Car - about history
The first working steam-powered vehicle was designed?and most likely 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.72122 It is not known if Verbiest's model was ever built.22
Cugnot's 1771 fardier ? 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.23 He also constructed two steam tractors for the French Army, one of which is preserved in the French National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts.24 His inventions were, however, handicapped by problems with water supply and maintaining steam pressure.24 In 1801, Richard Trevithick built and demonstrated his Puffing Devil road locomotive, believed by many to be the first demonstration of a steam-powered road vehicle. It was unable to maintain sufficient steam pressure for long periods, and was of little practical use.
The development of external combustion engines is detailed as part of the history of the car, but often treated separately from the development of true cars. A variety of steam-powered road vehicles were used during the first part of the 19th century, including steam cars, steam buses, phaetons, and steam rollers. Sentiment against them led to the Locomotive Acts of 1865.
Źródło: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car#History
Tuning cars
Continuous improvement car is quite popular, especially among younger car owners. Many a young man invests a lot in order to have a truly unique car. True, knowing the automotive industry can be on their own to carry out less complicated tuning the car, but in many cases it is necessary to use the assistance of specialized auto mechanics and so on. Why deal with the improvement of the car? First of all, when we consider the car after tuning, we can see that their value increases considerably. Many modernized car looks almost like new, even if they already have a fairly high mileage and are quite age.
Automotive industry - economy
Around the world, there were about 806 million cars and light trucks on the road in 2007, consuming over 980 billion litres (980,000,000 m3) of gasoline and diesel fuel yearly.7 The automobile is a primary mode of transportation for many developed economies. The Detroit branch of Boston Consulting Group predicts that, by 2014, one-third of world demand will be in the four BRIC markets (Brazil, Russia, India and China). Meanwhile, in the developed countries, the automotive industry has slowed down.8 It is also expected that this trend will continue, especially as the younger generations of people (in highly urbanized countries) no longer want to own a car anymore, and prefer other modes of transport.9 Other potentially powerful automotive markets are Iran and Indonesia.10 Emerging auto markets already buy more cars than established markets. According to a J.D. Power study, emerging markets accounted for 51 percent of the global light-vehicle sales in 2010. The study, performed in 2010 expected this trend to accelerate.1112 However, more recent reports (2012) confirmed the opposite; namely that the automotive industry was slowing down even in BRIC countries.8 In the United States, vehicle sales peaked in 2000, at 17.8 million units.13
Źródło: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automotive_industry#Economy