Welcome to Thursday Trivia where we offer up a historical automotive trivia question and you try and solve it before seeing the answer after the jump. It’s like a history test, with cars!
This week’s question: What was the first production car to be fitted with hydraulic power-assisted steering?
If you think you know the answer make the jump and see if you are right.
While the modern convenience of the automatic transmission is often vilified by automotive enthusiasts as a loss of ultimate control, not too many people feel the same way when it comes to power steering.
Hydraulic – and eventually electric – assist for turning the wheels is pretty ubiquitous these days and here in the States I don’t think there is a mass production car where it doesn’t come as an available feature. Oh sure, you can still get a Morgan that’ll build your upper body, but I think only the Lotus Elise was a recent entry into the market that didn’t offer power steering as even an option.
In the more traditional hydraulic power-assisted system, an engine-driven pump provides pressure to fluid that is then controlled through a bi-actuating hydraulic cylinder. That adds force to the effort provided by driver input through the steering wheel. Most of these systems are alike, the most notably different being the self-centering one developed by – who else – Citroën.
Electric systems work by having an electric motor apply pressure to the steering gear based on a series of torque sensors to determine direction and force. These designs were intended to lessen weight frictional drag, and complexity, as the whole pumps system was eliminated. The earliest ones were plagued with jumpy action and the steering feel of pancake batter.
A good power steering system aids your driving without ever calling attention to itself, and today most designs are pretty good. But where did it all start, and what was the first production car to offer this convenience feature?
From CarHistory4U:
The Chrysler Imperial became the first production vehicle to be fitted with a power steering system in 1951. The system was called “Hydraguide”.
The history of power-assisted steering goes back much further than the ’51 Imperial. The first practical design for the feature was developed by Pierce Arrow engineers Francis W. Davis and George Jessup in 1926. A short time later Davis moved on to General Motors and took his idea with him. The bean counters at GM determined that power-assisted steering would be too expensive an option to produce and hence shelved it. WWII helped advance the technology as it was required of the heavy equipment necessary for the war.
The Imperial power-assist design was based on Davis’ patents which by then had expired. Cadillac followed with their own power-assist option in 1952.
Image: Wikipedia
Leave a Reply