History of Vehicles Essay

Vehicles had provided humans a means of transportation and vehicles had been a great help in building early civilizations such as of Mesopotamia with its chariots, Egypt with its reed boats, and China with its wheelbarrow. The old had been improved; the new had been invented; and the future had been conceptualized. These had been the cycle of vehicles through the change of time. Looking ahead†¦ The Wheel and the Ship (3500 BC) The oldest wheel discovered was in Mesopotamia and is believed to be over fifty-five hundred years old. Rock drawings of ships were found in Egypt and are believed to have been drawn around 6000 BC. These thus proved that wheel and ships are known by man at that very early time and were used as a part of their trading and technology. Wheels are taught to had been conceptualized when â€Å"humans realized that heavy objects could be moved easier if something round, for example a fallen tree log, was placed under it and the object rolled over it† (Bellis, â€Å"The Invention of the Wheel†). First boats then were usually built of wood while animal skins, clay pots, and reeds had served as an alternative. The Wheelbarrow (181 – 234 AD) The wheelbarrow is believed to have originated from China and was invented by a general named Chuko Liang to transport supplies to injured soldiers. It is believed that â€Å"wheelbarrows do not exist in Europe before the 11th or 12th century (the earliest known Western depiction is in a window at Chartres Cathedral, dated around 1220 AD). Descriptions of the wheelbarrow in China refer to first century BC, and the oldest surviving picture, a frieze relief from a tomb-shrine in Szechuan province, dates from about 118 AD† (â€Å"Wheelbarrow†). The Early Triumphs to Fly (400 BC-1850s) Kite flying started by the Chinese had been the pioneer of man on how he could fly. Different thoughts as to how man could meet this objective had undergone. These included the experiment to imitate a bird by attaching feathers or light weight wood to arms which had been proven disastrous since human arms’ muscles are not like of birds and cannot move with a strength like of a bird. Other experiments though were not originally intended so as man could fly included the work of Hero of Alexandria on Aeolipile. â€Å"Hero mounted a sphere on top of a water kettle. A fire below the kettle turned the water into steam, and the gas traveled through pipes to the sphere. Two L-shaped tubes on opposite sides of the sphere allowed the gas to escape, which gave a thrust to the sphere that caused it to rotate. Aeolipile must be included in the history of vehicles because it gave the principle for engine created movement† (Bellis, â€Å"Early history of Flight†). In the 1480s, with over 100 drawings that illustrated theories on bird and mechanical flight, Leonardo da Vinci had also entered this search to man’s mean to fly (Bellis, â€Å"Early history of Flight†). Leonardo’s Ornithopter concept had been the basis to the invention of the modern day helicopter. In 1783, Jacques Etienne and Joseph Michel Montgolfier invented the first hot air balloon (â€Å"How Did We Learn to Fly Like the Birds? †). Using the smoke from a fire to blow hot air into a silk bag that was attached to a basket, they had been able to fly aboard the hot air balloons’ first passengers, a sheep, a rooster, and a duck. On November 21, 1783, the first ever successful manned flight took place sending Francois Laurent and Jean-Francois Pilatre de Rozier up in the air (Bellis, â€Å"Early history of Flight†). Further studies then went on. In the 1850’s, George Cayley, the considered founder of Aerodynamics, had made his contribution through his gliders wherein a young boy had been the first to fly. The Submarine (1578 – 1620) Designs for underwater boats or submarines date back to the 1500s and ideas for underwater travel date back even further but only in the year 1578 did appear a record of a craft for underwater navigation. â€Å"William Bourne, a former Royal Navy gunner, designed a completely enclosed boat that could be submerged and rowed beneath the surface (Bellis, â€Å"History of the Submarine 2†). Bourne’s idea had never been implemented but a similar apparatus was launched in 1605 (Bellis, â€Å"History of the Submarine 2†). The apparatus didn’t get farther as its designers did not considered the tenacity of underwater mud which caused the craft to stick in the river bottom in its first underwater trial. But in the year 1620, Cornelius Van Drebbel had invented the first â€Å"practical† submarine which was a rowboat covered with greased leather (Bellis, â€Å"History of the Submarine 2†). His submarine had successfully maneuvered at depths of 12 to 15 ft. below the surface of Thames River. He had then further made revisions of his first submarine and legends says that after repeated tests, King James I of England rode to one of his later models (â€Å"The Saga of the Submarine†). Despite success, Drebbel’s invention did not quickly amaze the British Navy that made submarine warfare infeasible during that time. Steam Powered Automobiles (1600 – 1700) Steam power had been known for the past centuries but it was only in the 1600’s where it had been in practical use. â€Å"Ferdinand Verbiest created a model steam carriage in 1678, that moved by using a principle that is used in the modern day turbine. In the 17th century the Dutch physicist, Christiaan Huygens built an engine that uses air pressure. About 1750, the French inventor Jacques de Vaucanson gave a demonstration of a carriage propelled by a large clockwork engine. The steam engine had then developed the motorized land transport by the 1760’s† (Brainard). The first built automobile is attributed to Nicolas Joseph Cugnot in the year 1769. He made his three wheeled steam driven tractor intending to help the French army to move its heavy artillery pieces in and around Paris (Brainard). His being the first had made also his automobile to be also the first to be involved in an automobile accident in 1771. Steamboat (1783 – 1787) After a century of steam power exploration used in automobiles, development of steam powered boats then took place. In 1783, the first practical steamboat was demonstrated by Marquis Claude Francois de Jouffroy d’Abbans – a paddle wheel steamboat. â€Å"The era of the steamboat then began in America in 1787 when John Fitch (1743-1798) made the first successful trial of a forty-five-foot steamboat on the Delaware River on August 22, 1787, in the presence of members of the Constitutional Convention. Fitch later built a larger vessel that carried passengers and freight between Philadelphia and Burlington, New Jersey. † (Bellis, â€Å"History of Steamboats†). Modern Bicycles (1790) The next notable improvement in the history of vehicles is the invention of modern day bicycles which is disputed on whether the invention of Pierre and Ernest Michaux were the first ever built or not. â€Å"Some history books states that Pierre and Ernest Michaux, the French father and son team of carriage-makers, invented the first bicycle during the 1860s. Historians now disagree and there is supporting evidence that the bicycle is already known before. However, historians all agree that Pierre and Ernest Michaux invent the modern bicycle pedal and cranks in 1861. † (Bellis, â€Å"Bicycle History†, â€Å"Bicycle History in Debate†). Steam Powered Locomotives (1801) Locomotives were designed first by Richard Trevithick but not originally for railroad tracks but for roads while George Stephenson is regarded as the inventor of the first steam locomotive engine for railroads. â€Å"Richard Trevithick’s invention is considered the first tramway locomotive, however, it was designed for a road, not for a railroad. † (Bellis, â€Å"Richard Trevithick†). The Motorcycles (1867) The mechanical version of the bicycles had been born with the invention of motorcycles in 1867. â€Å"American, Sylvester Howard Roper (1823-1896) invented a two-cylinder, steam-engine motorcycle (powered by coal) in 1867. This can be considered the first motorcycle, if you allow your description of a motorcycle to include a steam engine. † (Bellis, â€Å"Motorcycle†).