LAND TRANSPORT
|
|
LAND TRANSPORT
Evolution of land transport. First vehicles: Materials used, functions, shapes. History: The Middle Ages Renaissance, XVII century. The Industrial Revolution: The first steam engines and railways. Electric trains. Diesel engines. High-speed trains. Two-wheeled vehicles: bicycles. Cars. Fuels used. Summary.
|
INTRODUCTION
- One of man’s biggest problems since the beginning of time has been the overland transportation of people and merchandise on rivers, through mountains and over great distances.
- Animal traction.
THE FIRST VEHICLES
- Sledges, stretchers and rollers have existed for thousands of years.
- The first wheel was constructed more than 6,000 years ago in Asia, in the area between the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates.
- Some 5,000 years ago, man domesticated oxen and other animals which were used to substitute man himself.
- Construction of the first roads. The Roman roads.
- In the Renaissance, a rudimentary form of suspension was introduced into vehicles.
- The carriages developments gave rise to newer, easier systems of communications, gave a sharp, healthy push to trade and it became essential in the colonisation of new territories.
THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
- The first steam engine.
- Construction of the first railway between Liverpool and Manchester.
- Railways provided a source of transportation which was comfortable, fast and cheap.
- Urban traffic
- Electric trains. Trolley-buses.
- The Diesel locomotive using fuel-oil
- High-speed trains
- Monorails.
- Trains using magnetic suspension
TWO-WHEELED VEHICLES
- Bicycles. The first chain-driven bicycle
- Evolution.
AUTOMOBILES
- The first automobile constructed by Karl Benz in 1885.
- Daimler built the first four-wheeled automobile
- Panhard and Levassor
- The American, Model “T” Ford was easy to drive. It was the first mass-produced automobile. More than 15 million of them were sold.
- The German Volkswagen model “Beetle” is the only car which has been manufactured uninterrupted for five decades.
- The continuous increasing cost of petrol and pollution.
- New sources of possible energy are being studied to substitute petrol and its derivatives.
- Prototypes which run with solar and electric energy.
SUMMARY |
|
|
|
|
