Automobiles

Tractor This article is about the vehicle used in agriculture or construction. For the power unit of a semi-trailer truck (articulated lorry), see Tractor unit . For other uses, see Tractor (disambiguation) .   Modern tractors in customized g, Ursus 11054 and Fendt 820.   A tractor pulling a chisel plow in Slovenia .   A rubber tracked tractor pulling a disc harrow.   A scale model of a modern Mahindra tractor in Punjab , India .   Farm tractor in Balnain, Scotland.     Alvin O. Lombard of Waterville , Maine , invented in 1901 a tractor for hauling logs, as displayed at the Maine State Museum in the capital city of Augusta . Known as "Lombard Log Haulers," these vehicles revolutionized logging in Maine.   A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver at a high tractive effort (or torque ) at slow speeds, for the ...

  Engine When needed, the energy is taken from the source and consumed by one or more motors or engines. Sometimes there is an intermediate medium, such as the batteries of a diesel submarine. Most motor vehicles have internal combustion engines . They are fairly cheap, easy to maintain, reliable, safe and small. Since these engines burn fuel, they have long ranges but pollute the environment. A related engine is the external combustion engine . An example of this is the steam engine. Aside from fuel, steam engines also need water, making them impractical for some purposes. Steam engines also need time to warm up, whereas IC engines can usually run right after being started, although this may not be recommended in cold conditions. Steam engines burning coal release sulfur into the air, causing harmful acid rain . A modern scooter in Taiwan. While intermittent internal combustion engines were once the primary means of aircraft propulsion, they have been...

Types Types of motorcycles   A cruiser (front) and a sportbike (background)     A Ural motorcycle with a sidecar   French gendarme motorcyclist The term motorcycle has different legal definitions depending on jurisdiction (see #Legal definitions and restrictions ). There are three major types of motorcycle: street, off-road, and dual purpose. Within these types, there are many sub-types of motorcycles for different purposes. There is often a racing counterpart to each type, such as road racing and street bikes, or motocross and dirt bikes. Street bikes include cruisers , sportbikes , scooters and mopeds , and many other types. Off-road motorcycles include many types designed for dirt-oriented racing classes such as motocross and are not street legal in most areas. Dual purpose machines like the dual-sport style are made to go off-road but include features to make them legal and comfortable on the street as...

Motorcycle   Motorcycle     A classic Norton motorcycle     1952 Lambretta 125 D scooter     A motorcycle , often called a bike , motorbike , or cycle , is a two  or three-wheeled motor vehicle . Motorcycle design varies greatly to suit a range of different purposes: long distance travel, commuting , cruising , sport including racing , and off-road riding. Motorcycling is riding a motorcycle and related social activity such as joining a motorcycle club and attending motorcycle rallies . In 1894, Hildebrand & Wolfmüller became the first series production motorcycle, and the first to be called a motorcycle. In 2014, the three top motorcycle producers globally by volume were Honda , Yamaha (both from Japan), and Hero MotoCorp (India). In developing countries, motorcycles are considered utilitarian due to lower prices and greater fuel economy . Of all the motorcycles in the worl...

Automotive industry in Pakistan     Toyota Indus 's Corolla is the most manufactured car in Pakistan. In 2017, 52,874 models were made. The automotive industry in Pakistan ( Urdu : پاکستان موٹر گاڑی صنعت ‬ ‎) is the one of the fastest growing industries of the country , accounting for 4% of Pakistan's GDP and employing a workforce of over 1,800,000 people. Currently there are 3200 automotive manufacturing plants in the country, with an investment of ₨ 92 billion (US$870 million) producing 1.8 million motorcycles and 200,000 vehicles annually. Its contribution to the national exchequer is nearly ₨ 50 billion (US$470 million). The sector, as a whole, provides employment to 3.5 million people and plays a pivotal role in promoting the growth of the vendor industry. Pakistan’s auto market is considered among the smallest, but fastest growing in Asia . Over 180,000 cars were sold in the fiscal year 2014-15, rising to 206,777 units...

Why is the automobile so important?     As a result, in North America and Europe the automobile    became cheaper and more accessible to the middle class.  This was facilitated by Henry Ford who did two important things. ...  World War II saw a large increase in mass transit because employment  was high and automobiles were scarce.

Lighting   Automotive lighting         LED daytime running lights on an Audi A4 Cars are typically fitted with multiple types of lights. These include headlights , which are used to illuminate the way ahead and make the car visible to other users, so that the vehicle can be used at night; in some jurisdictions, daytime running lights ; red brake lights to indicate when the brakes are applied; amber turn signal lights to indicate the turn intentions of the driver; white-coloured reverse lights to illuminate the area behind the car (and indicate that the driver will be or is reversing); and on some vehicles, additional lights (e.g., side marker lights) to increase the visibility of the car. Interior lights on the ceiling of the car are usually fitted for the driver and passengers. Some vehicles also have a trunk light and, more rarely, an engine compartment light.

Seating and body style   Car body style     Most cars are designed to carry multiple occupants, often with four or five seats. Cars with five seats typically seat two passengers in the front and three in the rear. Full-size cars and large sport utility vehicles can often carry six, seven, or more occupants depending on the arrangement of the seats. On the other hand, sports cars are most often designed with only two seats. The differing needs for passenger capacity and their luggage or cargo space has resulted in the availability of a large variety of body styles to meet individual consumer requirements that include, among others, the sedan/saloon , hatchback , station wagon /estate, and minivan .

Safety   Car safety , Traffic accident , Low speed vehicle , and Epidemiology of motor vehicle collisions         Result of a serious car accident Road traffic accidents are the largest cause of injury-related deaths worldwide. Mary Ward became one of the first documented car fatalities in 1869 in Parsonstown , Ireland, and Henry Bliss one of the United States' first pedestrian car casualties in 1899 in New York City. There are now standard tests for safety in new cars, such as the EuroNCAP and the US NCAP tests, and insurance-industry-backed tests by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS).   Worldwide, road traffic is becoming ever safer , in part due to efforts by the government to implement safety features in cars (e.g., seat belts , air bags , etc.), reduce unsafe driving practices (e.g., speeding , drinking and driving and texting and driving ) and make road design more safe by adding features such ...

Costs and benefits Main articles: Economics of car usage , Car costs , and Effects of the car on societies           Road congestion is an issue in many major cities. (pictured is Chang'an Avenue in Beijing ) The costs of car usage, which may include the cost of: acquiring the vehicle, repairs and auto maintenance , fuel, depreciation , driving time, parking fees , taxes, and insurance, are weighed against the cost of the alternatives, and the value of the benefits – perceived and real – of vehicle usage. The benefits may include on-demand transportation, mobility, independence and convenience.During the 1920s, cars had another benefit: "[c]ouples finally had a way to head off on unchaperoned dates, plus they had a private space to snuggle up close at the end of the night." Similarly the costs to society of encompassing car use, which may include those of: maintaining roads , land use , air pollution , road congestion ,...

Industry   Automotive industry A car being assembled in a factory The automotive industry designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and sells the world's motor vehicles . In 2008, more than 70 million motor vehicles, including cars and commercial vehicles were produced worldwide. In 2007, a total of 71.9 million new cars were sold worldwide: 22.9 million in Europe, 21.4 million in the Asia-Pacific Region, 19.4 million in the USA and Canada, 4.4 million in Latin America, 2.4 million in the Middle East and 1.4 million in Africa. The markets in North America and Japan were stagnant, while those in South America and other parts of Asia grew strongly. Of the major markets, China, Russia, Brazil and India saw the most rapid growth. About 250 million vehicles are in use in the United States. Around the world, there were about 806 million cars and light trucks on the road in 2007; they burn over 260 billion US gallons (980,000,000 m 3 ) of gasoline a...

Autonomous car Main article: Autonomous car A robotic Volkswagen Passat shown at Stanford University is a driverless car Fully autonomous vehicles, also known as driverless cars, already exist in prototype (such as the Google driverless car ), and are expected to be commercially available around 2020. According to urban designer and futurist Michael E. Arth , driverless electric vehicles—in conjunction with the increased use of virtual reality for work, travel, and pleasure—could reduce the world's 800 million vehicles to a fraction of that number within a few decades.This would be possible if almost all private cars requiring drivers, which are not in use and parked 90% of the time, would be traded for public self-driving taxis that would be in near constant use. This would also allow for getting the appropriate vehicle for the particular need—a bus could come for a group of people, a limousine could come for a special night out, and a Segway could come ...

Fuel and propulsion technologies The Nissan Leaf is an all- electric car launched in December 2010 See also: Alternative fuel vehicle Most cars in use in the 2010s are propelled by an internal combustion engine, fueled by the deflagration (rather than detonation ) combustion of hydrocarbon fossil fuels, mostly gasoline (petrol) and diesel , as well as some Autogas and CNG . Hydrocarbon fuels cause air pollution and contribute to climate change and global warming . Rapidly increasing oil prices , concerns about oil dependence , tightening environmental laws and restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions are propelling work on alternative power systems for cars. Efforts to improve or replace existing technologies include the development of hybrid vehicles , plug-in electric vehicles and hydrogen vehicles . Vehicles using alternative fuels such as ethanol flexible-fuel vehicles and natural gas vehicles are also gaining popularity in some countries. Cars ...

Mass production See also: Automotive industry Ransom E. Olds founded Olds Motor Vehicle Company (Oldsmobile) in 1897 Henry Ford founded Ford Motor Company in 1903 1927 Ford Model T Kiichiro Toyoda , president of the Toyota Motor Corporation 1941–1950 Mass production at a Toyota plant in the 1950s Large-scale, production-line manufacturing of affordable cars was started by Ransom Olds in 1901 at his Oldsmobile factory in Lansing, Michigan and based upon stationary assembly line techniques pioneered by Marc Isambard Brunel at the Portsmouth Block Mills , England, in 1802. The assembly line style of mass production and interchangeable parts had been pioneered in the U.S. by Thomas Blanchard in 1821, at the Springfield Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts . This concept was greatly expanded by Henry Ford , beginning in 1913 with the world's first moving assembly line for cars at the Highland Park Ford Pl...

History   History of the automobile The first working steam-powered vehicle was designed — and quite possibly built — by Ferdinand Verbiest , a Flemish member of a Jesuit mission in China around 1672. It was a 65-cm-long scale-model toy for the Chinese Emperor that was unable to carry a driver or a passenger.It is not known with certainty if Verbiest's model was successfully built or ran. Cugnot's 1771 fardier à vapeur , as preserved at the Musée des Arts et Métiers , Paris Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot is widely credited with building the first full-scale, self-propelled mechanical vehicle or car in about 1769; he created a steam-powered tricycle. He also constructed two steam tractors for the French Army, one of which is preserved in the French National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts . His inventions were, however, handicapped by problems with water supply and maintaining steam pressure.In 1801, Richard Trevithick built and demonstrated his Puffing Devil ...

Car For other types of motorized vehicles, see Motor vehicle . For the 2006 Pixar film, see Cars (film) . For other uses, see Car (disambiguation) and Automobile (disambiguation) . Car Modern cars and trucks driving on an expressway in Ontario , Canada. Classification Vehicle Industry Various Application Transportation Fuel source Gasoline , diesel , natural gas , electric , hydrogen , solar , vegetable oil Powered Yes Self-propelled Yes Wheels 3–4 Axles 2 Inventor Karl Benz A car (or automobile ) is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transportation . Most definitions of car say they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four tires , and mainly transport people rather than goods. Cars came into global use during the 20th century, and developed economies depend on them. The year 1886 is regarded as the birth year of the modern car when German inventor Karl Benz built his Benz Patent-Motorwagen . Cars became widel...