If you are already experienced at this past time then you understand why even the mention of racing RC cars can excite you. It is a safe hobby (at least for you), and the excitement level it can provide is just out of this world.

If you are among those that have yet to get a feel of what racing RC cars is all about, well – heres your chance to read a bit about the hobby – and it is never too late you know.

1. A wide range

Remote Control cars can be operated from a joystick through wireless communication or radio frequencies.

The models of remote control model cars can be as simple as the start – stop variety or as complex as the sophisticated ones that offer the similar maneuverability as the real full size racing cars, and everything in between.

2. Its for everyone!

This hobby has got everyone from old to young to men to women to children interested in it.

After all the skills that you require for this cannot be affected by age, as long as you are not a toddler. This is the best thing about RC cars – anyone can enjoy it, as long as speed and strategy do hold your interest.

3. Where to get one?

[Want a Free RC Car?]

Well, racing car models are available widely. You could get some simpler models at toy stores, great models in the hobby stores, and a huge variety online as well. We suggest you buy your racing car model from a local store so you can maybe try it out before you actually pay for it.

RC cars are assets that become quite personal to you so you will want to get one that you are most comfortable with. The truth is, the best RC cars are often the most expensive ones. However that does not mean that the most expensive RC car would suit the absolute beginner.

The more the controls the harder it is to control the car, and the complexity of the task requires great skill when you consider that everything has to be done in the nick of time. We suggest – if you are a beginner get a simple model and get the hang of it before you move up to something really expensive. You’d be throwing your money away if you ditched the car into a pond you know!

4. Maintenance

Just as with most everything else, RC cars need care and maintenance. You need to take care of these babies just as you would take care of a full sized car, especially if it is the gas powered variety you are using. Timely cleaning, tire checks and the likes of that will ensure years of enjoyable racing.

Keep in mind that your model will require some care that you may not be able to provide yourself. So if you are a beginner, regular pit stops with the supplier will keep your car in top shape.

Abhishek has a passion for Remote Control Cars and he has got some great RC Cars Secrets up his sleeves! Download his FREE 106 Page Ebook, “Remote Control Cars Inside Out!” from his website http://www.Auto-Whiz.com/477/index.htm. Only limited Free Copies available.

Article Source: EzineArticles.com

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RC Traxxas Maintenance – To increase the life of your Traxxas RC vehicle you must provide proper maintenance and upkeep. Replacing parts can actually be a very inexpensive way of making your Traxxas RC vehicles last a very long time.

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Nicolaus August Otto was born on June 14, 1832 in Holzhausen, Germany. At the age of sixteen, Nicolaus Otto dropped out of high school and worked in a grocery store for a while and also worked as a clerk in Frankfurt.

Nicolaus Otto’s first occupation was as a traveling salesman selling sugar, kitchenware and tea to grocery stores on the German side of the Belgian and the French border as Nicolaus was trying to make enough money to wed his beloved Ann, whom Nicolaus Otto met at a carnival in Cologne in 1858, when he was 26.

As a young boy Nicolaus Otto had a fascination for things mechanical and soon developed an interest in the new technologies of the day. Nicolaus began experimenting with building four-stroke engines after coming across a newspaper article of the Lenoir two-stroke gas-driven internal combustion engine.

Nicolaus Otto built an internal combustion engine before year’s end and would invent the first practical alternative to the steam engine.

Although Nicolaus Otto’s early attempts at building a combustion engine failed, they so impressed Eugen Langen, a technician and proprietor of a sugar factory, who took on Otto as a partner. Nicolaus quit his job and joined Eugen Lengen and in 1864, the two of them started the world’s first engine manufacturing company ‘N.A. Otto & Cie’

Nicolaus Otto Patten

The company exists today as Klockner-Humbolt-Deutz AG and is the oldest company manufacturing internal combustion engines and the world’s largest manufacturer of air-cooled diesel engines.

In 1867, Nicolaus Otto and Eugen Lengen were awarded a Gold Medal at the Paris World Exhibition for their atmospheric gas engine built a year earlier. Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach later joined the company.

“In his youthful enthusiasm Nicolaus thought of this day and night,” wrote Kurt Rathke in his biography of Nicolaus Otto. “Otto had the wildest plans about the future, all to do with the gas engine and its possibilities.”

According to Rathke, Otto was inspired by watching smoke rise from a chimney. “Nicolaus decided that the place of explosion in a gas engine, which he likened to the chimney, should receive a rich fuel mixture. His idea was to let only fresh air enter first and fall down on unburned gases from the previous working stroke. Only then should the gas mixture be inducted.”

Although Lenoir built the first commercially practical internal combustion engine in 1859, the Lenoir engine failed to come up to initial expectations and fell suddenly from popularity.

This was due, partly to the troublesome electrical ignition system, but mainly to the high consumption of, what was then, expensive gas – and what’s different from today? In practice almost 100 cubic feet of gas were burnt per horsepower per hour.

The amount of cooling water needed was considerable and the heat generated was so great, that unless the bearings were heavily oiled, the engine would seize.

Nicolaus Otto felt that the Lenoir engine would have more uses if it could run on liquid fuel so he devised a carburetor for this engine and worked to improve it in other ways.

Although two years later, Alphonse Beau de Rochas set forth the principle of the four-stroke engine; one of the most important landmarks in engine design comes from Nicolaus Otto, who in 1876 invented an effective gas motor engine.

Nicolaus built the first practical four-stroke internal combustion engine with ignition device, calling it the “Otto Cycle Engine”. In 1861, Otto patented a two-stroke engine that ran on gas and in the next ten years, over 30,000 of the engine were sold. This engine was the prototype of the combustion engines that have since been built.

How the four-stroke Engine worked

On its first stroke the piston would draw in an explosive mixture of fuel and air. The second, return stroke would compress the mixture. Ignition would then explode the charge, the resulting expansion driving the piston for its third stroke. The final stroke would exhaust the burnt gases, clearing the cylinder to start the cycle again.

A very smart Otto patented his construction in 1877. And although he never became directly involved in car manufacturing, his compressed-charge engine marked the beginning of an era of pioneering and was the foundation of the modern engine.

Nicolaus Otto continued to develop his four-stroke engine after 1876 and he considered his work finished after his invention of the first magneto ignition system for low voltage ignition in 1884.

Nicolaus Otto’s patent was overturned however in 1886 in favor of the patent granted to Alphonse Beau de Roaches for his four-stroke engine.

But an undaunted Nicolaus Otto built a working engine while Roaches’ design stayed on paper. So on October 23, 1877, another patent for a gas-motor engine was issued to Nicolaus Otto, and Francis and William Crossley.

Gottlied Daimler’s first motorcycle Gottlieb Daimler constructed a very light engine, using Nicolaus Otto’s ‘model and attached one of them to a bicycle making the world’s first motorcycle. Daimler also constructed an automobile, using Nicolaus Otto’s engine.

Karl Benz three wheel vehicle

Karl Benz also built his fist three-wheel automobile employing Nicolaus Otto’s engine and the firms of Daimler and Benz merged and manufactured the famous Mercedes-Benz vehicles.

NIcolaus Otto’s practical internal combustion engine is used to power automobiles, motorcycles and motorboats. Also, the Diesel engine is a form of internal combustion engine, which employs a four-stroke cycle that is similar to Nicolaus Otto’s.

Nicolaus August Otto died at age 59 on January 26, 1891 in Cologne.

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Early in his career Gottlieb believed that steam engines were outdated and began working on an experimental gas engine

Gottlieb Daimler

Because Gottlieb Daimler was a difficult individual to get along with, he ended up leaving many engineering firms because they didn’t share his vision or work ethic.

He worked in Belgium, Britain and France and in 1872 Gottlieb Daimler became technical director to the gas-engine company ‘Deutz Gasmotorenfabrik’ which Nicolaus Otto co-owned.

One of Gottlieb Daimlers closest friends and good partners was Wilhelm Maybach whom he met in 1865 in Reutlingen where Gottlieb was the technical manager of the works at the orphanage in Bruderhaus where Wilhelm lived.

Gottlieb and Wilhelm became very good friends and worked on Daimler’s Reitwagen (1885) and Motorwagen (1886), which along with similar efforts by Carl Benz are considered the world’s first self-propelled vehicles.

While working at Deutz Gasmotorenfabrik Gottlieb put together a team of the best engineers he had worked with, with Wilhelm Maybach leading the way.

Although Gottlieb Daimler was very successful at Deutz Gasmotorenfabrik, he was not satisfied. Gottlieb wanted more time for research and development while Otto, the co-owned of the company, wanted to make more engines,

So Gottlieb Daimler left and his good friend Maybach went with him.

Daimlers Reitwagen Replica

Gottlieb Daimler and Maybach concentrated on producing the first light-weight, high-speed engine to run on gasoline.

Eventually Gottlieb and Maybach produced an engine with a surface carburetor, that vaporized the petrol and mixed it with air. The engine they’d produced with Nicolaus Otto achieved 130 revolutions per minute, however Daimler and Maybach’s engine reached 900 revolutions per minute.

In 1885, Gottlieb Daimler and his design partner Wilhelm Maybach took Nicolaus Otto internal combustion engine a step further and patented what is generally recognized as the prototype of the modern gas engine.

Although Gottlieb Daimler did not invent the internal combustion engine, he did improve on it.

In Cannstatt Gottlieb Daimler and Wihelm Maybach patented their four stroke engine in 1885. They also created the world’s first motorcycle by mating a Gottlieb Daimler engine to a bicycle.

It was In 1889 that Daimler and Maybach placed their engine into a horse carriage and drove the vehicle at speeds of 11 miles per hour, given them the first produced four-wheeled automobile.

They decided to sell their vehicles after they devised a four-speed gearbox and a belt-driven mechanism to turn the wheels.

The Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft was founded in 1890. The ompany soon developed a reputation for reliability.

In the first road race held between Paris and Rouen in 1894, only 15 of the 102 cars completed the course and all 15 cars were powered by Daimler engines.

Impressed by this Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin, decided to use Gottlieb Daimler engines in the airships he was building.

Gottlieb Daimler’s engines were also used in the armored cars that were being developed.

After being told to stay in bed because of failing health in 1899, the workaholic Gottlieb Daimler insisted on being driven in bad weather to inspect a possible factory site. On the way home Gottlieb Daimler fell out and died on March 6, 1900.

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They started out as ironmongers, making umbrella frames, coffee grinders and Peugeot racing bicycles – which are still one of the best bicycles available in the world today.

Around the world people began to recognize the quality of their saws, springs, pepper grinders and bicycles bearing the stamp of the Lion.

They also made corsets which gave ladies the familiar but very uncomfortable hour-glass figure of the period.

It was in 1858 that the Lion, which comes from the arms of Franche-Comt, where the company began, became the Peugeot company symbol. It was designed by Justin Blazer, a Montbeliard gold engraver and it symbolized “durability,suppleness and quickness of steel”. The lion also stood for the speed and aggressiveness of the Peugeot company. For more information on History of the Peugeot Logo, go to Peugeot Logo History

A big part of the history of the car began when the demand for economical cars began to spread and a strong requirement for industrial production was rapidly growing. Gasoline run cars started to outsell all other types of automobiles in the early 1900s. The very first car manufacturers in the world were French, Panhard & Levassor who completed an automobile in 1889 and Peugeot who completed one in 1891.

The term car manufacturer refers to individuals who built entire motor vehicles for sale and not just engine inventors who experimented with car design to test the engines they built – Daimler and Benz began as engine inventors before becoming full car manufacturers and started out by licensing their patents and selling their engines to car manufacturers.

Peugeot produced a steam driven three wheeler in 1889 in conjunction with LTon Serpollet, which had a tubular frame and a flash boiler, but steam was soon dropped in favor of Daimlers (who in his early engineering career, became convinced steam engines were an outdated form of power, so he started building experimental gas engines) V-twin engines which were installed on the frame along with handlebar steering.

It was in 1890 the history of the car saw Peugeot’s first car produced by the two giants of the Automobile Age – Armand Peugeot who built the body and Gottlieb Daimler who was an engine inventor.

In 1891, the first ever journey by a petrol-driven car took place when a Peugeot was driven from Beaulieu-Valentigney to Paris, then on to Brest. This was a remarkable accomplishment at the time and the Peugeots found there was substantial demand for their cars, rising from five sold in 1891, to about 72 sold in 1895 and an unbelievable 300 automobiles sold in 1899.

Peugeot adopted the internal combustion engine and built a gasoline quadricycle driven by a Daimler motor. Within two years the ‘Vis-a-Vis’ is appearing in Peugeot catalogs beside coffee grinders and corset stays.

History of the car made a dramatic change when electric ignition and a steering wheel in place of a tiller where introduced about 1900.

The German automotive pioneer Gottlieb Daimler who was born in Schorndorf Germany in 1834 had a lot to do with the history of the car. He was the man who was widely credited with pioneering the modern automobile industry.

After training as a gunsmith Daimler became an engineer. Early in his engineering career, he became convinced steam engines were an outdated form of power, and he started building experimental gas engines.

He was a workaholic and a relentless perfectionist who expected nothing less of the people that worked with him. He wasn’t an easy person to get along with, and he left many engineering firms because they did not share his vision or his work ethic.

At one of them he met Wilhelm Maybach, a man who understood him. Maybach became an inseparable friend and an engineering partner.

Daimler is known as the pioneer of the modern internal combustion engine. Although Daimler did not invent the internal combustion engine, he did improve it and him and his partner Wilhelm Maybach made engines small, lightweight and fast-running, which played a large part in the history of the car by mading the automobile revolution possible. Daimler was instrumental in founding auto industries in Germany, France and England.

In Cannstatt, he and Maybach patented their four-stroke engine in 1885. That same year, they created what was probably the world’s first motorcycle by mating a Daimler engine to a bicycle. They built the first motor truck in 1896. Daimler’s truck had a four-horsepower engine and a belt drive with two forward speeds and one reverse. It was the first truck. daimler taxi history of the car

In 1889 Daimler and Maybach placed their engine into a horse carriage and drove the car at speeds of 11 miles per hour. They had therefore produced the first four-wheeled automobile. And in 1897 he built the first taxi.

In 1889 history of the car took another very important step when they made their first purpose-built automobile and founded Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft. Ten years later, Maybach designed the first car named Mercedes, which was named after the Austrian businessman, Emil Jellinek’s daughter.

In 1890 The Daimler Motor Company was launched and the company soon developed a reputation for reliability. In 1894 the history of the car took yet another large step when the first car trials were held for vehicles without horses. This event ran between Paris and Rouen and only 15 of the 102 cars completed the course. Incredibly all 15 cars were powered by Daimler engines! For more information on the first csr trials please see the First Car Race

This impressed Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin, who decided to use Daimler engines in the airships he was building. Daimler engines were also used in the armored cars that were being developed during this period. Gottlieb Daimler died in 1900 but Wilhelm Maybach continued to develop the Mercedes car and the Zeppelin Airship.

Two other very important individuals who were involved in the hisrtory of the car are Rene Panhard and Emile Levassor who worked together in a wood working machinery business when they decided to become car manufacturers. In 1890 they built their first car using a Daimler engine which was commissioned by Edouard Sarazin who held the licensing rights to the Daimler patent for France. They not only manufactured cars, they improved the automotive body design.

Licensing a patent means whoever holds the license rights pays a fee and has a right to build and use someone’s invention for profit. In this case Sarazin had the right to build Daimler engines in France.

Panhard-Levassor made vehicles with a pedal-operated clutch, a chain transmission leading to a change-speed gearbox, and a front radiator. The history of the car moved forward again when Levassor became the first designer to move the engine to the front of the car and use a rear-wheel drive layout. This design was known as the Systeme Panhard and quickly became the standard for all cars because it gave a better balance and improved steering. Panhard and Levassor are also credited with the invention of the modern transmission – installed in their 1895 Panhard.

Panhard and Levassor also shared the licensing rights to Daimler motors with Armand Peugeot.

Unfortunately, in 1897 during the Paris to Marseille race Emile Levassor was in a fatal auto accident where he was killed.

Initially, French manufacturers did not standardize car models, each car was different from the other. The first standardized car was the 1894 Benz Velo. One hundred and thirty four identical Velos were manufactured in 1895.

The Duryea brothers, Charles and Frank played a large role in the history of the car. They built America’s first gasoline powered commercial car manufacturers. The bicycle makers built their first motor vehicle in 1893 in Springfield Massachusetts.

By 1896, the Duryea Motor Wagon Company had sold thirteen models of the Duryea, an expensive limousine, which remained in production into the 1920s.

The American car manufacturer Ransome Eli Olds also played a large part in the history of the car. In 1901 his Curved Dash Oldsmobile was the first automobile to be mass produced in the United States.

It was Olds who invented the basic concept of the assembly line and started the Detroit area automobile industry. He first began making steam and gasoline engines with his father, Pliny Fisk Olds, in Lansing, Michigan in 1885. Olds designed his first steam-powered car in 1887. In 1899, with a growing experience of gasoline engines, Olds moved to Detroit to start the Olds Motor Works, and produce low-priced cars. He produced 425 “Curved Dash Olds” in 1901, and was America’s leading auto manufacturer from 1901 to 1904.

One of the better known contributors to the history of the car is Henry Ford who made his first car called the “Quadricycle” in June 1896. However, success didn’t come until after he formed the Ford Motor Company in 1903.

The American car manufacture improved on the ‘assembly line’ and installed the first conveyor belt-based assembly line in his car factory in Highland Park in his Michigan plant around 1913-14. The assembly line reduced production costs for cars by reducing the assembly time.

He introduced the successful Model T which was assembled in ninety-three minutes in 1908. After installing the moving assembly lines in his factory in 1913, Ford became the world’s biggest car manufacturer. By 1927, 15 million Model Ts had been manufactured.

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Red Hummer Humvee

As the development race began, two companies, Teledyne and Chrysler Defense (which was later sold to General Dynamics) already had designs on their drawing boards.

Although AM General appeared to be well behind both of them when they came into the competition with no preconceived design notions whatsoever.

However an undaunted Am General rolled up its sleeves, went to work and soon created an undeniable original — the HUMMER.

AM General tested it’s prototype HUMMER in the Nevada desert in July 1980 — a mere eleven months from its first designs! This would be just the first of many breakthroughs that would demonstrate AM General’s know how and leadership.

At this point, the Army now had three serious competitors working on vehicles, Teledyne and Chrysler Defense (which remember, was later sold to General Dynamics) and AM General.

There were extremely stringent Army specs for the making of this vehicle and by right there very well should’ve been. I mean this vehicle is for military use and would be used during a war. So obviously the thing had to be put together much more better then great.

Some of these extremely stringent specs included:

* Light armor.Which also had to be strong, remember, this vehicle is being made for the military, people are going to be shooting bullets, rockets, bombs whatever at it. It’s gotta be able to withstand being shoot at and still be light enough to move rather quickly.
* Deep water fording.Which is the ability to be able to cross a body of water without messing up the engine or stalling out because during a war, that truly would not be a good thing.
* Arctic and desert operational ability.
* And obviously it had to have absolute reliability,durability and maintainability.

Army Military fording hummer humvee

Because this vehicle was being made for the Army and had to be made of a very strong very tough armor with weight constraints, it called for material application breakthroughs.

All of this had to be done in just ten months and again AM General and Hummer History came through when it became the first company to complete its test vehicles.

Prototype Hummers were delivered to Army proving grounds at Aberdeen and Yuma, and a test site at Fort Hunter-Liggett in April 1982.

In March 1983 AM General’s ’superior’ vehicles were finally awarded the initial HUMMER production contract which called for 55,000 vehicles to be delivered over a five year period.

It took just six months from tooling up time at AM General’s Mishawaka plant to delivery the first production test vehicles — yet another phenomenal achievement for AM General.

First Hummer rolled off the production line January 2, 1985

It was in January 1985 that the first Hummer rolled off the production line. If it in anyway reminds you of Jeep, that’s because in the 1940’s, Willys-Overland Motors, Inc. (a company which AM General spun from in the 1970’s) designed and manufactured America’s first four-wheel drive 1/4-ton tactical utility truck – the well known ‘Jeep.’ So there ya have it, the people who make Hummers are the same peoples that make the Jeep.

In December of 1999 AM General sold the Hummer name and rights to market and distribute Hummers to General Motors.

AM General continues to Build the original Hummer (now called H1) at the Mishawaka plant and will build the Hummer H2 in a new state of the art manufacturing facility adjacent to the HMMWV/H1 plant.

Red and Yellow Hummer Humvee Sut

The Hummer or Humvee as it very often is called, is the ultimate 4×4 designed as an all-purpose vehicle for the U.S. Army by AM General. The military version has been in production since 1985 and the civilian version which is available in four body styles,

* Two-door Hard Top
* Four-door Hard Top
* Open Top
* Wagon

became available in 1992, These big boys go from zero to 60 in a lackadaisical 16 seconds, with top speeds of about 83 mph.

Optional accessories include a 6.5-liter turbo-diesel engine for more power, and a towing system that can haul over 8,500 lbs.

A Central Tire Inflation System (CTI) which AM General developed and patented in response to the need for increased mobility in the military, allows the driver to inflate or deflate the tires from inside the vehicle when one needs the traction provided by depressurized rubber.

Wouldn’t you just love to have that feature during the next nor’easter?

Red Hummer Humvee in Snow

However the new 1999 version with standard traction-control system, could make running soft tires a thing of the past.

TorqTrac4 uses sensors on all four wheels to monitor wheel slip. If wheel speed exceeds vehicle speed, the system applies braking to the spinning wheel and transfers torque to the wheels that still have some grip.

Also new for 1999 is a hydraulic four-wheel anti-lock braking system. With these changes, AM General spokespeople says the Hummer’s off-road prowess is 90 percent attributable to the vehicle itself and only 10 percent attributable to the driver.

Giving unskilled and skilled drivers the ability to handle most any terrain.

The Hummer become well known to most people during the Gulf War where it proved to be a highly reliable and dependable machine.

With a 16″ ground clearance when fully loaded, and full time four wheel drive powered by a 170 hp diesel engine (and now some 190 hp Turbos too) the Hummer can maneuver through almost anything.

It was designed to follow in the tracks of the M1 Abrams tank, and every other military vehicle in the field.

Now a days, that being in the year 2005 and beyond, you can see Hummers on almost any MTV cribs show or even driving down the street in your neighborhood.

They are large and charge and very eye catching and I have to admit that when I was looking for a new vehicle, I did look at Hummers.

I just love the H2 SUT and I saw myself riding around in a bright yellow one with black trim or a red metallic one with black trim or a solid black one.

Hey if the truth be told, I really didn’t care what color it was, I just wanted one.

I drooled over’em for about four months and although I didn’t end up getting one (filling the tank would have broke me) I still drool over’em and hey ya neva know, one of these days….. I just might have one of these babies sittin’ in ma driveway.

Update – Year 2008

Toyota Prius Okay so I’ll never get that hummer I wanted, not with gas well over $4 a gallon. Now a days I’m leaning more toward the Toyota Prius.

I’ve always loved a tough rugged looking SUV and the Hummer is the epitome of an all around tough off roader. The Hummer is definitely ‘The SUV’ – the superior ultimate vehicle that rides above all the rest. To bad it’s a also a real gas hog.

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Born February 9 1846 in Heilbron, Wilhelm Maybach who became known as the Roi des Constructeurs – King of Designers grew up one of six children who’s family later moved to Stuttgart.

His mother died in 1854 and his father died two years later making young Wilhelm by the age of ten an orphan.

In response to an advertisement in the Stuttgarter Anzeiger newspaper, a charitable organization offered to look after young Maybach. He grew up in an orphanage known as Bruderhaus in Reutlingen and was trained as a technical draughtsman in the adjoining engineering works.

Gustav Werner, the founder and director of the school, spotted and nurtured young Maybach’s technical talents.

During 1861 to 1865 Wilhelm Maybach trained as a draughtsman or draftsman and he also enrolled in evening classes for physics and mathematics.

It was in 1865 when Wilhelm Maybach was 19 years old that he met Gottlieb Daimler the technical manager of the works. Daimler recognized Wilhelm’s talents and taking him under his wing, Maybach became Daimler’s protégé.

The two developed a close working relationship and friendship that lasted until Daimler’s death in 1900.

Maybach would follow Daimler to Karlaruhe in 1869 and in 1872 to the Gasmotorenfabrik AG in Co-logne, a company founded by Nicolaus Otto. There they worked on the four-stroke engine invented by Nicolaus Otto.

It was in 1878 that Wilhelm Maybach married Bertha Habermaas and on July 6, 1879 their son Karl Maybach was born.

In the middle of 1882 Daimler left Gasmotorenfabrik Deutz after a disagreement with Nicolaus Otto. and Wilhelm Maybach followed him to Cannstatt near Stuttgart where they converted a greenhouse into a workshop. Daimler established his own company which later became Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft.

In October of that same year, Maybach was able to develop the light-weight, high-speed internal combustion engines suitable for water, land-based and airborne vehicles.

Daimler wooden framed vehicle car

They developed their engine after just one year of work. It was later in that same year that they really made strides with the ‘grandfather clock’ engine which was shaped like a grandfather clock. It was a lightweight compact engine with a vertically fixed cylinder which was suited for installation in vehicles.

In 1885 this 0.5 horsepower engine was put on a wooden ‘riding car’ making the worlds first ‘motor cycle’. Even though a year later, it was installed into a carriage, Maybach quickly realized he couldn’t be content with just producing engines for carriages.

The steel-wheeled car was the first of such products. It was with this vehicle that Maybach introduced the sliding pinion gearshift system into automotive engineering.

TPresented at the Paris World Exhibition of 1889, the steel-wheeled car also precipitated the birth of the French automotive industry.

In November 1890 when Daimlerfounded ‘Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft’ with Duttenhofer and Lorenz, Maybach was appointed chief engineer. However, because of unacceptable terms of his contract he decided to leave the company in February 1891.

For the next year and a half Maybach worked out of his apartment and Gottlieb Daimler continued to provide financial support.

In the fall of 1892 development work, also supported financially by Daimler, began in the Hotel Hermann which yielded such important designs as the spray-nozzle carburetor and the Phoenix engine as well as improvements to elements of the belt drive system.

Pressure put on Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft by English industrialist Frederick Simms eventually led to Maybach being reinstalled as the company’s chief engineer in November 1895.

Once back Wilhelm first developed the tubular radiator with fan, then the honeycomb radiator; and this effective form of engine cooling opened the way to the development of the modern automobile.

The ‘Roi des Constructeurs’ – King of Designers, as the French called him, went from one technical achievement to another, creating the first four-cylinder automobile engine, and in 1898-99 a whole generation of engines consisting of five models producing between 6 and 23 hp.

During the years Wilhelm Maybach worked at Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart he achieved many firsts.

The work he developed resulted in many inventions which are looked on as landmarks in the development history of automotive engineering. His focus on components led him to achieve firsts with:

* the gearwheel transmission in 1889
* the float-chamber spray-jet carburetor in 1893
* the honeycomb radiator core in 1896

Maybachs strongest point was the ability to combine individual solutions to create the complete concepts that turned engine-driven carriages into motorcars.

It was Emil Jellinek, who ran a large establishment in Nice, a city in southern France, who had good relations with international financiers and aristocrats, who promoted and sold Daimler’s cars especially to the very rich.

In 1899, Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart’already supplied ten cars to Jellinek and as many as 29 in 1900.
Emil Jellinek’s daughter Mercedes

Jellinek continued to demand faster and more powerful cars from Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart which he entered in race meetings – where he raced under a pseudonym, using his daughter’s name Mercedes, he soon became known as ‘Monsieur Mercédès’ in the motoring circles.

In April 1900, the decision was made to use Mercedes as a product name. In addition, it was agreed that a new engine bearing the name Daimler-Mercedes was to be developed.

Maybach develops a race car using lightweight metals. It was fitted with a 35-hp four-cylinder engine featuring two carburetors. With honeycomb radiator, gear-only transmission and a very low center of gravity, this vehicle represents the car of the future. First Mercedes developed by Wilhelm Maybach, the chief engineer at Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart caused quite a stir in the first year of the new century

This car was delivered to Jellinek by Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart on December 22, 1900.

This first Mercedes, developed by Wilhelm Maybach, the chief engineer at Daimler-Motoren-Gesellshart caused quite a stir in the first year of the new century. With its low center of gravity, pressed-steel frame, light, high-performance engine and honeycomb radiator, it featured numerous innovations and is regarded today as the first modern automobile.

Jellinek ordered 36 of these cars at a total price of 550,000 marks – a sizable order even at today’s equivalent value of DM 5.5 million. A few weeks later, he placed an order for another 36 cars, all with 8 hp engines.

The Nice week in March 1901, were the Mercedes cars were found to be unbeatable in virtually every discipline, attracted tons of publicity for Jellinek and the Mercedes.

In March and August 1901, the 12/16 hp and 8/11 hp sister models appeared. Jellinek’s orders soon stretched the Daimler plant in Cannstatt to full production capacity.

Mercedes was lodged as the trade name on June 23,1902 and legally registered on September 26.

Maybach’s jem was his 1900 35 Horsepowed Mercedes where he combined two decades of his automotive engineering experience.

The car was rear-wheel and had a front-mounted four-cylinder engine — partly made of light alloy — and a three-speed transmission.

The Mercedes also featured a revolutionary low-to-the-ground design, setting it apart from the tall, clumsy looking cars of that period, as well as front wheels that were turned by a round steering wheel on an angled steering column.

The Mercedes truly represented a major turning point in the development of the automobile.

The first Mercedes is regarded as the first modern automobile. In 1901-02 a Mercedes car reaches 64.4 km/h to smash the world speed record and it was in 1903-04 that Maybach developed the first six-cylinder Mercedes. In 1906 Maybach designed an innovative 120-hp race engine with overhead intake and exhaust valves and dual ignition.

Of all his designs, Maybach created one of the most outstanding after Daimler’s death in 1900: the Mercedes, which caused such a sensation at Nice Week in March 1901 because it was a vehicle that stood head and shoulders above anything previously conceived or built at Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft.

Both Wilhelm Maybach and Emil Jellinek get credit for the birth of the new car and for constantly challenging Maybach and Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft to produce ever more powerful and faster cars.

However despite the great success of the Mercedes cars in the years that followed, Maybach was the victim of scheming behind his back. He was replaced as chief engineer and his activities were reduced to the level of an Inventors Office causing his acrimonious departure from Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft in 1907, seven years after his close friend Gottlieb Daimler’s death.

When the Zeppelin LZ 4 airship was destroyed in a storm in Echterdingen on August 5, 1908, Maybach offered to build Count Zeppelin a new, improved airship engine.

The resulting negotiations led to the creation on March 23, 1909 of Luftfahrzeug-Motorenbau-GmbH Bissingen”. The technical manager was Wilhelm Maybach’s son Karl who also designed the new engine.

In 1912 the firm, renamed Luftfahrzeug-Motoren-GmbH, moved to Friedrichshafen. Both father and son held a 20% stake in the company however father Maybach placed the future of the business firmly in the hands of his son Karl.

After 1922 luxury cars were also produced in Friedrichshafen. One highlight of the product range was the 1929 Maybach 12 DS, the first automobile with a V12 engine and, along with its successor the Zeppelin, seen as the German answer to Rolls Royce.

Stuttgart’s technical university presents Wilhelm Maybach with an honorary doctorate in 1916 and in 1929 Wilhelm Maybach died on December 29 in Stuttgart.

In 1996 Wilhelm Maybach was accepted into the Automotive Hall of Fame.

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