Imagine, you are living in the early 1900s. The family is going on a picnic today, taking the new car out for a spin. You know you are very lucky to even have a car, and it is a real status symbol. You don't look forward to getting it started though. At home, you can get one of the servants to do it, but your wife doesn't want them coming on the picnic, so you will have to do it on the way home, and you just know you will get dirty, or injured!
When I took this car crank to show the children, their reaction was absolutely hilarious. They had no idea what it was, and when I explained it to them, refused to believe that cars used to be 'wound up like a toy' as one child said. They had worked out that it was part of a piece of machinery or motor of some sort, but they are so used to modern cars which start with the twist of a key or even the push of a button, that the idea of having to wind a car up was utterly ridiculous to them.
The car has a long and complex history, having no single 'inventor'. In fact, there are a whole range of vehicles which led to the car we know today, some of them dating right back to the 1700s. These early automobiles were often one offs though, and those that were commercially made were too expensive for most people to own. Instead, most people simply used trains, trams, horses, carriages and even the humble foot to get around. The car though, came to dominate the transport market, and today it is an everyday part of life for many. If you would like to read about the history of the car, why not visit the Tingle Factor Post about Rugby 4 by clicking here.
You might imagine that owning one of these early cars would have been wonderful, but driving early cars was far from simple. Even starting one of these cars was a complex and sometimes dangerous process. After all, cars at this stage didn't have keyed ignitions or simple buttons which could be pushed to start the motor. Instead, a crank handle, like the one I showed the children (which came from a later car, the Morris Minor), had to be pushed into the crankshaft in the motor and turned until the engine began to run. Today, we have starter motors, quite often electric, which turn the engine over the get it working, but in the early days, you were the starter motor, using the crank to start the car. This was difficult, as everything was metal and you needed lots of muscle. If you couldn't turn the crank handle properly, the car just didn't start! On top of this, the crank handle could easily break a finger, a thumb or even an arm if you weren't careful, as it jerked when the engine started running, and being made of heavy metal, it was painful if it hit you. In fact, there were actually common injuries, including broken arms, fingers and wrists! If you would like to learn more about early cars and how they worked, click here. If you would like a detailed description of how to start a car with a crank, click here.