With advancing technical insight, we have become increasingly better able to control complex systems over the years. Nevertheless, a lot of modern technology has its roots in the past, including cruise control and ‘Auto Pilot’.
Cars that keep themselves up to speed are not very surprising in 2021, even a small shopping car is now available with cruise control. While such systems were not long ago reserved at the top end of the market, the first ideas go back to the early last century, at least for the car. As early as 1788 (!) James Watt and Matthew Boulton come up with a speed control for steam locomotives. On the basis of a construction with centrifugal weights, the steam supply is dosed so that the speed of the train can be kept constant, uphill and downhill.
First ‘cruise control’ on car
In the early days of the car, the accelerator pedal is not self-evident, usually the cars in those days are equipped with a throttle. The ‘hand throttle’ can also be locked on most cars. This leads to a constant position of the throttle valve, but not necessarily a constant speed. But it can also be done differently. In 1910 Peerless (American luxury car manufacturer from Cleveland, Ohio) advertises the first true cruise control. The throttle valve is not locked here, but its position is varied to keep the speed constant as much as possible. The pivot in the system works just like the Watt and Boulton locomotives with centrifugal weights. It is not known how many cars Peerless has built and sold with this cruise control system.
blind faith
In the mid-1930s, a blind American inventor, Ralph Teetor, sits in the car with his lawyer. When the lawyer is speaking, he lets go of the gas and when he listens, he accelerates again. The fluctuations in speed disturb Teetor quite a bit and make him decide to find a solution. And with success. In 1945, after almost ten years of experiments, Teetor received a patent on a system that maintains the speed of the car. In those days the system went through life under different names such as ‘Controlmatic’, ‘Touchomatic’, ‘Pressomatic’ and ‘Speedostat’ until we finally got to know it as cruise control. Teetot is not a small boy, by the way, in 1936 he is elected president of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) and in addition to cruise control he also invented a motor mower.
Imperial
‘Auto Pilot’
Anyway, a patent is nice, it would take until 1958 for Chrysler to have the first car with ‘its’ cruise control (under the name Auto Pilot) off the production line. Chrysler mounts it in the New Yorker and in the Windsor. In addition, the Imperial, at that time a separate brand from Chrysler, which competed with the exclusive brands of the time such as Cadillac and Lincoln. In Europe, we are not introduced to cruise control until four years later when Mercedes-Benz takes it into production as Tempomat.
This article previously appeared in 2014’s Techzle Classics issue 3.