【The Mars Rover Fun Station column is jointly planned by Tencent Auto and Mars Talking Car】
Welcome to this issue of "Mars Rover Fun Station", speaking of the car itself, compared to many people are familiar with the performance, configuration and other aspects of the car they like, but for the culture and historical heritage of the car, many people know very little, especially some of the anecdotes in the automotive industry, which is even less known. Today we're going to talk about some interesting things about cars and see if there's anything you don't know.
First, the inventor of the first car was actually the founder of the Mercedes-Benz brand
In the field of luxury cars, Mercedes-Benz can be described as a big name, but do you know who the founder of the Mercedes-Benz brand is?
The inventor of the first car in the modern sense was the German engineer Carl Benz, who researched the construction of a three-wheeled car in 1885 and applied for a patent in 1886. The three-wheeled car features a two-stroke single-cylinder 0.9 hp gasoline engine. Although this car is very imperfect, speed, loading capacity are very low, but because it has many characteristics of modern cars, such as flower ignition, water cooling cycle, steel pipe frame, leaf spring suspension, rear wheel drive, front wheel steering and brake handles, etc., later cars are basically following this design framework, so it is still recognized as the first modern car, the car is currently in the Collection of the German Benz Automobile Museum.
Due to the lack of technology, the car invented by Carl Benz always broke down, and was sneered at by others as a "stinking monster", and Carl Benz, who was afraid of being foreign, did not even dare to drive it in public. In August 1888, Beretta Ringer, who had been silently supporting benz behind him from beginning to end, made a brave decision. She took her child and drove in Benz's car to visit her grandmother in Pforzheim, more than 100 kilometers away. Due to lack of power, it was necessary to get down and push the vehicle forward when going uphill, although it was a bit awkward, but no car in the world had ever traveled such a long distance at that time, which made Beretta Ringer the world's first recognized driver. When Beretta completed this feat, he immediately telegraphed Benz, "The car has been tested, please apply for the Munich Fair." ”。 On September 12 of the same year, Benz's invention made a big splash at the Munich Fair, and a large number of customers began to order cars from Benz.
In 1906, Benz and his two sons founded the Benz Father and Son Company in Ladenburg, which was also the prototype of the Mercedes-Benz Automobile Company, and after more than a hundred years of development, the Mercedes-Benz brand finally became a world-renowned automobile brand.
Let's talk about the origin of the name for the Ford Model T.
Second, the name of the first national model, the Ford Model T
As we all know, the first car in the auto industry that ordinary people can afford was the Ford Model T, and before the advent of the Ford Model T, the car was more like a toy for the rich because of its very high price. In 1908, when cars sold for $4,000, the Ford Model T went on the market for $850, which immediately detonated the entire automobile market.
The mystery of the low price of the Ford Model T is that it applied the automobile production line for the first time, each worker was fixed in one position, responsible for only one piece of work, and the car circulated in different stations to finally complete the assembly. As a result, the Ford Model T was built in just 12.5 hours, which was incredible in an era when 700 hours were needed to manually produce a car.
But do you know why the Ford Model T is called a Model T? Some people say that there are still A-type, B-type, C-type, D-type cars in front, when it is the turn of the Ford T-model to be officially produced, the model just uses the letter T, or that the Ford T-model looks like a T-shape, because the shape is similar to the name.
Both of these claims are false, although the Ford Model T is indeed very similar to the T-shaped car, and the A-model, S-model and N-model have been produced before, but only these three cars have been produced, far less than the name given to it. The reason why it is called T-type car, mainly because the production of body parts needs to use a mold, and the mold technology at that time is not mature, the original mold can not withstand too hard iron or steel, so Ford considered using tin (Tin) to make a mold, so the new car name took the English initials of tin "T", which everyone knows its origin.
Earlier we are talking about foreign car fun facts, next, we will give you a popularization of "China" and "world" car fun facts.
Was Empress Dowager Cixi's car the first car in China?
In a courtyard hall on the east side of the current Summer Palace, a royal car of Empress Dowager Cixi is on display, which many tourists have witnessed with their own eyes. In order to please Empress Dowager Cixi, Yuan Shikai specially imported a Tulia brand car from the United States as a gift on the birthday of Empress Dowager Cixi in 1902. Many people say that the first car owner in China was Empress Dowager Cixi, but this is not the case.
Although Empress Dowager Cixi's car entered the country very early, it is well documented that the first car in China was a Shanghai car. In 1901, a Hungarian named Lee transported two Ozmobi American cars from Hong Kong to Shanghai. At that time, the Shanghai Ministry of Works bureau also held a special meeting and decided to issue a temporary license plate to Li Enshi's car and allow it to drive on the street, so it left a relevant written record. Therefore, Empress Dowager Cixi is not the first car owner in China.
There is also a car anecdote related to Empress Dowager Cixi and the legend that "the driver should drive on his knees". Those who believe this claim believe that Empress Dowager Cixi is a noble person and will not allow the driver to sit on an equal footing with her. Not to mention that it is not safe to drive on your knees, in fact, Empress Dowager Cixi has never ridden this car at all, but just used it as a birthday gift, and put it away after taking a look.
This claim comes from the memoirs of U.S. Minister to China Reinsch. In his book, he says, "If I had more time, I might have come up with a way to get the driver to drive the royal car on his knees... But in fact, the poor Empress Dowager Cixi never enjoyed the pleasure of riding a car. ”
The minister also admitted that Empress Dowager Cixi had never ridden in this car, but the ridiculous words in front of her were falsely spread and were taken as real by everyone.
Fourth, the fastest car in the world
The speed of sports cars such as Bugatti and Ferrari is fascinating, but is the Bugatti sports car the fastest car in the world? No, the world's fastest car has a top speed of more than 1609 km/ h, which is even faster than the cruising speed of many fighter jets.
The fastest car on record is a British-made "Bloodhound" supersonic car, the shell is forged from aviation-grade aluminum, the body is 12.8 meters long, the weight is 6.4 tons, and the diameter is 0.9 meters. Looks like a long pencil. The car' wheels are made of high-strength titanium alloy, the engine is a fighter engine, and a rocket engine on top provides additional thrust, and in a test in 2012, the car ran at a speed of 1,000 mph (1609.344 km/h), making it the fastest car in the world.
Of course, the Bloodhound supersonic car is a specially built test model, and the fastest of the production models is the SC Ultimate Aero, which is equipped with a 1183-horsepower twin-turbo 7.0-liter V8s engine with a top speed of more than 437 km/h, and only 25 are mass-produced.
These are some of the anecdotes from the automotive world, which of them are you interested in? Welcome to leave a message to discuss.
In the next issue, we will tell some interesting facts about the longevity models in the automotive world.
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