► How Cars Are Built?

Features of the car.

A modern day 5 seater car.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/dec/08/ford-focus-car-review-martin-love

Cars are typically fitted with multiple types of lights. These include headlights, which are used to illuminate the way ahead so that the vehicle can be used at night, brake lights to indicate when the brakes are applied, turning lights to indicate which way the driver is turning and white-colored reverse lights. Interior lights on the ceiling of the car are usually fitted for the driver and passengers. The weight of a car influences fuel consumption and performance, with more weight resulting in increased fuel consumption and decreased performance. Research has proved that global energy use could be heavily reduced by using lighter cars. Most cars are designed to carry more than one person, often with five seats. Cars with five seats typically seat two passengers in the front and three in the rear. Larger cars can often carry seven people. On the other hand, sports cars are usually designed with only two seats. The differing needs for passenger capacity and their luggage space have resulted in the availability of different car types that include the sedan, hatchback, station wagon and minivan. Road traffic accidents are the largest cause of injury-related deaths worldwide. Road traffic is becoming ever safer due to new safety features in cars such as seat belts and airbags and on roads due to new safety features like speed bumps. While there are different types of fuel that may power cars, most rely on petrol or diesel. The average vehicle will emit 10,180 grams of carbon dioxide. Many governments are using road taxes to influence vehicle purchase decisions, with a low CO2 figure often resulting in reduced taxation. Growth in the popularity of vehicles and commuting has led to traffic congestion.
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The inside of the car.

The inside of an old car. Much more basic than cars today.
http://raoulpop.com/2012/04/15/chasing-rfi-waves-part-seven/

Cars are equipped with controls used for driving, passenger comfort and safety. Cars are normally operated by the use of feet and hands, and sometimes by voice. These controls include a steering wheel, pedals for operating the brakes and controlling the car's speed, a stick for changing gears, and a number of buttons and dials for turning on lights, ventilation and other functions. Modern cars' controls are now much simpler, such as the location for the accelerator and brake, but this was not always the case. Controls are evolving in response to new technologies, for example the electric car. Since the car was first invented, its controls have become fewer and simpler throughout the years, for example all cars once had a manual control for the choke valve, clutch, ignition timing. Cars also used to have a crank instead of an electric starter. However new controls have also been added to vehicles, making them more complex. Examples include air conditioning, navigation systems and in car entertainment. Another trend is the replacement of physical buttons and switches with touchscreen controls.

(credit:wikipedia)

Production of the car.

Henry Ford
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car#/media/File:Henry_ford_1919.jpg

The large-scale production-line manufacturing of affordable cars was made by Ransom Olds in 1902  and based upon the assembly line technique. The assembly line style of mass production had been used in the America by Thomas Blanchard in 1821 ^.This concept was greatly expanded by Henry Ford, beginning in 1914. As a result, Ford's cars came off the assembly line in fifteen-minute intervals, much faster than previous methods, increasing the rate of cars being made while using less manpower (from 12.5 to 1 hour 33 minutes). It was so successful but painting the cars was a problem. Only Black would dry fast enough, forcing the company to drop the variety of colours available until fast-drying paint was developed in 1926.Ford's complex safety procedures, especially assigning each worker to a specific location instead of allowing them to roam about, dramatically reduced the rate of injury. The combination of high wages and high efficiency  was copied by most major industries. The assembly line forced workers to work at a certain pace with very repetitive motions which led to more output per worker while other countries were using less productive methods. In 1914, an assembly line worker could buy a Model T with four months' pay.

(Credit: Wikipedia)

Background of the car.

Karl Benz
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car#/media/File:Carl-Benz_coloriert.jpg

Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot is widely credited with building the first full-scale, self-propelled mechanical vehicle,  in 1769 he created a steam-powered tricycle. His inventions were limited by problems with water supply and maintaining steam pressure. In 1801, Richard Trevithick built and demonstrated his vehicle , believed by many to be the first demonstration of a steam-powered road vehicle. It was unable to maintain sufficient steam pressure for long periods, and was of little practical use.

 In 1807, Nicéphore Niépce and his brother Claude created what was probably the world's first internal combustion engine  but they chose to install it in a boat instead of a car .In 1807 the Swiss inventor François Isaac de Rivaz designed his own combustion engine and used it to develop the world's first vehicle to be powered by such an engine. Rivaz used a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen. But it wasn't very successful, as was the case with others, such as Samuel Brown, Samuel Morey, and Etienne Lenoir who each produced vehicles  powered by internal combustion engines. In November 1881, French inventor Gustave Trouvé demonstrated a working three-wheeled car powered by electricity. Although several other German engineers  were working on the problem at about the same time, Karl Benz  is known as the inventor of the first modern car.
(credit: Wikipedia)

The Geography of the car.




Benz  model (1894) by German inventor Carl Benz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car#/media/File:Benz-velo.jpg

The car is a wheeled, self-powered motor vehicle used for transportation. Most definitions of the term specify that cars are designed to run  on roads, to have seating for one to eight people, to  have four wheels and to be used for the transportation of people rather than goods.
The Benz Patent-Motorwagen was built in 1886 and is  the first automobile, a vehicle designed to be propelled by an internal combustion engine. Cars did not become widely available until the early 20th century. One of the first cars that was accessible to the public was the 1908 Model T, an American car made by the Ford Motor Company. Cars are equipped with controls used for driving, parking, passenger comfort and safety.  As of 2010, controls have been added to cars, making them more complex. Examples include rear reversing cameras, air conditioning, navigation systems, and in car entertainment. Most cars in use in  2010 are propelled by an internal combustion engine, fuelled by  petrol or diesel. Both fuels cause air pollution and are also blamed for contributing to climate change and global warming. Electric cars began to become commercially available in 2008. The benefits of having a car  include on-demand transportation, mobility, independence and convenience.

(credit: Wikipedia)










 

I am doing my blog on the geography of cars