The concept of “overdrive” has been around for decades and in theory is the ability of the car to use a gear ratio that allows the engine to be running at a lower rpm to that of the road speed which in turn means fuel savings when cruising at motorway speeds, for example, and therefore lower engine wear and noise. Mechanically, the overdrive unit is a secondary gearbox that … [Read more...]
Automatic Transmissions
Did you know that the original version of the modern type of automatic transmission is nearly 100 years old? This is true, however it took about 20 years to reach the automobile! The first automatic transmission that we would recognise today was developed in the early 1920s by Alfred Horner Munro, a Canadian engineer, who developed his to use compressed air to act as the … [Read more...]