Cugnot: The Basics
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- čas přidán 17. 08. 2022
- The world's first self-propelled (and indeed, high pressure) steam engine was built in France by Army Officer Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot, in 1769. Designed to help move heavy siege guns, further development of the Fardier a Vapeur was put on hold due to intrigue at the Court of Louis XV.
Find out more about the replica Fardier Cugnot at:
lefardierdecugnot.fr/Accueil%...
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Imagine going back in time and suggesting to Cugnot that he should put his engine on rails... What a different world we might've lived in. ;)
Absolutely. It's amazing to think that in France in the 1770s you had Cugnot and has Fardier and also Jouffroy d'Abbans experimenting with steam boats - another invention the development of which was curtailed through politics.
Railways certainly would be different - They would have a centre running rail....🤣
@@BassandoForte Lifesize Lionel...🤔
I think going back and introducing Cugnot to a condensor would have been a greater leap forward.
@@heatherroseisrflyer why? high pressure steam was the way forward to make a steam engine small and powerful enough to be self-moving!
It's insane to me that there isn't more out there about this absolutely incredible machine. It's like half a century before its time at least and yet it's so obscure these days. It deserves to be more widely known about
The French were ahead of all nations concerning technology back then : The first balloon, the first iron covered battleship, the first self propelled car, the first telegraph, the first mechanical computer, the first camera both for still and motion pictures, the latex, the first photovoltaic panel, first Gyroscope, radioactivity, blood transfusion, stethoscopes, vaccination... and the guillotine.
Unfortunately for them they focused a lot on the latter.
I love how its got an actual number plate
And its from *Florida* of all places
Great job overall!
That must have been a very interesting trip to the DMV.
"So you said it's an early car. What year? 1900? 1905?
@@splicetape9435 It would actually be registered as a replica. I had to go through the process of getting a bonded title, (of course, different states have different laws, so don't quote me on this,) and they had an option for "replica" as a description for the automobile in question.
@@markhenry5294 florida its SUPER EZ
I remember seeing an old lithograph of this vehicle in a history book when I was in elementary school back in the 60s. I couldn't believe that someone had built a working auto before Henry Ford. The French seemed to have lead the way in the industrial revolution. I was always amazed by this vehicle. Great seeing a working replica.
Is Henry Ford really seen anywhere as the inventor of the automobile?
I think he is rightfully known for making the automobile a mass transport vehicle and for his new modern production line (though this too, was not entirely new). As for the automobile, even if you only consider IC engines, Benz made his first car 30 years before the model T.
Brands like Peugeot and Panhard (as well as Benz, obviously) were already making fairly large numbers of production cars as early as the 1890's.
But Ford certainly made the car available for the average american citizen, something that would not happen in europe until the 1940's and 50's.
I've been reading about this vehicle since I was a kid, to see the replica run was fantastic!
I would actually consider this to be the first car, my definition of "car" being a personal combustion vehicle that travels on roads.
Personal combustion?
You burn the driver?
Perhaps it would be better to say self propelled? As in, a vehicle that travels on roads and it not pulled/pushed by animals or people.
I have looked but it would appear that no one has done a deep dive on the mechanics of this wonderous beast. There needs to be a startup and running video made!
This video really helped me clear things up. I had not even begun to think about politics of time, (other than that the U.S Revolution had not even started at the time it was built,) and it really brings things into perspective. Thank you, have a Blessed Day.
Glad it helped!
I always was under the impression this was an idea that was just on paper and perhaps was modeled. It is amazing to find out it was not only built but still in existence today. Good history to finally know. Thank you.
Glad you enjoyed it!
In fact, the first automobile ever! Absolutely iconic in France (on a par with Clément Ader's "Avion" - steam propelled bat wing planes, almost ten years before the Wright brothers - and Joseph Montgolfier's hot air balloon)
PS: a pronunciation's tip: it is 'Cunio' or 'Cuño' and not 'Cughno' but French pronunciation is indeed a beast.
Thankyou, Jean. I'll re-record the audio.
It is indeed - there's a lot of French industrial history which often gets ignored by Anglophone books etc. Thomas Newcomen is often considered the 'inventor' of the Steam Engine but what about Denis Papin? And as I covered on this channel M. Giffard and the first powered, controlled flight.....I should also look at the Marquis Joffrouy d'Abbans and his steam boat.
I'm more or less self-taught with my French. I was an award-winning German Student at School (perhaps not surprising given my ancestry) but haven't used it since school, whereas I've used French perhaps every single day since. I've studied French Military and Poltical history for the best part of twenty years and my Masters Degree was a study of the French Army in the Crimean War, and I've written several books on the army of Napoleon III. And gone to places like hte Musee de l'Armee and the Chateau de Vincennes to do archive research.
jean bonnefoy, this bull (me) has seen a red flag. the first powered flight in america was probably not by the wright brothers but by someone they had met, a german immigrant named whitehead. apparently, the wright brothers, or their family, offered their first plane to the smithsonian institute on the condition that there will be no consideration of claims that whitehead beat the wright brothers for the title of first powered flight.
Good video. There was some debate among my friends about whether the machine was powered by an atmospheric steam engine or a single acting steam pressure engine. Thank you for clarifying.
I remember seeing this in a children's book when iwas a child. It is interesting to see more detail on how it works. I wonder how well it runs off metalled roads as most roads would be dirt tracks at the time especially out at the front line. I would imagine it wouldn't be easy to steer and for anything but the heaviest loads horses would be better for off road. The Germans were still using a lot of horse drawn vehicles in their army right into ww2.
I wonder how it would compare with trevithicks puffing devil?
Interesting to see your comments on the reasons for steam coaches not catching on in Britain. Having seen replicas on TV, I had wondered why they just disappeared rather than being improved or just slowly dying out, rather than being so little known.
I am an engineer that worked on the project in Florida to create a working full-scale replica. We achieved it in 2008-2009, before the working full-scale replica was built in France. If that story is of interest, I recommend contacting the Tampa Bay Automobile museum in Pinellas Park, FL to speak to the folks there about the timeframe of our build.
I've known about this machine for over 50 years but I had a chance to actually see it in 2019 (just before the world went to pieces) in the Musée des Artes et Métiers in Paris where they have the actual machine on display.
Sadly it is in preservation so we didn't get to see it working. :(
If I had known of the working replica I would have made a very serious attempt to find it.
judging by the licence plate in the video, seems it is in florida
Wow so you actually found an original model and not a replica, now we need to know if a 1886 Benz original model exists
@@tros_725 Not just an original model - THE original model.
I was surprised by how large it is. The boiler would be a good 1.5- 2 meters in diameter at it's widest point.
I was taught about this in school way back in the 1960s, along with a story about two chaps in a balloon who had to throw their trousers overboard to save weight. It was a BBC Schools radio series as I remember.
@@creamwobbly well story goes they tried to loose everything 2 save weight. Even possibly crapping off side
I do know about this engine but it is interesting to see it again.
THIS COULD BE CONSIDERED THE VERY FIRST TRUCK/ TRACTOR FOR HAULING TRAILERS!!
I just want to mention that I uploaded my own video on this subject on my channel a few days ago, and in summary, its just an elementary version of this video.
I had no idea that it was propelled by a ratchet mechanism! Very interesting solution to how to utilize a small boiler to haul heavy loads!
love it! an excellent segment on a very under appreciated design well ahead of its time!
I remember as a child finding out about this particular story about Joseph Cugnot and his steam powered vehicle and was always fascinated by it. I love automotive history and mechanical history as well. I'm very happy that you have made this video and highlighted this often overlooked Creator and his creation
As a young boy I had a book with “all” car companies - starting with this, until 1975.
So this is a very interesting video.
🚗🙂
This review for the first time made clear to me why the engine is overslung before the front wheel: It simply replaces the horse, which would have stood in that position between the drawbars.
Cugnot intended for the engine unit to be able to be coupled to *any* horse drawn vehicle in lieu of the limber and horses.
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory of course the weight would counterbalance the weight of the load. Reminds me too of those Rushton Petrol 3wheel trailer movers and similar used by the post office and rail companies -a pain to drive in a straight line 1
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory Gosh, I've known about this steam vehicle since childhood, but never knew that! So the steam engine and its driving wheel really is a mechanical horse, "harnessed" in the same position as a horse, all very logical.
The video footage of the device in action
I believe was filmed at green field village
I think I just figured out why the boiler and engine are in front. The designers were used to horses, and those would be in front.
In french Cugnot is pronounce "cunio". When theres a GN with an (a,e,i,o,u) after its sounds like an Ñ. The real fardier a vapeur burned with the museum in the 1890s. There were 3 version of fardier a vapeur, the first one was a scale fonctionnal model. The 2nd and 3rd one are the same but 2 different version. You can tell the difference by looking the pipe on the top of the boiler. If the pipe is round* its the first version. The second version the pipe is attached to a 90 degrees angled pipe. The second version was created after they hit a brick wall in the artillery end of 1770. I own 19th century archives and I am a real passionate about that fardier, I am also french. I really enjoy your video!! The project was abandonned because it was too costly compared to horses and not enough reliable.
Many thanks for your kind words. Yes as soon as I uploaded the video I realised I'd pronounced Cugnot incorrectly! Sadly I can't re-record the audio. I looked in the army archives at Vincennes the other year about the fardier but couldn't find anything obvious about it. What annoys me most in Britain is the ignorance shown about it, and how Cugnot is dimissed as a failure - not just hitting a metaphorical brick wall due to the politics, but a literal one crashing into the house of the Bishop of Paris. A story I can't find any record of in C18th records in France but which appears in English just after Cugnot's death. There should be a dossier on Cugnot somewhere at Vincennes or the Archives Nationale. I look forward to seeing the results of your work sometime. We could always collaborate on CZcams.
My car wouldn’t stand a chance in a race against this beast. What blazing speed! I’m sure this thing gets pulled over for speeding all the time 😆
Joke aside, this is a really cool thing I didn’t know about til today.
I think Stirling engine could have been more energy efficient and lighter weight than this steam one, however, this truck or crane is way ahead of its time.
good job
Thanks
Great work as always, that replica is really quite the machine when it gets going!
Can I put forward a request that you take a look into Jacob Perkins and by way of making it link into rail story the early high pressure steam locomotives of the UK. Plenty of content centered around the LMS and Fury but the story is never really fully told as to the roots of high pressure steam technology on british railways or railways in general.
Perkins came up with a variety of "patent circulators" to help hot water and steam circulate in a locomotive boiler. They were put on a trial on the Liverpool & Manchester railway as Perkins claimed to reduced running costs, and that his patent device would prevent or at least mitigate sludge deposition in boiler barrels and furring of tubes. Suffice to say, the "patent circulator" did not live up to Perkin's expectation under actual trial conditions. Thereafter it got a bit acrimonious.
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory the son wasn't much different from the father either, slew of inventions that no one remembers that are probably a touch overblown at the time.
Edit, and the grandson...🙄
There is one (or was) on display in St.Petersburg, Florida, at an automobile museum.
Edit: The one in this demo appears to have a Florida license plate.
Fascinating. A childhood wonder appearing on collector cards, it is gratifying to see a replica in operation, proof that it works. I love that it has a modern number plate at the rear of the carriage. TFP
best of luck trying to steal that for a collection.
Funny how the French replicated most of the features of the Fardier de Cugnot with the Citroën 2CV :
Front drive utilitarian car with no attempt to make it look fancy, be powerful or easy to drive. A huge success nevertheless.
Thank you. I didn't know they made a working replica, so far I only knew the thing from drawings in books. I remember wondering why that front-heavy vehicle didn't tip over.
It's a curious contraption: when you build a tricycle and put a heavy engine on it, the most natural place for that appears to be within the wheelbase, however Cugnot chose to put it in an overhang and use the single front wheel for both traction and steering. So to go around the corner you would have to turn the whole engine. I guess at the slow speed the thing operated that wasn't a problem and it looks like it did its job, though only for a limited time, so for all practical purposes it might still have been more cumbersome than just using horses.
And indeed horses weren't put out of business for over a hundred years after that; motorized road vehicles only really took off after internal combustion and electric motors had been developed.
Cugnot basically intended his self-propelled "wheel" to replace horses and limbers on trasditional road vehicles. This meant he couldn't put the engine behind the wheel, it had to go in front so it could couple up in place of the traditional limber. It was capable of turning in the same space as horses. The Replica built in France has been shown to operate for over and hour and a half without needing refuelling or the water tank filling up again. It was also officially measured at 6mph by a police radar gun. So for its day it was not that slow and could travel a reasonable distance without a break.
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory Also it was meant to haul cannons, so you needed the back area to be available for cargo space.
The first front wheel drive vehicle!!
The funny thing is, the ancient Greeks and Romans had the technology to build this sort of thing. Had Hero of Alexandria thought to take his steam ball and pair it with the pneumatic piston technologies in existence at the time, I imagine he might have come up with a design very similar to the Cugnot.
The potential of a self-propelled “steam chariot” would certainly have been of interest to Rome, if not for its military applications, then certainly for its novelty in the emperor’s court. Imagine a steaming bronze horse on wheels chuffing along while pulling a chariot in a Triumphal parade through Rome - a mystical experience to onlookers of the time.
There'd be no need for pistsons - you've already got rotary motion, so just connect it to a gear train! Basically a turbine, so Turbomotive or Turbinia 2,000 years earlier!
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory True! Though, to get the sort of power to drive a vehicle, I imagine the inventor would also need to think of an efficient way to harness that energy - perhaps by taking inspiration from waterwheels or an Archimedean screw, or by lining up a series of Hero’s steam balls attached to an axle, then gearing that axle to the wheels (the Antikythera mechanism shows the ancient Greeks had the ability to manufacture precise gears and had a knowledge of gearing ratios - not sure whether or not they understood force differential, though).
If, for the second design, the steam balls were contained within a cylinder, it could act as a condenser to catch water to be pumped back into the boiler via an injector (if the ancient Greeks managed to figure out siphons, it’s not too far of a stretch they could figure out steam injection technology if they put their minds to it).
Alternatively, they could use two boilers - one that’s fired and another that’s cool and acts as a condenser for the waste water; they could then move the heat source over to the other boiler when the first boiler is exhausted.
It's interesting that "high preassure" seems to be a relative term, as for more modern boilers to be called "high preassure" they are operating WAY above 60psi.
"High pressure" refers to steam being used ABOVE atmospheric pressure.
There’s a working replica in St. Petersburg, Florida at an auto museum there.
The large copper boiler and Bourbon barrel makes me wonder if it doubled as a mobile still.
Fascinating! On a humorous note, a film featuring this machine would be good featuring Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer as Le Corbusier et Papin.. 👍😁👍
Cannot. Unsee.
To think that, being a regularly registered vehicle, you could go for a drive down the freeway with this...
One of those famous devices that I have known about since childhood, but never understood it's history. Thanks for the video. Any chance of a piece on the George England 0-4-0 narrow gauge engines?
Interesting story
If the boiler exhaust steam had a radiator to save water and also a worm gear to feed wood pellets from a large container located somewhere this thing could have been viable.
I seem to remember that an English 'inventor' designed something along the same lines, and was tremendously mocked by his contemporaries as his invention' was so near to that of Cugnot ,the main difference being that the english lash up was basically a bus !
Yes, Richard Trevithick over thirty years later.
18th century French Skunk Works !
Technically it’s the first mobile crane.
the thick rimmed front wheel looks to me kinda medieval and the whole thing like some kind lf torture instrument
I feel like, if we consider the steam cars of the early 1900 to be cars, steam carriages like this should also be considered cars
Cugnot's Fardier a Vapeur is considered to be the world's first automobile.
"Car" is "carriage" shortened.
Cugnot definitely deserves credit, but surprisingly there is evidence from a car built in 1459-1460 by Leonardo Da Vinci
I like that the Barrel of Bourbon whas the first fright 🍻🤩... i presume that the reversegoing is done by the doublestrokecylinder, not by singlestroke ... but you be the expert...
The cylinders act on the down stroke only. To go astern, the pawl of the ratchet is changed over, so that the wheel is turned on the upward stroke of the piston rod.
This looks like the action of a double-acting engine; but it is not. The upward driving stroke is powered by the downward stroke of the cylinder on the other side, through the balance beam visible behind the two cylinders.
The very first successful artificially propelled vehicle.
Thumbs up.The worlds first 'white van man'
Thanks.
I was surprised it had a reverse gear.
If it had been mass produced a Chemical Company would have insisted on better efficiency by using Leaded Steam or Unleaded Steam at a knock down price.
It is perhaps ironic that it was wars with France that spurred the British development of steam railway locomotives to save on horses and horse feed - with horses being also needed for Army use to move artillery.
That's the first time I have heard that slant on it. It is usually said that development was due to the economics of shifting more load plus people experimenting with new technology, but it's possible your reason could be a factor. Worth considering anyway.
There were steam stagecoaches in Uk in the 1850’s history had forgotten about.
You may have heard about the UK law requiring a person with a red flag to go out in front of an automobile that held up British auto development?
It was left over law from 50 years earlier when horse stagecoach lobbying and physical sabotage put an end to the steam Stages coach passenger wagons!
The steam road coaches were killed off by Turnpike trusts - whilst several Parliamentary Select Committees in the first half of the 1830s found them a succesful and rapidly maturing technology, the rapid spread of Turnpike Roads, managed for profit by Trusts who could establish their own bye-laws killed them off. Turnpike trusts charged excessive tolls for steam carriages and by the end of the decade the steam coach was basically dead. Many Turnpike Trusts also stipulated no steam engine could be used or erected within 20 yards of the road - a very real challenge to the use of agricultural engines. Turnpike trusts were very powerful and influential, often made up of the local Gentry and with the ear of Parliament....
The 'Red Flag' Act of 1864 was a modification of an earlier piece of legislation from 1861. The 1864 Act stated any road locomotive had to have a crew of three and during daylight hours be proceeded by a man with a red flag 100 yards ahead to warn horses and horse drawn traffic and help them around the road locomotive. It stated locomotive could not produce smoke and that the safety valves could not lift in built up areas. It also granted local authorities the right to make bye laws to manage the hours during which a road locomotive could pass over its roads, often down to Parish level. These local authorities tended to be very conservative and imposed very tight restrictions on road engines often to a few hours, usually at night. The Act, however, didn't apply to agricultural engines. A new Act in 1871 made the 1864 Act less onerous by saying the red flag man had to be only 20 yards ahead and said any restrictions on road locomotives had to be more reasonable - as some very unreasonable locla laws had been imposed. It also legislated about bridges and the use of road locomotives over bridges - but again individual cases were left to local authorities.....There was favourable Parliamentary Select Committee reporting on road locomotives in 1896 which, approved steam (and others) on the road. Finally in 1898 (as late as that!) you get the Road Locomotive Act which abolishes the red flag man; abolishes the need for three men on the engine; and says they can move about in daylight. 🙂🙂
The first ever!
Sounds like 60 RPM.
Thank you for this most exact speech about this invention of a first automotive vehicle, alas put under the carpet by political interests, which is shamefull for us French people.
We could nearly do the same video for the first motorised boat, made in Lyon, France, under Louis 16th. This explains why it never navigated on the River Seine in Paris, where the Science Academy wanted to examine it :( and also fell in forgoten history.
Louis 15th and "La Pompadour" wanted to deeply reform French nobility, taxes, administration, etc. with the help of e.g. Choiseul. But they found harsh and organised resistance through nobility, even fearing for their lives. Had they make it, let's imagine no revolution may have occur in 1789. So that nobility (and priests) problems leading to the revolution however came from themselves.
And the Gribeauval cannon became the one of Napoleon's victories...
I hope to do a video on the first steam boat built by Jouffroy d'Abbans under Louis 16th.
Is that a cannon barrel slung to the undercarriage?
It is. The Fardier Cugnot was built to move heavy artillery. At that time heavy artillery pieces were dismantled and transported on what in English is termed a "sling carriage" and in French an "affut fardier" - the barrel was carried slung beneath the "affut fardier" and the carriage eight dismantled (if it was a garrison carriage with small truck wheels) or if it was a field carriage pulled by a gun team of horses - but much lighter, obviously, without the barrel. When it came to put the gun back together, a gin was used - a three legged crane based around an A-frame - to winch the barrel back in position.
Cugnot's "Fardier" was essentially such an "affut fardier" but with a steam engine attached in lieu of the limber and horse team. He didn't design the back half, jsut the engine unit at the front. The plan was that the engine unit could be connected to any reasonable large vehicle.
@AnthonyDawsonHistory Folks really underestimate steam power, I think.
It wouldn't have required that much work to make it better. Quite a missed opportunity!
Indeed. Sadly what it did need was support at Court - which it did not have.
Wow.
In a Facebook video they lie that there was only one cylinder
That's very naughty. It definitely had two!
i think that this is the first true car, not the one made by benz
absolutely!
Quite funny. The cylinders were bored with proven technology used to bore cannons
Yes. Developed by a Swiss army officer working for France Jean Maritz and his son, Jean Maritz jr.
It is interesting that steam engines came from the convergence of technologies formed from the cannon boring, brewing (copper boilers), and Bell making (bronze foundry and machining pre cannon). One can only wonder whether steam engines would have been invented if Europeans hadn't been religious, boozy, and warlike.
Darn, first again? I need a life!
You could start by making a relevant comment on the videos instead of playing some childish game
Someone has to be :-)
@@misterflibble6601 You say you're not a child at heart, and yet you love trains. Curious.
I love your videos but can you please get rid of the annoying loud whistle at the beginning?
The first tractor was a dud: who woulda guess3d?
Not a dud - killed off by politics. It worked perfectly well :-)
@@AnthonyDawsonHistory His mindset was on military use rather than attempting to improve the boiler for example and didnt think of cranked inclined cylinders rather than the verticle cyinders of steam pumps. We never really got Steam Tractors that I can think of, but the Steam wagons of Foden and Sentinel had the kind of front wheel drive that this unit has. At least one Sentinal was equipped with pnuematic tyres in the 1970s and could do 60mph along the motorway (stopping distance was a big longer than the normal trucks on the road though !!
Steam tractors certainly exist, they are just called traction engines. But in europe they never really caught on like in the US. Most european farmers went from horses to diesel.
@@slome815 Certainly in UK there were a variety of steam traction engines in a variety of formats - Road Rollers for macadaming roads, steam lorries for carriage of goods, farmers and haulage traction engines ( eg used by pickfords and others for the haulage of heavy made plant - often boliers and stationary large engines for loom work or pumping purposes ), the steam plough - often worked in pairs with a chain winch underslung on each road locomotive which would haul a plough or plough systems accross a field from top to bottom, showmans engines - often would generate electricity for lighting as well as a direct drive for various fairground rides - though many would have their own small boiler and engine system, with the showmans engine hauling a road consist of up to four vehicles. The steam tractor was a sort of short steam lorry often fitted with a winch and used a lot in forestry operations it could again haul a trailer or two of loaded wagons. Examples of each are often on show at the likes of the Great Dorset Steam Fair each year.
@@highpath4776 Yes, the Uk has a good deal more, but mainland europe has fairly few. And I don't think it was anywhere as widespread as in the US. Nor are the engines as huge as in the US. I noticed when I was visiting the car and tractor museum bodensee, that out of their huge old tractor collection, almost all of the steam traction engines were american. The first german tractors really only start with hot bulb engines. Obviously there will be some exceptions to this.
The last reliable French car.
This thing must be French. It makes no sense.
disliked because french