1、TThe Automobile A Century of Progress 1900 2000The Automobile: A Century of Progress Prepared under the auspices of the SAE Historical Committee Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc. Warrendale, Pa. Copyright 1997 Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc. eISBN: 978-0-7680-6329-5Library of Congress Cata
2、loging-in-Publication Data The automobile: a century of progress/prepared under the auspices of the SAE Historical Committee. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-7680-0015-7 1. AutomobilesDesign and constructionHistory. I. SAE Historical Committee. TL240.A795 1997 629.23109dc21 Copyright 1997 Society of A
3、utomotive Engineers, Inc. 400 Commonwealth Dr. Warrendale, PA 15096-0001 U.S.A. Phone: (412) 776-4841 Fax: (412) 776-5760 http:/www.sae.org ISBN 0-7680-0015-7 All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. Permission to photocopy for internal or personal use, or the internal or person
4、al use of specific clients, is granted by SAE for libraries and other users registered with the Copy- right Clearance Center (CCC), provided that the base fee of $.50 per page is paid directly to CCC, 222 Rosewood Dr., Danvers, MA 01923. Special requests should be addressed to the SAE Publications G
5、roup. 0-7680-0015-7/97 $.50. SAE Order No. R-203Table of Contents Foreword Chapter 1 Powerplant Perspectives: Part I Gordon L. Rinschler and Tom Asmus Automotive Engineering, April 1995 Chapter 2 Powerplant Perspectives: Part II Gordon L. Rinschler and Tom Asmus Automotive Engineering, May 1995 Chap
6、ter 3 Powerplant Perspectives: Part III Gordon L. Rinschler and Tom Asmus Automotive Engineering, June 1995 Chapter 4 U.S. Passenger Car Brake History Larry M. Rinek and Carl W. Cowan Automotive Engineering, July 1995 Chapter 5 A History of the Passenger Car Tire: Part I William J. Woehrle Automotiv
7、e Engineering, September 1995 Chapter 6 A History of the Passenger Car Tire: Part II William J. Woehrle Automotive Engineering, October 1995 V 1 13 23 33 47 61The Automobile: A Century of Progress Chapter 7 A Century of Automobile Body Evolution Karl E. Ludvigsen Automotive Engineering, November 199
8、5 Chapter 8 A Century of Automobile Comfort and Convenience Karl E. Ludvigsen Automotive Engineering, December 1995 Chapter 9 The First 100 Years of Transportation Safety: Part I Anthony J. Yanik Automotive Engineering, January 1996 Chapter 10 The First 100 Years of Transportation Safety: Part II An
9、thony J. Yanik Automotive Engineering, February 1996 Chapter 11 A History of Automobile Electrical Systems Ralph H. Johnston Automotive Engineering, September 1996 Chapter 12 Gasoline Specifications, Regulations, and Properties Lewis M. Gibbs Automotive Engineering, October 1996 Chapter 13 A History
10、 of Lubrication Syed Q.A. Rizvi Automotive Engineering, November 1996 Chapter 14 Materials: Key to 100 Years of Automotive Progress Gary Bragg Automotive Engineering, December 1996 Chapter 15 About the Authors Index 73 99 121 133 151 185 203 231 251 261 ivForeword Welcome to The Automobile: A Centur
11、y of Progress! This book marks the culmination of a five-year effort by the SAE Historical Committee com- memorating the 100th anniversary of the automobile industry in the United States. When this project was first contemplated in 1992, we anticipated doing a chronological review of the technical h
12、istory of the automobile in the “who-did-what-when“ manner that is typical of most automotive history publications. Then, one of the committee members suggested, “Lets deviate from the norm and use the systems approach because this is the way a car is engineered.“ His suggestion was unanimously acce
13、pted. With inspired enthusiasm, we set out to develop a series of twelve systems-oriented articles for publication in Automotive Engineering maga- zine, delineating the technological progress of the American automobile over the past 100 years. After the task was defined, selecting the exact topics t
14、o be covered turned out to be a greater challenge than we had an- ticipated. In an effort to obtain the assistance of the various SAE technical committees, we aligned the subjects of our articles accordingly and then proceeded to enlist appropriate authors from the committees. However, as the clock
15、ticked and the calendar rolled, we experienced mixed response from the committees. Thus, we came to what should have been an obvious realization: Technical committees look to the future and not to the past, which is as it should be.The Automobile: A Century of Progress After this bit of wisdom was u
16、nderstood, we refocused our attention on the more traditional automotive systems and sought authors from SAE at large to write about the topics on which they had both expertise and genuine historical interest. This turned out to be the proper approach. As a result, we produced and published a series
17、 of fourteen articles covering ten topics, including a time line in the September 1996 issue of Automotive Engineer- ing. Those articles have now been compiled in this book. Although we are indeed proud of our efforts, our pride is tempered somewhat because we were unable to complete the series as o
18、riginally intended. When we could not find an author available to do justice to driveline, chassis, and lighting systems development, we elected to eliminate these topics rather than cover them inadequately. Rest assured that we regret these omissions as much as you do. Having said that, let us now
19、extend kudos to all who have contributed to this book. We trust that you will enjoy the fruits of our effort as we pledge to continue serving SAE in the preservation of the history of mobility technology. James K. Wagner, Coordinator Centennial Publication Effort SAE Historical Committee April 2, 19
20、97 viChapter 1 Powerplant Perspectives: Part I Gordon L. Rinschler and Tom Asmus Chrysler Corporation In 1824, Sadi Carnot concluded his solitary treatise on heat engines, which became a significant element in the foundation of thermodynamics, with the following: “We should not expect ever to utiliz
21、e in practice all the motive power of combustibles. The attempts made to attain this result would be far more hurtful than useful if they caused other important considerations to be neglected. The economy of the combustible is only one of the conditions to be fulfilled in heat engines. In many cases
22、, it is only secondary, often giving precedence to safety, to strength, to the dura- bility of the engine, to the small space it must occupy, to cost of installation, etc.“ Although Carnots precise motives were unclear, they most certainly did not pertain specifically to automobile engines. Yet, thi
23、s timeless statement is both insightful and realistic in describing the challenges of developing powerplants throughout the history of the automobile. His words remind us that the powerplant is not an end in itself, but a result of many, oftenThe Automobile: A Century of Progress conflicting factors
24、 of which efficiency is but one. The journey, so to speak, is not one of linear logic methodically moving toward a solution, but an often disjointed process of confronting literally thousands of issues and then engineering practical solutions. What follows is an attempt to capture the essence of thi
25、s paradoxical journey without necessarily including every limb on the family tree of todays powerplants. Several loosely connected vignettes are offered relating to how it was at the start of the journey and how some of the human, technical, and scientific events evolved into the volume-production p
26、owerplants of today. Engine ConfigurationHow Many Is Enough? “Why have an eight when you can go 60 mi/h with either a six- or four- cylinder motor?“ This question was presented by Mr. John O. Heinze and was hotly debated at a 1915 meeting of the Indiana Section of the Society of Automobile Engineers
27、 (SAE). With slight modifications to the technical arguments, similar questions are being debated todayperhaps in an envi- ronment confused by the ensuing history rather than clarified by it. The early progression of engine types and number of cylinders was quite straightforward, as Mr. Heinze noted
28、 so eloquently: “As you well know, we started at the beginning with a single cylinder motor. We had a great deal of troubleThe next step was to make a two-cylinder motor, which proved more successful.“ What he failed to note was that, even at the time of his meeting, evolution of the automobile engi
29、ne was proceeding in a most diverse manner, a far cry from the first logical step from one to two cylinders. To wit, the first eight-cylinder car was apparently produced a year before the first six-cylinder car, and the first high-volume car with a five-cylinder engine would not come along until 197
30、4. Cylinder arrange- ment and combustion-chamber design are key elements to provide insights into the intensive, and often circuitous, development that has resulted in todays automotive powerplants. Pre-automotive engines had simple combustion chambers, essentially a flat plate closing the cylinder,
31、 and were aspirated by slide-type valvesa hold- over from prior steam-engine experience. As technology evolved from atmospheric cycles to compression of the charge before combustion, valves capable of sealing ever higher pressures and managing more heat were required. Poppet valves, successfully use
32、d on pumps for many years prior to gasoline engines, were an obvious choice for early designers. The first 2Chapter 1 motorcycle engine by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in 1885 had a suction-operated inlet valve, an exhaust valve located directly under the inlet valve, and an unusual third va
33、lve in the piston; all three were poppet type. The combustion chamber could loosely be described as hemispheri- cal, although the valves were located in an adjoining volume. The first two decades of automotive engi- neering produced dramatic improve- ments in combustion, ignition, and volumet- ric e
34、fficiency with specific output rising from approximately 1.5 kW/L in 1896 to an average of approxi- mately 7.5 kW/L in 1914. Even so, engine designers of this pe- riod were forced to meet customers ever increasing desire for performance by creat- ing engines with enor- mous displacements. Engines as
35、 large as 11.5 L were not un- common in large road cars, with racing models as large as 26.2 L! Starting in 1902 when Locomobile introduced the first water-cooled inline four-cylinder engine in the United States, four cylinders quickly became the configuration of choice. After 1915, the manufacturin
36、g genius of Henry Ford and his Model T would ensure the dominance of the four, based on sales. By 1906, six cylinders were in limited models such as Pierce-Arrow, Stevens- Duryea, and Franklin, with more to follow: Oldsmobile in 1908, Buick in 1910, and Packard in 1912. A few eights were produced du
37、ring this pe- riod, most notably a V8 produced by French automakers De Dion and Daimler and Maybach engine for the first motorcycle, 1885. (Source: Internal Fire by Lyle Cummins.) 3The Automobile: A Century of Progress Pierce-Arrow produced one of the earliest six- cylinder engines. The end section
38、is shown. (Source: SAE Bulletin, Volume II, April to September 1912.) Bouton. A survey of the leading 1914 American models showed one two- cylinder, 54 fours, 45 sixes, and no eights; average displacement was 5.7 L, and average output was 25 kW. The alphabet soup of “T,“ “F,“ “L,“ and “I“ cylinder h
39、eads appeared in a seem- ingly unpredictable manner as designers struggled to improve output. Starting with Mercedes in 1901, the T-head, with intakes on one side of the bore and ex- hausts on the other, became quite popular, but by 1910 were being displaced by less expensive L-head de- signs. By 19
40、17, L-heads accounted for approxi- mately 70% of the engines produced, but overhead valve designs (then called valve-in-head) were becom- ing popular, used in approximately 20%. The Buick Light Six was a typical production overhead valve unit of the day; it featured an I-head, roller lifters, and an
41、 exposed pushrod valvetrain. Four valves per cylinder had captured the eyes of race-engine designers, an example being the Wisconsin-Stutz 4.9-L racing motor; this sixteen-valve inline four devel- oped 97.6 kW at 3000 rpm. Regardless of configuration, all the pre-World War I poppet-valve designs wer
42、e noisy, unreliable, and required frequent adjustment. These shortcom- ings kept some designers and numerous inventors from abandoning 4Chapter 1 The alphabet soup of cylinder heads. sleeve-valve technology. Of the many efforts, the most notable design was the double sleeve valve invented by Charles
43、 Y. Knight of Indiana. He was clearly focused on quietness of operation, referring to his engine as the “Silent Knight“ during the 1906 Chicago Auto Show. Knight engines achieved remarkable early success in England, where, by 1910, Daimler- Knights accounted for nearly a quarter of British auto prod
44、uction. Knight received patents in eight countries, and his engines were ultimately produced by 30 firms. In the United States, Knight had a more difficult time. Rejected by Packard, Locomobile, and Peer- less, he finally licensed F.B. Stearns and Willys Company in 1911, and these became the main U.
45、S. producers of the sleeve valve. By April 1932, when key patents Sectional view of Willys-Knight sleeve valve en- gine. (Source: SAE 1926 Transactions, Part 1.) 5The Automobile: A Century of Progress Cadillac V8s introduced in 1915 (top), 1928 (center), and 1936 (bottom). (Source: SAE Quarterly Tra
46、nsactions, 1949, Volume 3.) expired, improvements in pop- pet-valve engines had made Knight sleeve valves compara- tively heavy, poor in oil economy, and expensive. Pro- duction ceased shortly thereaf- ter, but its legacy is one of having intensified development for quietness in engines of all types
47、. With large-displacement inline fours, vibration was a major problem, and it was not long before market demand arose for more cylinders. Alhough not the first in production world- wide, Cadillac led the headlong rush to V8s by introducing the first mass-produced version in 1914. The 5.1-L 90 L-head
48、 design featured two integral block and head castings in iron mounted on an aluminum crank- case. The original version had a single plane crankshaft that had unbalanced, second-order shak- ing forces and undoubtedly failed to deliver the smoothness of operation demanded by ever more sophisticated cu
49、stomers; it was redesigned in 1923 with counterweighting and a two- plane crank. Peerless followed in 1915, and by 1916 there were eighteen companies building V8s. Low-priced cars would not see V8s until 1932 when Ford introduced the first of the legendary “Flatheads,“ setting a benchmark for simplicity and cost effectiveness. Somewhat 6Chapter 1 surprisingly, straight eights did not come along until consider- ably later, with the first mass-produced version introduced by Packard in 1923. By 1930, it had become the most prevalent arrangement in premium vehicles including Aub
