Benz Patent-Motorwagen

Benz Patent-Motorwagen
Overview
Manufacturer	Benz & Cie. Rheinische Gasmotorenfabrik (subsumed within Mercedes-Benz)
Production	1886–1893
Body and chassis
Layout	Rear Engine, RWD
Powertrain
Engine	954 cc (58.2 cu in; 1.0 L) single cylinder engine (Ligroin fuel)
Power output	0.68 PS (0.50 kW; 2⁄3 bhp) @ 400 rpm 0.082 kg⋅m (4⁄5 N⋅m; 0.59 lb⋅ft)
Transmission	Single-speed belt drive to counter shaft with differential; then separate chain drives to each rear wheel
Dimensions
Wheelbase	1,450 mm (57.1 in)
Length	2,700 mm (106.3 in)
Width	1,400 mm (55.1 in)
Height	1,450 mm (57.1 in)
Curb weight	270 kg (600 lb)
Chronology
Successor	Benz Velo

The Benz Patent-Motorwagen ("patent motorcar"), developed over the period 1885 - 1887 by the German engineer Carl Benz, is widely regarded as the first practical automobile. It was also the first car to be put into production.

Motorwagen Nr. 1

Benz began work on his vehicle in 1884 but it was in Spring 1885 that he got his prototype moving under its own power for the first time. He worked continually to improve his vehicle. Initially it would only run for a short distance and was driven only in the factory grounds. Over the year 1885 its range grew, and in the latter part of the year Benz took it out on unfrequented roads and at night. By the end of 1885 he was sufficiently confident in it to prepare a patent application. This was filed on 29 January 1886. and granted on 2 November 1886 (if a patent is granted, the date of the patent is the filing date). The 1885 vehicle is known as Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 1.

Motorwagen Nr. 2

Around the time he was applying for the patent, Benz began work on Motorwagen Nr. 2. This was a new vehicle: it followed the basic design of Nr. 1 but, apart from the engine, very little of the fabric of Nr. 1 was used in Nr. 2. The tubular frame; the wheels; the seat with its scroll-spring supports: all were discarded. The steering was moved to the middle, where it was joined by a hand lever to engage drive. In Nr. 1 when the drive/brake lever was pulled back, it operated a band brake on a pulley on the counter-shaft, slowing the vehicle.. In Nr. 2 the lever was dedicated to braking: as well as the band brake, brake blocks were applied to the rear wheels.

Photographs survive showing side and rear views of a Motorwagen which looks much like the series production of Model 2. These appear to be of Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 2 after it had been transformed into the prototype of Model 2. In them the carburettor, fuel tank and the pulleys used for the belt drive are all different from those of Nr. 1. They are more likely to have changed in the transition from Nr. 1 to Nr. 2 than in that from Nr. 2 to the prototype of Model 2. The latter transition was concerned with providing full suspension and required a new front-end and tubular chassis.

Motorwagen Nr. 2 looks very different from Nr. 1. It was far better suited to use on public roads: it had better brakes; all the controls could be reached by a driver sitting on the left. It had stronger, wooden wheels with iron tyres. Images of Carl Benz driving it with Josef Brecht (later his commercial clerk) beside him show it with a half-hood and lights.

On 4 June 1886 the Neue Badische Landeszeitung described the vehicle, mentioning its brakes. This means that Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 2 had been completed by June 1886. It, not Nr. 1, was the first practical automobile. Its engine came from Nr. 1, but with new carburettor, fuel tank and pulleys for a wider belt drive. The crankcase changed between the patent drawings and the photo of the rear of the prototype of Model 2, most probably at this time, to increase the stroke.

From the start, the Patent-Motorwagen had a large horizontal flywheel at the back; this rotated all the time the engine was running. In the patent drawing, almost half of this lay behind the rear wheels. When he built Nr. 2, Benz moved the engine forwards to reduce the overhang.

Motorwagen Nr. 3

In 1887 the vehicle was transformed again. In Nr. 2, there was suspension only at the rear. Now the front of the vehicle was rebuilt with a bent-tube chassis which connected the front wheel to the rear axle. That it was only the front which was rebuilt is indicated by the similarity in appearance of the rear of Nr. 3 to Nr. 2, in particular where the rear sub-frame meets the side tube. The side tubes of the frame of Nr. 2 were cut just beside the lever which engaged drive; a new bent tube in the form of a U was connected to these to create the upper frame of the vehicle. Fully-elliptic springs at the front were added to those at the rear to provide full suspension. A rear-facing seat was added at the front of the vehicle.

In the records of Benz & Cie, there is a Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 3; after this, vehicles have a Fabrikationsnummer (serial number). Nr. 3 is usually identified as the vehicle in a contemporary newspaper illustration in which Benz and his wife Bertha are depicted driving around Munich in September 1888. This vehicle looks very similar to its prototype: the differences lie at the back, where the engine of the prototype is not enclosed behind the seat.

Nr. 1 and Nr. 2 are stages in the development of the Patent-Motorwagen. Nr. 3 is more likely to be the final stage in this development than a production vehicle. Benz appears to have used it as his personal car until switching to a new Model 2 around the end of 1887. Around this time, Nr. 3 was scrapped ("disassembled"). Parts which could be reused were salvaged.

As his new Model 2 looked identical except at the back, it was natural for people to refer to this vehicle as Nr. 3, even though it was not. That it was a Model 2 is evident from the picture of Carl and Bertha driving round Munich in it.

Model 2

During 1887 Benz exhibited a Model 2 at an exhibition in Paris, but it passed unnoticed. He also made his first sale, to Émile Roger, a bicycle manufacturer in Paris who made Benz stationary engines under license and who came to see him in Mannheim.

During 1888 Roger became Benz's agent in France and began selling the Patent-Motorwagen there. When Benz visited Roger in March 1888, he found that Roger had sold one of his vehicles to Émile Levassor. Import taxes were lower on parts than on assembled vehicles, so Roger imported kits from Mannheim which he assembled in Paris. This also enabled him to advertise and exhibit the vehicle as made in France.

In Benz's Lebensfahrt, the caption to the image of the photograph of Model 2 is Mein erster Serienwagen von 1888 . This translates as "My first production car from 1888". Benz evidently considered that Model 2 had gone into series production at that time. The photograph of Model 2 in Benz's Lebensfahrt and that of him and Bertha driving around Munich are identical, apart from cosmetic differences, and match the surviving Model 2 in the Science Museum in London The front of Model 2 also matches the photograph of its prototype, Nr. 3.

Model 2 was the first commercially available production automobile in history. The cost of the vehicle in 1888 was 3000 Imperial German marks, approximately 750 US dollars (equivalent to $26,900 in 2025). The number of Model 2's manufactured is not known: at least four are known to have existed; more likely, five or six were made.

Carl's wife Bertha recognised the value of publicity. In August 1888 she decided to respond positively to requests from their sons Eugen and Richard to make a holiday trip in the car. She decided that they should visit her mother's in Pforzheim, some 50 miles away. Eugen drove at the start. On a hill, Bertha and Eugen had to get out and push (Richard steered). During the journey, Bertha had to make running repairs and buy fuel, Ligroin, from a pharmacy. She had to work out why the car had broken down and improvise solutions: a hatpin to clear a blockage in the fuel line; a garter to fix the ignition.

Not only did this trip succeed in gaining publicity, the feedback from it led Carl to use a larger engine in Model 3 and to add an extra, low gear.

In September 1888 the Model 2 was shown at an exhibition in Munich, winning a gold medal. The image of Carl and Bertha Benz driving around Munich appeared in a Leipzig newspaper and was reproduced in the Scientific American.

Model 3

In order to accommodate the extra belt system for the low gear, the flywheel in Model 3 was changed from horizontal to vertical. Copper radiators on each side of the engine replaced a coolant water tank above the engine; other components were improved. The rear-facing front seat was removed, but a single rear-facing seat hanging out above the front tubes was an optional extra. Benz was selling Model 3 at the 1889 Paris Exposition, where he had a display which was separate from Roger's.

Sales Numbers

Benz sold about 25 Patent-Motorwagen between 1887 and 1894. He also supplied vehicles in kit form to his French agent Émile Roger, who had sold about 50 of his vehicles (including the Victoria and the Velo) by 1894. The Velo was a runaway success and perhaps 10 of Roger's 50 sales could have been these.

In his Lebensfahrt, Benz writes that, despite the absence of Locomotive Acts, he made no sales in Germany for years. That being so, all sales of the Model 2 would have been through Roger. The handful of Model 2's known to have existed may be all that there ever were. Ironically, the Locomotive Acts which suppressed sales in Britain may also have preserved the one Model 2 which found its way there: until 1896 its owner would have needed to keep his head down and use it only locally (if he could keep it in running order when there were no motor mechanics in Britain). By the time it became legal, the Model 2 was obsolescent.

Reassembly of Original Vehicle

Around 1895 the Sales Manager at Benz had surviving parts of the original vehicle sought out and reassembled. It was photographed in the late 1890s. In 1906 it was given to the Deutsches Museum in Munich. In 1925 it headed a procession of historic vehicles with Benz at the controls. A video from the 1920s or 1930s shows it being demonstrated. It remains in the Museum today.

When the surviving parts of the original vehicle were reassembled, the aim appears to have been to produce a working demonstrator which contained those parts which had survived. These were from Nr. 3, the vehicle which had been scrapped, with parts worth saving being salvaged. The most significant of these was the engine, which had been used as a stationary engine in the factory. The photo from 1887 of the rear of Nr. 3 shows a different rear subframe, a different coolant water tank and the bevel gear to the driveshaft on the right rather than the left. The reassembled vehicle copied Nr. 1, in using bevel gears with a 2:1 ratio from the crankshaft to the driveshaft rather than the 1:1 ratio of Nr. 3; this would have required rework to the valve gear.

Although the reassembled vehicle has since come to be known as "Benz Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 1", it bears little direct relation to the vehicle shown in the patent drawings. The cylinder and cylinder head bear signs which link them to the patent drawings. Elsewhere in the engine, development was rapid between Nr. 1 and Nr. 3: the crankcase changed, along with the carburettor (probably more than once); the fuel tank was moved. In the transmission, the belt was doubled in width and the doubling of the diameter of the crankshaft bevel gear would have had consequences. When Nr. 3 was disassembled, the frame and body would have been regarded as scrap metal.

In sum, the cylinder and cylinder head are probably from 1885. Some parts of the engine may be from 1886-87. Other parts of the engine may be from Model 2, which had essentially the same engine as Nr. 3 but with a larger cylinder. The transmission replicated some features of Nr. 1; where it did so, they were replicas.

Replicas of the reassembled vehicle have been produced from the mid-twentieth century. About 150 examples from various suppliers have been made. In 2001, Daimler (now Mercedes-Benz Group) began manufacturing replicas by hand. These can run on petrol but are not permitted on public roads..

Conclusion

The Patent-Motorwagen has been recognised as the first practical automobile (Nr. 2) and the first to enter production (Model 2). As its creator, Carl Benz has been hailed as the father and inventor of the automobile.

Sources

The development of the Benz Patent-Motorwagen is complicated and sources are often contradictory.

There appears to be only one surviving vehicle in near-original condition: a Model 2 in the Science Museum in London. There is a Model 3 in the Technical Museum in Vienna, but it was rebuilt in 1898 to have four wheels. As noted above, the vehicle in the Deutsches Museum in Munich was reassembled c.1895 using parts from the original vehicle. It gives something of the flavour of Nr. 1, Benz's vehicle of 1885, rather than showing what it looked like.

The principal sources used here (apart from the original vehicles) are:

• technical histories, especially two early ones: William Worby Beaumont's Motor Vehicles and Motors (1900) and Benz's Lebensfahrt (1925). The latter is both a memoir by Benz and a technical history written (in Benz's voice) mainly by his sons-in-law and a Professor Volk;
• early images, notably an engraving of Nr. 2, photographs of the original vehicle in 1887, a newspaper illustration of Carl and Bertha Benz driving a Model 2 in Munich in 1888 and contemporary photographs of a Model 2, a Model 3 and the reassembled prototype in the late 1890s;
• documents, notably patent 37435 and contemporary newspaper reports.

The patent drawings cannot be trusted as representing the vehicle as built. They show an early form of car radiator immediately above the engine cylinder connected to its water jacket. In Benz's Lebensfahrt he says that a coolant water tank was used at first.. Such a tank can be seen on the rear view of Nr. 3 in 1887. In the Model 2, the coolant tank was larger (only the top was exposed to ambient air, so its diameter needed to be greater). The first version to have a radiator was Model 3, which had one on each side of the engine (see the Vis-à-vis of 1893).

Another source of confusion is that when the Sales Department drew up the first advertisements in 1888, they used engravings of Nr. 2, the 1886 vehicle, instead of Model 2, which they were selling. Worby Beaumont captions the image as "Benz Second Motor Tricycle Carriage made in 1886" and says it is "from an engraving lent me by Mr. Benz, of the second type of car he made".

The identification of vehicles in images in the Mercedes-Benz Public Archive differs from those given here. A full analysis of images in the Public Archive which show original vehicles (including the reassembled vehicle in the Deutsches Museum but not replicas of it) is given at the bottom of this article.

Development and specifications

View of the reassembled original Patent-Motorwagen in Deutsches Museum, photograph from Benz's Lebensfahrt, 1925

In 1873 Benz developed a successful gasoline-powered two-stroke piston engine. He was less successful in running a company and was forced to take external shareholders and see his shareholding reduced to 5%. His dream remained to apply a gas engine to create a horseless carriage.

Benz started work on his Motorwagen in 1884 in his own time, outside his responsibilities as a director of the company. He continually made changes to it, so it is hard to tie down details of its specification at any particular date. What can be said is that the first version which Benz was happy to take into Mannheim and be seen in was the Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 2 in summer 1886. This was his first practical car: it fixed the mistakes he had made in the design of Nr. 1 and was sufficiently reliable not to have to worry about constant breakdowns.

The Benz Patent-Motorwagen was a motor tricycle with a rear-mounted engine. The vehicle contained many new inventions. It had a frame of steel tubing with a floor of wooden slats. The steel-spoked wheels and solid rubber tyres in Nr. 1 were Benz's own design. They were replaced with wooden wheels in Nr. 2.

Steering was by way of a toothed rack that pivoted the front wheel. Elliptic springs were used at the back along with a beam axle and chain drive on both sides. The front wheel in Nr. 1 and Nr. 2 was unsprung; elliptic springs were added in Nr. 3 (1887) and used in the first production version (Model 2) that year. Brakes and lights (using vaporised fuel from the carburettor) were added in Nr. 2.

View of the reassembled original vehicle showing the crossed drive belt; the patent drawings show it straight, 2015

A belt system served as a single-speed transmission, varying torque between a drive pulley and a two-part pulley on a counter-shaft. By moving the drive/brake lever forward from its central position, an increasing width of belt was applied to the fixed pulley on the counter-shaft in a process similar to lifting the clutch pedal with manual gears. When the drive/brake lever was fully forward, the belt was wholly on the fixed pulley and the vehicle would go at the speed dictated by the power of the engine and the road.

After Nr. 1, control of the position of the belt was moved to a hand lever on a stalk in the centre of the vehicle. Brakes were added to the rear wheels and the lever on the left was dedicated to applying these.

In the Model 3 a second, low gear was added. The transmission for this was provided by a second belt system to the right of the existing one (see the image of the Vis-à-vis of 1893), with separate hand levers to control whether that belt was driving the vehicle or not. The flywheel was changed from horizontal to vertical to accommodate the extra belt drive.

3 h.p. engine of a Benz Vis-à-vis (1893). The vertical flywheel is in the centre; to its right are two belt systems, one for each "gear"

The selected belt drove the counter-shaft, which had a differential so that the wheels went round corners at the correct speeds. Chains on each side provided the final drive from the counter-shaft to the rear wheels.

The report in the Neue Badische Landeszeitung of 4 June 1886 states that the bore of the engine was 9 cm and that it developed about 1 h.p. at 300 rpm. The single cylinder of the reassembled vehicle has a bore of 9 cm and a stroke of 15 cm, giving a displacement of 954 cc (58.2 cu in). While the appearance of the crankcase of the reassembled vehicle matches that in the 1887 photograph, it differs from what is shown on the patent drawings. These show the outer diameter of the crankcase to have matched the diameter of the cylinder with its water jacket.

Excerpt from Benz Patent 37345 for Motorwagen, showing crankcase

The cut-out for the motion of the connecting rod on the patent drawing is also smaller than that in the reassembled original vehicle (and its replicas). The only reason to reduce the diameter of the crankcase and increase the cut-out is to accommodate an increased stroke. At 1.67, the stroke / bore ratio is high: surviving examples of Models 2 and 3 have ratios between 1 and 1.39. Model 2 was the next cylinder Benz made; it was square, with bore and stroke of 11cm. He is unlikely to have used a square cylinder in Model 2 unless he preferred it. The implication is that Benz's original cylinder was also square, with bore and stroke of 9cm.

Engine of a replica of the reassembled original vehicle showing the cylinder and crankcase

The engine of the reassembled vehicle is a four-stroke engine with trembler coil ignition. When tested, it produced 0.68 PS (500 W; 2⁄3 hp) at 250 rpm, although later tests by the University of Mannheim showed it to be capable of 0.91 PS (670 W; 0.9 hp) at 400 rpm. These details are shown in the Infobox. Technical details of the Model 2 and Model 3 are shown immediately before the section Patent-Motorwagen Model 2.

It was an extremely light engine for the period, weighing about 100 kg (220 lb). Although its open crankcase and drip oiling system are alien to a modern mechanic, its use of a pushrod-operated poppet valve for exhaust is quite familiar. A large flywheel (horizontal until changed to vertical for the Model 3) stabilized the single-cylinder engine's power output.

Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 1

Figures 1-5 from Patent 37435 for Benz's Motorwagen, 1886

Motorwagen Nr. 1 is identified with the year 1885. During that year, Benz demonstrated it to the public for the first time, in the factory grounds. The vehicle was difficult to control and it collided with a wall.

Later, he took it out onto the public road, but suffered frequent mishaps:

. . . suddenly disaster strikes – in the form of the first "breakdown." The carriage slows down, and ... comes to a complete stop. The driver gets out, kneels down, tinkers, and patches it up. People gather, smiling and laughing. . . Wherever a treacherous fault was lurking, I didn't rest until it was discovered and eradicated. More and more often, the return journey was also made in motorised fashion, that is, without the assistance of people pushing or horses and cows pulling. At the same time, the driving distance had increased from 100 meters to a kilometre or more.

By the end of that year, Benz and his wife had become sufficiently confident that the vehicle would be of practical utility to prepare a patent application. This was submitted on 29 January 1886.

The patent is the best available evidence of the state of the Motorwagen at the end of 1885. The drawings show a motorised tricycle with wire wheels and a single-cylinder horizontal engine mounted fore-and-aft with cranks driving a horizontal flywheel, almost half of which projects behind the back of the rear wheels.

Apart from the piston cylinder, open crankcase, cranks and the flywheel, the only equipment which the patent drawings show in the engine is a vertical cylinder in front of, and with a pipe to, the combustion chamber. This lay beneath the seat with its top at the level of the vehicle's floor. The patent drawings provide a section, which was reproduced in Benz's Lebensfahrt: as Fig. 9. It contains the evaporative carburettor, which typically would have held 1 litre of fuel, with a 3-litre fuel tank over it.

How the fuel was made to evaporate was not described in the patent. Worby Beaumont shows details from the British patent of 1886. In this, hot exhaust gases from the engine are forced through a fine annulus filled with fuel, vaporising it. He also shows a slide mixer valve which adjusted the richness of the air/fuel mixture. As the slide was moved in or out, the air intake holes were covered or uncovered.

The patent drawings do not show an electrical system, but it is discussed in Benz's Lebensfahrt and illustrated in Fig 8. The patent drawings show what looks like the end of a (presumably wooden) box beneath the seat. Given its proximity to the cylinder head, it probably contained the battery and the coil for the ignition.

Drive was taken from the axis of the flywheel through bevel gears on the left side to a pulley, from which a belt ran straight (not crossed) to a pulley on the counter-shaft just in front of the rear wheels. This pulley is in two parts: one fixed to the counter-shaft; the other loose. By means of a lever (9 on Fig. 1 of the patent drawings) at the left of the vehicle, the rod 10 could be shifted to left or right, moving guide pins to transfer the belt from the loose pulley to the pulley fixed to the counter-shaft. Its effect was similar to that of putting an automatic car into Drive. The lever 9 could also be moved back, to effect a form of engine braking.

The split pulley contained the differential, which ensured that the rotation of the counter-shafts on each side adjusted correctly when turning corners. Final drive was taken by roller chains between sprockets on the partial counter-shafts to sprockets connected to the wheels, which rotated freely on the rear axle.

Steering was controlled by a hand lever at the top of a stalk which was at the right edge of the vehicle, above the counter-shaft. At its bottom was a pinion which acted on a rack at the end of a rod, which ran diagonally immediately above the floor of the vehicle to a lever connected to the front wheel.

The engine was started by vigorously turning the flywheel. There was a step on the left side to ease getting into the vehicle: the floor was 800mm off the ground.

The controls – steering and drive/brake – both by hand, were at opposite edges of the vehicle, 1m apart. Benz must have set the flywheel turning at the back to get the engine started, then got into the vehicle on the left, sat down, moved the drive/brake lever forward to engage drive and then moved over to the right to drive it. To stop, he would have reversed this, moving the drive/brake lever all the way back to engage engine braking, waited for the vehicle to stop and then dismounted.

The seat consisted of a sprung squab for two people on large scroll springs which projected far in front of and behind the seat, hindering access to it. The arm rest and seat back appear to have been of wrought-iron.

Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 2

The first practical motor car: Carl Benz's Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 2 of 1886

In early 1886, Benz became more confident about exposing his vehicle to the public. In his Lebensfahrt he writes.

Until then, I had preferred to conduct my test drives far from the city – on the factory grounds or out on the old, lonely ring road that still encircled the city of Mannheim and was hardly ever used – but from the spring of 1886 onward, I no longer shied away from people and their criticism. Now, twilight and darkness were no longer my favorite times for practising and rehearsing. Now I also appeared with my vehicle on the city's streets and squares, even the busiest ones.

A report appeared in the Neue Badische Landeszeitung of 4 June 1886:

For cycling enthusiasts, it should be of great interest to learn that a major advance in this field has been made by a new invention from the local firm Benz & Co. . . .This velocipede is powered by an engine similar in design to gas engines. The engine, with a cylinder bore of 9 cm and placed between the two rear wheels on springs above the wheel axle, represents, despite its small size, approximately one horsepower and makes 300 revolutions per minute, thereby increasing the vehicle's speed to that of an ordinary passenger train. Above the engine, which is powered by a type of gas, ligroin, contained in a reservoir and sufficient for an extended period, is the seat for two people, also mounted on double springs. In front of it are the steering and brake levers. By means of another lever, the vehicle is set in motion or stopped at will, by directing the belt, which transmits the motive power of the engine to the wheels, onto the loose or fixed pulley.

When William Worby Beaumont was preparing his book Motor Vehicles and Motors (1900), he corresponded with Benz. The image above is captioned "Benz Second Motor Tricycle Carriage made in 1886" and is

from an engraving lent me by Mr. Benz, of the second type of car he made. It differs from the first mainly in the seat or body.

The photographs of Nr. 3 show that the drive pulley and the belt match those of the reassembled vehicle rather than the patent drawings, on which they were about half this width. This suggests that the increase in the width of the belt, and therefore of the pulleys, occurred as part of the changes from Nr. 1 to Nr. 2. The bevel gears to the drive pulley were switched to the right. As the reassembled original vehicle uses a crossed belt (as do all Benz vehicles), it seems likely that the change from straight to crossed belt was from Nr. 1 to Nr. 2.

When the engine was moved forwards, the carburettor and fuel tank had to be moved. The 1887 photographs show that the carburettor was moved to the left side and the (taller, narrower) fuel tank was placed between it and the engine cylinder with a pipe below to connect them.

As well as the changes to shorten the overhang of the flywheel, the following changes were made:

• the floor at the front was lowered, curving up to the pivot for the front wheel;
• the steering control was moved from the right edge to the centre, enabling the driver to control the vehicle from a single position;
• the drive/brake lever at the left became the brake lever, with brakes on the wheels superseding the engine braking of Nr. 1;
• the control to engage drive (by moving the belt from the loose to the fixed pulley) was moved to a hand lever on a separate stalk next to that for steering;
• the wheels were changed from wire to hybrid wooden / iron (see the section on Model 2);
• mudguards were added, both above the rear wheels and, beneath the floor, above the front wheel;
• lights (important for testing at night) were added;
• the seat was made more comfortable, with side and lumbar support, padded armrests and a padded seat-back;
• the scroll springs of the seat were reworked so that they lay beneath the seat and no longer inhibited access to the seat.

The carburettor seems to have been the part which gave Benz most trouble: he continued to develop it for many years with two further patents, the earlier being submitted in April 1887. Fig. 11 of his Lebensfahrt shows the definitive version with the air intake as a knob at the centre; on the Vis-à-vis of 1893 (and the reassembled original vehicle), the air intake knob is at one side.

Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 3

Side view of Benz Patent-Motorwagen Nr. 3, 1887

This is the final form of the original vehicle before it was disassembled around the end of 1887. It is known from two photographs: that of the side, which is shown; and one of the rear.

The front looks much like the series production of Model 2 and has fully-elliptic springs as suspension from the front sub-frame. This is connected to the rear sub-frame, which is based on the main tubes on either side of the tubular steel frame of Nr. 2.

One change from Nr. 2 is to the brake lever. This now has a small transverse arm at the top which can be rotated. It probably locks the brakes in position, ensuring that the vehicle doesn't move when, having applied the brakes, you dismount to go and stop the flywheel.

At the rear, the scroll springs which supported the seat have been replaced by a wooden box. Their function as suspension has been replaced by the front elliptic springs. The sides of the wooden box do not reach the main tubes of the frame, but it is supported at front and back by members running between the main tubes.

A small-diameter gas pipe can be seen entering the box beneath the seat. As Benz had used the vehicle at night, this was probably to supply vaporised fuel from the carburettor to the lights which are shown on the engraving of Nr. 2. No electrical wires can be seen entering the box, although, as the battery cannot be seen, it seems likely that it was in the box, along with the coil. As the lower parts of the box are hidden by the engine, the wires could be there.

On 8 April 1887 Benz applied for a patent for a 2-speed gearbox using epicyclic gears. Model 2, however, had only one gear and Model 3 had two gears which were provided by separate belt systems, each of which was controlled by its own hand lever. There was no reverse.

Technical data

	Benz Patent-Motorwagen Models 2 and 3
Motor	Single-cylinder, four-stroke engine with a large horizontal (Model 2) or vertical (Model 3) flywheel, mounted at the rear.
Displacement	1045 cm³	1660 cm³	1990 cm³
Bore × Stroke	110 × 110 mm	115 × 160 mm	130 × 150 mm
Power	1103 W (1,5 PS) at 500 rpm	1839 W (2,5 PS) at 500 rpm	2206 W (3 PS) at 500 rpm
Fuel mixture preparation	Benz evaporative carburettor
Valve control	1 inlet mixer valve adjusted from lever beneath driver's seat 1 vertical exhaust valve controlled by eccentric rod, cam disc, rocker arm, and pushrod
Transmission	Belt drive to counter-shaft with loose and fixed pulleys, then chain drive to rear wheels Model 2: single speed with hand lever to shift belt between loose and fixed pulleys Model 3: two speeds, each with its own belt system and hand lever to shift that belt between loose and fixed pulleys
Front suspension	1 front steering fork, small transverse full-elliptic spring
Rear suspension	Rigid axle, full-elliptic spring
Steering	Rack and pinion; steering lever on a vertical stalk in the centre of the car
Rear track width	1190 mm
Wheelbase	1575 mm
Kerb weight	360 kg
Top speed	20 km/h
Price	3.000 ℳ (Model 2)

Patent-Motorwagen Model 2

The first production car: Benz Patent-Motorwagen Model 2, 1888

The year 1887 marked the transition for Benz & Cie. from development to production. The model which was sold was known as Model 2. It had a 1.5 PS (1.1 kW; 1.5 hp) engine; one speed; wooden external brakes on the rear wheels controlled by the lever to the left of the driver; and hybrid wooden/iron wheels. The engine with the flywheel was enclosed in a wooden box with a tonneau cover, through which the top of the coolant water tank projected. Optional extras were a folding half-hood and lights.

During the year, Émile Roger, a bicycle manufacturer in Paris who made Benz stationary engines under license, visited Carl Benz in Mannheim and bought a vehicle. Roger became Benz's agent for the Motorwagen and by the time Benz visited him in Paris in March 1888, Roger had sold one to Émile Levassor.

As well as the vehicles sold to Roger in 1887 and through Roger to Levassor in early 1888, there is photographic / pictorial evidence of:

• the vehicle which Benz himself used during 1888, which Bertha took for her trip to Pforzheim in August 1888 and in which Carl and Bertha were depicted driving around Munich in September 1888. This is often referred to as Nr. 3, but was actually a Model 2: the box beneath the seat extended back to cover the whole engine;
• the vehicle which appears as Fig. 27 of Benz's Lebensfahrt with the caption "My first Series Production Car from 1888: 1.5 PS, 2 speeds, up to 16 k.p.h, original price 3000 Mark" (the side of its rear box is painted all over whereas the central panel of Benz's was varnished, as in the example in the Science Museum in Londo);
• the unique surviving example of Model 2 in the Science Museum in London.

Apart from finishes, all three of these vehicles look the same and are clearly based on Nr. 3. We may infer that the vehicle Roger bought was a Model 2 too. It follows that it was in 1887 that Benz's Patent-Motorwagen Model 2 started being series production.

The example in the Science Museum in London has a manufacturer's label stating that it was produced by Roger in Paris. It is known that Roger produced Benz vehicles from kits supplied by the factory in Mannheim and that at the Paris Expo he exhibited in the pavilion showing French products. Parts carried lower import taxes than vehicles and enabled Roger to sell the assembled vehicles and exhibit them as made in France. As the series production of Model 2 was perhaps 5 or 6, it is hard to believe that this vehicle was not assembled and tested in Mannheim before being disassembled sufficiently to qualify as the export of parts.

The survival of the example in near-original condition makes it possible to study details of the construction. The wheels have alternate inner and outer spokes, as in a bicycle wheel. As was common in large wheels, the felloes are made from two laminas of steam-bent wood rather than from wood which was cut and shaped before being joined together. There is a thin iron hoop inside the iron tyre, to which the felloes were bolted as part of its construction. This was permanent and strengthened the wheel while retaining the ease with which the tyre could be replaced.

About 200mm from the axle, the inner spokes are enlarged and bolted to the rear sprocket of the chain drive. This addresses a problem which bedevilled early steam road vehicles: transmitting the torque to the rim of a wooden wheel (wood being required for its flexibility and better ride) without suffering breakages at the nave. The De Dion Bouton steam carriage which completed the 1894 Paris–Rouen race fastest used metal carriers to transmit torque to the heavy felloes. Goldsworthy Gurney had introduced them in his steam drag of 1829.

The front wheel has both the iron tyre (as with the rear wheel) and a solid rubber tyre over it. The rubber tyre provided grip on slippery road surfaces, necessary as it was the sole contact with the road to steer the vehicle.

The top of the coolant water tank projects through the cover over the engine. As cooling of the engine depended on the radiation of heat from this tank, it had to be exposed to ambient air.

Bertha Benz's trip to Pforzheim and the exhibition in Munich

Main article: Bertha Benz § First cross-country automobile journey, 1888

Carl's wife Bertha came from a successful business family. Her dowry had enabled Benz to start his business. Her family had put more money into Benz & Cie when it had been in difficulties. She counseled Carl in business matters. In his Lebensfahrt, Benz sets out the gestation of this trip:

It was the summer of 1888. The schools had closed their gates . . . in the minds of my boys—Eugen was 15, Richard 13—the audacious idea arose to take a newfangled holiday trip and drive out into the world in the car. "But we'll never get Father's permission," Richard lamented, deeply saddened. "Then we'll ask Mother," replied Eugen, "she's more daring than Father and will probably go with us." And so the plot was hatched.

No doubt Bertha saw the advantages of the publicity such a trip would create. She decided that the trip would be to her mother's in Pforzheim, some 50 miles away (60 miles by the route they took there; 50 miles for the return journey).

Bronze plaque outside the pharmacy in Wiesloch where Bertha Benz refuelled the car during the trip. The vehicle depicted is the reassembled original vehicle, not the Model 2 which was used.

They set off at the crack of dawn one day in early August 1888. To continue in Benz's words:

Eugen was at the wheel, his mother beside him, and Richard in the small back[-facing] seat. Less than an hour later, they reached Heidelberg on the lovely, level road. Everything went well until Wiesloch, too. But then, as the roads became hilly, the trouble began. The transmission wasn't designed for such steep inclines. Eugen and his mother had to get out and push while Richard steered. Going downhill, his mother felt uneasy. What if the simple wooden brake with its leather covering suddenly failed? Fortunately, this didn't happen on the entire journey. However, new leather pads had to be bought from the village cobblers and nailed on again and again from time to time. The journey continued, but the leisurely drive was over. Since the chains were stretching and slipping off the gears; they stopped in front of a village blacksmith. The villagers arrive and admire the motor car as if it had just fallen from the sky. After the chains had been tightened, they continue on their way—until the next breakdown. The car stalls because the fuel line is blocked. Mother's hatpin is just the right surgical instrument to repair the damage. During another breakdown, when the ignition failed, the "first female long-distance driver" even sacrificed her garter as insulation.

Although Eugen was driving when they set off, and Richard drove when Bertha and Eugen were pushing the car up a hill, Benz describes Bertha as the "first female long-distance driver", so she probably did most of the driving. On the way, they had to stop in Wiesloch, where Bertha bought some Ligroin fuel from a pharmacy.

Bertha was evidently enough of a mechanic to undertake running repairs and improvise solutions; she probably did most of the driving. However, it was the boys who came up with the idea of the trip; the use of leather coverings for the wooden brake blocks was an established practice.

Not only did this trip succeed in gaining publicity, the feedback from it led Carl to use a larger engine in Model 3 and to add an extra, low gear. This latter change required a substantial redesign of the engine bay.

What is evident from the account, however, is how primitive and unreliable the Model 2 was in August 1888. The sales to Émile Roger and Émile Levassor were both to professional manufacturing engineers, who would be as interested in understanding the capabilities of the new technology as in using it as a means of transport. As with steam coaches in Britain in the 1830s, ordinary users would soon tire of breakdowns and revert to the more reliable horse. In Roger's case, it led to his becoming Benz's agent for the Motorwagen in France; in Levassor's it helped him to build his first vehicles using the Daimler licence.

Exhibition in Munich, September 1888

Carl and Bertha Benz driving around Munich in their Model 2 Patent-Motorwagen, September 1888

One month later, Benz exhibited his vehicle at an industrial exhibition in Munich. In his Lebensfahrt he describes it as a triumph and his vehicle received a Gold Medal. He and Bertha drove around Munich to demonstrate the vehicle and their drives were reported in the local Neue Nachrichten on 16 and 18 September 1888. It was reported in the Leipzig Neue Illustrirte Zeitung of 1 December 1888 with the illustration shown. The illustration was reproduced in the Scientific American of 5 January 1889.

But of sales, it produced none.

Patent-Motorwagen Model 3

Carl Benz driving a Benz Patent-Motorwagen Model 3. His passenger is Josef Brecht, later his commercial clerk

Model 3 was introduced in 1889. It had a 2.0 PS (1,500 W; 2 hp) engine, allowing the vehicle to reach a maximum speed of approximately 16 km/h (10 mph). Its most obvious distinguishing features were the absence of a front seat; and the copper louvred panels on the sides of the box enclosing the engine. These were the outer surface of the radiators, which superseded the exposed upper surface of the coolant water tank in Model 2.

Eugen Zardetti in his Benz Patent-Motorwagen Model 3, 1893. The passenger at the front is in a rear-facing single seat which hangs out in front.

A single rear-facing front seat was available as an optional extra. It was cantilevered out from the front panel, hanging over the front suspension and the front wheel. Eugen Zardetti had it on his Model 3; in the photograph it is being used by his front passenger (it can be seen more clearly in the image on the Mercedes-Benz Public Archive).

Copper and brass on show in the engine of a Benz Vis-à-Vis (1893). This was an upmarket larger version of the Model 3 with more brass.

In the engine, the flywheel was changed from horizontal to vertical (and it was now a dedicated flywheel made for the vehicle, not one which also served as a pulley). This was part of the changes to the transmission to provide a second, low gear. A second belt drive for the low gear was added to the right of the existing belt drive. This had its own stalk with hand lever to control whether the belt was propelling the vehicle.

Benz Vis-à-vis (1893). The rear end is essentially a large-engined Patent-Motorwagen Model 3

The wheels appear to be of standard wooden construction: in the photograph of Carl Benz and Josef Brecht in a Model 3., the felloes are made from two laminas of bent wood. Later vehicles, e.g. the Vis-à-vis of 1893 have a metal rim to which the spokes are fixed by specially-purpose connectors. As can be seen in this meticulously-restored Vis-à-vis, the wooden brake blocks had been superseded by brass ones with leather brake pads.

Despite being produced in larger numbers, there seem to be fewer survivors of Model 3 than Model 2. Only the rear half of Eugen Zardetti's survives, in the Technical Museum in Vienna. In 1898 he got himself a new front half with two wheels rather than one.

Reassembly of the original vehicle

An early advertisement (date unknown) shows a couple on a Model 2 with the caption "The First Petrol Motor Car". Evidently there was a time, at least in Britain, when Model 2 was promoted as Benz's first car.

Around 1895, the Sales Manager at Benz had the parts of the original vehicle sought out and reassembled. The aim seems to have been to produce a vehicle which worked, which could be demonstrated on the road (see this video from the 1920s or 1930s) and which offered something of the flavour of Nr. 1.

Such a vehicle had to be practical. Nr. 1 was not: its floor was 800mm off the ground; its steering control was at the right edge, 1m from other controls; it had broken down frequently. By 1895, sales of the Velo were increasing rapidly. The three-wheeled Model 3 had ceased production a couple of years earlier. If Model 2 had remained on sale after 1889, sales had long since ceased.

The horizontal flywheel and the rear subframe used in Model 2 were specific to that model. Other parts of the engine – the carburettor, in particular – and the transmission had been superseded. The only demand for surviving Model 2 parts was as spares for the tiny number of Model 2's which remained in use.

The engine cylinder of the original vehicle was retrieved from among the stationary engines in the factory, along with associated parts. The engine cylinder was certainly old: by 1895, Benz had removed the piston rod from their car engines. Where original parts of Nr. 3 could not be found, old parts were used. As Model 2 was closely related to Nr. 3, it would have been the obvious source.

Rear view of the reassembled original vehicle in the Deutsches Museum showing the rear sub-frame, 2015

The most obvious differences between the reassembled vehicle and the photograph of the rear of Nr. 3 are:

• the side members of the rear sub-frame are thicker than those of Nr. 3; they drop at 45° and then 30° to the vertical to the cross-piece rather than being bent just inboard of the elliptic springs and then dropping vertically to the (longer) cross-piece;
• the coolant water tank is wider than in Nr. 3 and lacks its neck;
• the bevel gear which drives the pulley of the belt drive is on the left (as in Nr. 1) rather than on the right (as in Nr. 3).

1961 postage stamp for the 75th anniversary of the first practical car in 1886

A new front was created for the reassembled vehicle. Its platform was similar in shape to the front of Nr. 1, but it was placed closer to the ground. In Nr. 1, the pivot for the front wheel lay beneath the platform. To connect the pivot of the front wheel to the lower platform, a bent tube was inserted between the pivot and the front of the platform. This gave it its characteristic profile, as seen on the 1961 postage stamp for the 75th anniversary of the first car.

The steering control for the reassembled vehicle was placed in the centre of the vehicle, towards the front (as in Model 2), not near the right edge immediately above the counter-shaft. The seat copied that of Nr. 2 with its padded seat, arm-rests and seat-back, rather than that of the more spartan Nr. 1.

Several distinctive features of Nr. 1 were reinstated: wire wheels; the combined drive/brake lever; and the absence of external brakes on the wheels.

With the passage of time, the reassembled vehicle has come to be seen as a replica of Nr. 1. Its composite nature as a working re-creation of the spirit of the earliest vehicles has been lost. Images of it outside the pharmacy in Wiesloch outnumber those of Bertha, Eugen and Richard in a Model 2.

Carl Benz on the reassembled original Patent-Motorwagen (with Bertha standing to his right), Munich, 12 July 1925

After its reassembly, the vehicle was kept in working order and more changes were made. On 12 July 1925 the Allgemeine Schnauferl-Club organised a parade of historic vehicles in Munich which Benz headed, driving his Patent-Motorwagen for one final time.

The photograph of the event shows that the slats of the floor had been carried up beneath the seat to provide a rigid barrier between the driver's legs and the engine (the engraving of Nr. 2 shows a heavy cloth hanging below the front of the seat).

Most modern replicas appear to be derived wholly from the vehicle in the Deutsches Museum and include the slats beneath the seat. Those produced by Mercedes-Benz Classic include these slats but deviate from the vehicle in the Deutsches Museum by replicating the rear sub-frame of Nr. 3.

Mercedes-Benz Public Archive

At 18 May 2026 the Mercedes-Benz Public Archive's entries for "Model 3; 3 hp" included images of Nr. 2, Nr. 3 and Model 2, but not Model 3. The images may be identified as:

• 22389: Model 2 – this image appears as Fig. 27 of Benz's Lebensfahrt and is out of copyright. Its caption there is Mein erster Serienwagen von 1888. 1,5 PS, 2 Geschwindigkeiten bis zirka 16 km/Std., damaliger Preis 3000 Mark (My first series-produced car of 1888. 1.5 h.p., 2 speeds to approx. 10 mph, original price 3000 Mark)
• 22390: Nr.3. – this is a less-degraded version of the image on Wikimedia Commons used in this article
• 22588: Nr. 2 – this was used as advertising in 1888; the report beneath from the Munich Neueste Nachrichten of 16 September 1888 references the exhibition in Munich and describes the vehicle as eine viersitzige Komfortable Kaleche mit umlegbarem Regenbach (a comfortable four-seat calèche with a fold-down rain-hood)
• 31809: Model 2 – Carl and Bertha Benz driving round Munich in their Model 2 in September 1888. This image is out of copyright and on Wikimedia Commons. It is a drawing (not a photograph) which appeared in the Leipzig Neue Illustrirte Zeitung of 1 December 1888 and was subsequently reproduced in the Scientific American.
• 82441: Nr. 2 – another copy of 22588
• B39394: Model 2 – this is a painting of the trip by Bertha, Eugen and Richard from Mannheim to Pforzheim in early August 1888.
• C42836: Model 2 – engraving from unidentified source of a Model 2 in a street around 1890

The entries for "Model 3; 2.5 hp" included some of those listed above together with images of the Science Museum's Model 2 when it was on loan to Automuseum Dr Carl Benz in Ladenburg. Among them is:

• 2008DIG1669: photograph of the Science Museum's Model 2 to the left of a modern replica of the reassembled original vehicle.

The entries for "Model 3; 1.5 hp" include some of those listed for the Model 3; 3 h.p and in addition:

• 22584: Nr. 2 – this is similar to 22588 and is an advertisement from a catalogue; if the catalogue was published, the image would now be out of copyright. It offers the most detailed view of the engine of Nr. 2 and complements the photograph of the rear of Nr. 3. That it was based on a photograph is evident from the composite photograph and CAD rendering which appears as Archive number 46305.
• A33374: Model 3 – this shows Carl Benz driving a Model 3 with Josef Brecht beside him outside the Benz factory on Waldhofstrasse. It is evidently the basis of the engraving of Model 3 with the same occupants but in a Rhineland landscape with vineyards.

At 18 May 2026 there were no entries for Model 2.

At 18 May 2026 the entries for Model 1 mostly related to replicas of the reassembled original vehicle. Those which related to the reassembled original vehicle itself were:

• 7689: Fig 31 of Benz's Lebensfahrt; out of copyright.
• 22680: Fig 17 of Benz's Lebensafhrt; out of copyright.
• H3365: photograph of the reassembled original vehicle being driven at the Baden-Baden Automobile Tournament, 10-15 July 1923.

See also

• History of the automobile
• Benz Velo (later four-wheel model)

External links

• Patent 37435, by Karl Benz for his 1885 Motorwagon The birth certificate of the automobile – the German patent application of January 29, 1886, that was granted on November 2, 1886, to Benz & Company in Mannheim
• Automuseum Dr. Carl Benz, Ladenburg (Heidelberg)
• John H. Lienhard on Bertha Benz's ride