How did they restart them Is Mise. The electric starter was invented I believe in 1911, but in those days was only fitted to very upmarket vehicles. Most were still started with a crank handle for a decade or more.

They most certainly did not have fuel injection to squirt fuel mist into a hot cylinder, nor a computer to tell it which cylinder to charge.

While our 1928 Chev, & the 1930 Dodge were both inclined to have the engine stop when motion stopped, this was more in the nature of stalling, & was a most undesirable habit.

That Chev was real comedy. It would start easily when dad cranked it, then stop, just before he got to the accelerator. This could go on for quite a while. It was most unwise to let my mother near anything mechanical, so I became the accelerator pusher. It now became my fault if the thing stopped before he got to the seat.

In self preservation I learnt what the 2 leavers on the steering boss did. Using the hand throttle & the spark advance/retard made all the difference, but dad never really mastered them. If they had not had them in the light horse, he didn't approve.

Gentlemen,

100 years ago steam and electric cars were common and in 99% of them
the engine/motor(s) was stopped when the car was stopped.
Most steam vehicles had no gearboxes and were direct drive as the reciprocating steam engine develops maximum torque at zero revolutions.
To stop a steamer all that is necessary (most times) is to shut the regulator (throttle) and on steep descents speed is regulated by shifting the valves to reverse and opening the regulator to go slower as the steam pressure provides braking.

On well made petrol cars, particularly those having six or more cylinders it was possible to restart by the spark advance/retard lever.
Some cars of the time were fitted with air starters; either an air starter motor or an air distributor that fed pressurized air to the cylinders.
Steam cars are a joy to drive and modern automatics are approaching the best of them for ease of driving

Hi there IS MISE & HASBEEN...

Thank you very much IS MISE, for enlightening us both on the benefits of steam and early, petrol powered automobiles ! I must admit, something in 'steam' sounds just the ticket for an adventurous or 'daring-do' old fart like me ! No hard to understand technology, no fancy dials or other contraptions to interfere with a nice Sunday afternoon run in the country. Just the gentle, soothing sound of escaping steam, as we meander quietly through the countryside in our steam driven convertible ?

What do you think eh HASBEEN ? You'd probably go for the sports version, in a steam car ? Something really gutsy...like nought to sixty in say, half an hour ? Now that's pushing it !

Thanks again IS MISE.

It's true they'd start engines by firing one cylinder back years ago, but I only thought they did it in planes. I remember seeing charges like 2 shotgun shells to start the old B17 bombers. It was also taught to me when I was a lad living in the sticks of North Western Australia when they were building the gas pipe lines; if your battery went flat you could start any old petrol engine by taking out a plug on the correct cylinder, wetting the plug with petrol, place it back and cause it to fire by cranking the engine by the back wheels when raised off the ground with the tire lever.

I'm amazed it took them till now to make it happen automatically as in the Euro cars.

Oh and steam cars such as the Stanley Steamer and Doble cut the fuel to the burner when you stop as they had mono tube steam generators which produced flash steam which is quite different than a loco with an actual boiler. Once you cut off the flame there's no more steam produced.

The 1925 Doble. What a gorgeous car :~)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUg_ukBwsyo

Thank you RAWMUSTARD for your informative contribution and the interesting link. Ah the old 'Stanley Steamer', now that sounds to be the almost perfect vehicle for me ? Without any of these modern implements and gauges destined to confuse us old folks ?

Hi there o sung wu. All this bulldust is to create more efficient ICE (internal combustion engines) engines.
In my honest opinion, I think they're all full of it. And they won't change much until some young bloke like o sung wu twists their arms round and back up their spineless backs :~). There are much better ways of reducing a ICE engines fuel usage but they won't release it for years to come. Think of all the ancillary devices driven off the power of the engine now. Water pump(Huge waste, could be electric), Alternator(Not needed), Aircon(Could be electric), Oil pump(Could be electric), Power Steering(Could be electric), Cam shafts, valves (Could be electric). The water pump alone uses around 8 horse power, what a waste!

70% to 75% of an ICE engines fuel gets thrown out the exhaust in the form of heat and pressure. A turbo can be used to capture some of this waste but they could capture a whole truck load more than simply using some stupid computer to stop your engine in traffic when you stop.

None of the things they are doing today are new, they've been around for over 50 years, it's just they don't release them till they think they need to, to be competitive. Remember the cars released today were in development over ten years ago!

I laugh at all the greenies driving their gay Prius's what a complete waste of time and energy, only a complete dill would ever by one!
I shake my head at the car companies throwing money at these techs, when they damn well know it's a complete joke. But hey, the free sh!t soldiers will by them if nanny says so!