Leonardo Da Vinci invented a hand-cranked vehicle in 1490, and the mathematician Geronimo Cardano invented the universal joint in 1545. Christiaan Huygens invented an atmospheric piston engine in 1673 and James Watt patented the steam engine in 1769. Thus the story of mechanically-powered vehicles begins. Among the many brilliant successes that have come down to us are also ignominious failures and idiosyncratic departures from the mainstream that almost defy belief.
In fact, the story of the motorcar features an outstanding failure as one of its first true representations. Nicholas Joseph Cugnot developed what is generally felt to be the first full-scale vehicle to be propelled by mechanical force.
Cugnot was a Swiss engineer, working for the French military in the eighteenth century. He was attempting to develop a military conveyance when he built his first vehicle. This steam-powered vehicle carried four passengers on its maiden voyage, and moved at a steady three mph (4.8 kph) until the boiler ran out of steam, which was every 12 minutes.
His second vehicle is better-known, however. It had a top speed of 2.5 mph (4.5 kph). This vehicle is still preserved in Paris, and is a wagon-like conveyance with three wheels.
The front wheel is both the steering and traction wheel, and the steam engine, with its boiler and twin 12.8 X 14.9-inch (325 X 378-mm) cylinders, is mounted upon the steering swivel with the front wheel. Steering this Cugnot wagon required great strength, as the full weight of the boiler and engine assembly is supported by the same armature that turns the front wheel. The difficulties of this setup are illustrated by the following accounts of the Cugnot vehicle in action.
An apocryphal account depicts Cugnot’s vehicle snorting and whistling through the streets of Paris. AS the barely controllable machine veered to-and-for, the astonished citizenry alternately hooted, railed and shrieded in fright. Finally, Cugnot’s arms gave out and his front-heavy monster plowed into a stone wall, knocking it down. Shortly thereafter, Cugnot was dragged from amidst the rubble, taken to jail, and his machine impounded before it could cause further harm.
Another story is generally accepted as being more accurate. The drive in question took place on private property, and no outraged citizens were present. The machine did, however, ram a wall, for which Cugnot had to pay a fine (we presume that he also had to rest his exhausted biceps and triceps for a day or so). The government cut off funding for the project, and that was the coup de grace for the Cugnot vehicle.
Further developments over the next century resulted in the establishment of the four-wheel internal combustion ‘horseless carriage,’ the development of such as Gottlieb Daimler, Karl Benz and Henry Ford in the 1880s and 1890s. In general, such development segued neatly into the existing Machine Age milieu.
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