FUEL PRICES

As the price of petrol increased, especially in the 1970s, car manufacturers concentrated on building more efficient engines. A more efficient engine allows a car to travel further on the same amount of fuel. The need for more efficient vehicles also increased the number of small cars produced and influenced the shape of the bodywork. Certain shapes travel through the air more easily and so use less fuel. Engineers use artificial wind tunnels to study how the different shapes of car bodies affect their wind-resistance.

THE INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINE

The development of the motor car had to wait until a more suitable type of engine was invented. That was the internal combustion engine. Combustion is another word for burning. In an internal combustion engine the fuel is burned inside the engine’s cylinders, causing tiny explosions that move the pistons. This is different from a steam engine, in which the fuel is burned outside the engine, turning water into the steam that drives the pistons.
The first practical motor cars to use the new engine appeared in Germany in 1885. Karl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler, each working independently, produced self-propelled vehicles powered by petrol-fuelled engines.

STEAM POWER

In the 1760s the Frenchman Nicolas Cugnot built several steam-driven vehicles for driving along roads. They travelled at a walking pace and could carry four people easily and tow heavy loads such as cannons.
For the next 100 years many other engineers and inventors in several European countries and the United States experimented with steam-powered cars. While steam power was ideal for railways, it proved unsuitable for road vehicles, mainly because of the weight of steam engines.