A car, also known as an automobile, is a wheeled, self-powered vehicle used for transportation.
The earliest example of a car was a steam tricycle built in France in 1769. This was followed up over a century later by other steam tricycles, including one made by Léon Serpollet in 1887. Serpollet would later perfect the flash boiler, which made steam a much more practical source of power for an car.
On June 12, 1893, after Dr. Emmett Brown's first experiment with the Jules Verne Train failed, Clara Clayton noticed a man driving a Serpollet steam tricycle. Upon seeing the vehicle, Doc remembered the early experiments with steam powered cars, and decided to use Serpollet's innovations in his own steam engine design.
The first internal combustion engine powered by gasoline was created by Karl Benz in Germany, and was patented in 1879. It was first used in an car, called the Motorwagen, in 1885. Gasoline-fueled internal combustion engines were used in most automobiles throughout the 20th century and into the 21st century.
Doc used a DeLorean DMC-12 for his first time machine that was capable of transportation. The flux capacitor, which made time travel possible, was powered by a nuclear reactor. However, the vehicle itself was powered by an internal combustion engine fueled by gasoline. When he installed the garbage-fueled Mr. Fusion to the vehicle in 2015, it was used to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity needed to power the flux capacitor instead of the harder-to-obtain plutonium, but the vehicle itself still retained its original gasoline-fueled engine.
Many manufacturers made automobiles, including:
- American Motors
- BMW
- Buick
- Chevrolet
- DeLorean Motor Company
- DeSoto
- Ford
- General Motors
- Jeep
- Rolls-Royce
- Studebaker
- Toyota
- Volkswagen
External links[]
Appearances[]
- Back to the Future draft screenplays
- Back to the Future trilogy
- Back to the Future novelizations
- Back to the Future: The Story
- The Earth Day Special (Non-canonical appearance)
- Back to the Future: The Animated Series
- Back to the Future (Harvey Comics)
- Back to the Future: The Ride
- 2007 Microsoft TechEd Conference Keynote introduction (Non-canonical appearance)
- Back to the Future: The Card Game
- Back to the Future: The Game
- Back to the Future (IDW Publishing)
- LEGO Dimensions (Non-canonical appearance)