicle which ran successfully and is now preserved in a museum in Vienna as forerunners of the modern automobile - early cars in their infancy.

Nikolaus A. Otto, a German inventor, built the most direct ancestor of today's automobile engine in 1876. Otto's engine used the four-stroke principle of operation - intake, compression, power, and exhaust. Car engines today operate on this principle. Otto's engine originally operated on coal gas but was soon adapted for use with other fuels. Otto's engine provided a compact yet powerful engine, much different from the cumbersome, noisy and clunky engines a few decades back. These early cars were important to the developments that would come later.



Gottlieb Daimler and another German, Karl Benz, are usually credited with being the earliest builders of successful automobiles that used internal combustion engines. Each produced a motor car in 1886 and they are now classic automobiles that command very high prices for classic car collectors. Daimler produced light, reliable, medium-speed gas engine. The design formed the basis for the modern car engine.Benz concentrated on the idea of a vehicle fitted with a gasoline motor which combined with body, chassis (frame and wheels), and other parts into an efficient unit. The pair produced excellent early cars.

Steam-driven cars were even more popular than electrics in the late 1890's and early 1900's. There were more than 100 different makes of American steamers during those times. Steamers offered more power than electrics, quiet operation, and smooth performance. But their drawbacks were serious. It took a long time to build up steam and and procedures were complicated. Also, owners were afraid that the boiler might explode.