Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede
Encyclopedia
The Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede was a steam powered velocipede
made in France sometime from 1867 to 1871, when a small Louis-Guillaume Perreaux
commercial steam engine was attached to a Pierre Michaux
manufactured iron framed pedal bicycle. It is one of three motorcycle
s claimed to be the first motorcycle, along with the Roper steam velocipede
of 1867 or 1868, and the internal combustion engine
Daimler Reitwagen
of 1885. Perreaux continued development of his steam cycle, and exhibited a tricycle version by 1884. The only Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede made, on loan from the Musée de l'Île-de-France, Sceaux
, was the first machine viewers saw upon entering the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
rotunda in The Art of the Motorcycle
exhibition in New York in 1998.
commented that, "the simplest way to define a motorcycle is as a bicycle propelled by a heat engine
; and if we accept this we must go on to admit that its prototype is unidentifiable, shrouded in the mists of industrial antiquity." Both the Michaux-Perreaux and Roper machines have been assigned years of origin of 1867, 1868, and 1869 by different authorities, and which combination of these three years is given to the two steam motorcycles determines whether it was a tie, or whether one can be called the first.
Both steam cycles are rejected as the first motorcycle by other experts, such as Cycle World
s Technical Editor Kevin Cameron, who either argue that a true motorcycle must use a gasoline internal combustion engine, or that the first motorcycle must use the same technology as the successful motorcycles that later went into mass production, and not a 'dead end'. They therefore give credit to Wilhelm Maybach
and Gottlieb Daimler
's 1885 Daimler Reitwagen.
After the period of experimental steam and internal combustion motorcycles, the uncertainty dissolves on the question of the first production motorcycle. The 1489 cc liquid cooled four-stroke Hildebrand & Wolfmüller
of 1894 was the first motorcycle produced in quantity and sold commercially.
and David Burgess-Wise
, and Motorcycle Consumer News
design columnist Glynn Kerr date the Roper later, to 1868, and the AMA
Hall of Fame
and author Mick Walker
have it as 1869. Walker also dates the Michaux-Perraux at 1869, declaring a tie. Louis-Guillaume Perreaux patented his steam velocipede on December 26, 1869, while Roper did not seek patents on any of his steam vehicles, and Daimler took out a patent for his Reitwagen on 29 August 1885. Classic Bike
editor Hugo Wilson says because the Perreaux-Michaux has patents to verify its date, it has a stronger claim on being first than the Roper, even if they both probably appeared in about the same year.
and others include having an internal combustion engine as a criterion for a motorcycle. This definition of motorcycle worked for nearly the entire 20th century until electric and diesel motorcycles grew in prominence and were accepted as true motorcycles without question.
A different tack in favor of the internal combustion Reitwagen is that it was the prototype for virtually all successful designs that followed, in so far as the powerplant is concerned. Cameron said, "History follows things that succeed, not things that fail." Design columnist Glynn Kerr, ignoring the Michaux-Perraux altogether and championing the Roper, feels it would be more accurate to call the Daimler Reitwagen, "the predecessor of all gasoline-driven vehicles on land, sea, or air," but not a true motorcycle because it used two outrigger wheels to remain upright and could not lean. Further, Kerr notes the design was not up to the standards Daimler and Maybach's engineering skill, because they had no interest at the time in motorcycles, but only wanted an expedient test bed for their engine, and immediately dropped the Reitwagen in favor of a four wheeled stagecoach, a hot air balloon and a boat for their ongoing research. David Burgess-Wise called the Daimler-Maybach test bed "a crude makeshift", saying that "as a bicycle, it was 20 years out of date."
Only one example of the original 1867–1871 machine was ever made, but by 1884, Perreaux exhibited a tricycle version of his steam velocipede, with two rear wheels and the belt driving the front wheel, at the Industrial Exhibition on the Champs-Élysées
, Paris. The alcohol fueled engine had a similar bore and stroke to the original, and developed a steam pressure of 3½ atm
(250 kPa) in its 3 USqt boiler, resulting in a speed of 15 mile per hour. The water tanks were sufficient for two to three hours of operation, resulting in a range of 30–54 mi (48.3–86.9 ).
Velocipede
Velocipede is an umbrella term for any human-powered land vehicle with one or more wheels. The most common type of velocipede today is the bicycle....
made in France sometime from 1867 to 1871, when a small Louis-Guillaume Perreaux
Louis-Guillaume Perreaux
Louis-Guillaume Perreaux was born in a village called Almenêches, in Normandy, France on 19 February 1816 was a French inventor and engineer who submitted one of the first patents for a working motorcycle in 1869...
commercial steam engine was attached to a Pierre Michaux
Pierre Michaux
Pierre Michaux was a blacksmith who furnished parts for the carriage trade in Paris during the 1850s and 1860s. He started building bicycles with pedals in the early 1860s. He, or his son Ernest, may have been the inventor of this machine, by adapting cranks and pedals on the front wheel of a...
manufactured iron framed pedal bicycle. It is one of three motorcycle
Motorcycle
A motorcycle is a single-track, two-wheeled motor vehicle. Motorcycles vary considerably depending on the task for which they are designed, such as long distance travel, navigating congested urban traffic, cruising, sport and racing, or off-road conditions.Motorcycles are one of the most...
s claimed to be the first motorcycle, along with the Roper steam velocipede
Roper steam velocipede
The Roper steam velocipede was a steam-powered velocipede built by inventor Sylvester H. Roper of Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts, United States sometime from 1867–1869. It is one of three machines which have been called the first motorcycle, along with the Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede,...
of 1867 or 1868, and the internal combustion engine
Internal combustion engine
The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high-temperature and high -pressure gases produced by combustion apply direct force to some component of the engine...
Daimler Reitwagen
Daimler Reitwagen
The Daimler Reitwagen or Einspur was a motor vehicle made by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in 1885, and is widely recognized as the first motorcycle. Daimler is often called "the father of the motorcycle" for this invention...
of 1885. Perreaux continued development of his steam cycle, and exhibited a tricycle version by 1884. The only Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede made, on loan from the Musée de l'Île-de-France, Sceaux
Sceaux, Hauts-de-Seine
Sceaux is a commune in the southern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.-Wealth:Sceaux is famous for the Château of Sceaux, set in its large park , designed by André Le Nôtre, measuring...
, was the first machine viewers saw upon entering the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is a well-known museum located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is the permanent home to a renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions...
rotunda in The Art of the Motorcycle
The Art of the Motorcycle
The Art of the Motorcycle was an exhibition that presented 114 motorcycles chosen for their historic importance or design excellence in a display designed by Frank Gehry in the curved rotunda of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City, running for three months...
exhibition in New York in 1998.
First motorcycle?
Motoring author L. J. K. SetrightL. J. K. Setright
Leonard John Kensell Setright was an English motoring journalist and author.Born of Australian parents in London, his father Henry Roy Setright, was an engineer who invented the Setright ticket machine used on buses and trams. Setright studied Law at the University of London and practised for a...
commented that, "the simplest way to define a motorcycle is as a bicycle propelled by a heat engine
Heat engine
In thermodynamics, a heat engine is a system that performs the conversion of heat or thermal energy to mechanical work. It does this by bringing a working substance from a high temperature state to a lower temperature state. A heat "source" generates thermal energy that brings the working substance...
; and if we accept this we must go on to admit that its prototype is unidentifiable, shrouded in the mists of industrial antiquity." Both the Michaux-Perreaux and Roper machines have been assigned years of origin of 1867, 1868, and 1869 by different authorities, and which combination of these three years is given to the two steam motorcycles determines whether it was a tie, or whether one can be called the first.
Both steam cycles are rejected as the first motorcycle by other experts, such as Cycle World
Cycle World
Cycle World is a motorcycling magazine in the United States. It was founded in 1962 by Joe Parkhurst, who was inducted to the Motorcycle Hall of Fame as "the person responsible for bringing a new era of objective journalism" to the U.S. and is now the largest motorcycling magazine in the world...
s Technical Editor Kevin Cameron, who either argue that a true motorcycle must use a gasoline internal combustion engine, or that the first motorcycle must use the same technology as the successful motorcycles that later went into mass production, and not a 'dead end'. They therefore give credit to Wilhelm Maybach
Wilhelm Maybach
Wilhelm Maybach was an early German engine designer and industrialist. During the 1890s he was hailed in France, then the world centre for car production, as the "King of constructors"....
and Gottlieb Daimler
Gottlieb Daimler
Gottlieb Daimler was an engineer, industrial designer and industrialist born in Schorndorf , in what is now Germany. He was a pioneer of internal-combustion engines and automobile development...
's 1885 Daimler Reitwagen.
After the period of experimental steam and internal combustion motorcycles, the uncertainty dissolves on the question of the first production motorcycle. The 1489 cc liquid cooled four-stroke Hildebrand & Wolfmüller
Hildebrand & Wolfmüller
The Hildebrand & Wolfmüller was the world's first production motorcycle. Heinrich and Wilhelm Hidebrand were steam-engine engineers before Alois Wolfmüller agreed to finance them to produce their internal combustion Motorrad in Munich in 1894....
of 1894 was the first motorcycle produced in quantity and sold commercially.
Year of origin
The earliest year suggested for the Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede is 1867, which could be either the same year, or earlier than the Roper velocipede, which some authorities also date as early as 1867, while others such as motorcycling historians Charles M. FalcoCharles M. Falco
Charles M. Falco is an American experimental physicist and an expert on the magnetic and optical properties of thin film materials....
and David Burgess-Wise
David Burgess-Wise
David Burgess-Wise is a motoring author, enthusiast, and automobile historian. A motoring writer since 1960, he has written some 25 books on motoring history. He also edits the award-winning Aston, journal of the Aston Martin Heritage Trust.-See Also:...
, and Motorcycle Consumer News
Motorcycle Consumer News
Motorcycle Consumer News is a monthly periodical offering reviews of motorcycles and other information such as motorcycle safety techniques...
design columnist Glynn Kerr date the Roper later, to 1868, and the AMA
American Motorcyclist Association
The American Motorcyclist Association is an American not-for-profit organization of more than 300,000 motorcyclists that organizes numerous motorcycling activities and campaigns for motorcyclists' legal rights...
Hall of Fame
Motorcycle Hall of Fame
The Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum is an offshoot of the American Motorcyclist Association that recognizes individuals who have contributed to motorcycle sport, motorcycle construction and motorcycling in general. It displays motorcycles and riding gear and memoribilia. The museum is located in...
and author Mick Walker
Mick Walker (motorcycling)
Mick Walker is acknowledged as one of the world's leading motorcycle authorities. Walker is a British former motorcycle dealer and racer with a particular interest in Italian motorcycles, who played a key role in popularizing the Ducati marque in Britain, but is also an expert on numerous other...
have it as 1869. Walker also dates the Michaux-Perraux at 1869, declaring a tie. Louis-Guillaume Perreaux patented his steam velocipede on December 26, 1869, while Roper did not seek patents on any of his steam vehicles, and Daimler took out a patent for his Reitwagen on 29 August 1885. Classic Bike
Classic Bike
Classic Bike is a UK motorcycle magazine. Launched in 1978, it is noted for coverage of all makes of classic motorcycles, including US and Japanese models, and one-off specials. Editor Hugo Wilson, who began riding motorcycles at the age of 11, formerly edited Bike magazine and is the author of...
editor Hugo Wilson says because the Perreaux-Michaux has patents to verify its date, it has a stronger claim on being first than the Roper, even if they both probably appeared in about the same year.
Definition of first motorcycle
The Oxford English DictionaryOxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
and others include having an internal combustion engine as a criterion for a motorcycle. This definition of motorcycle worked for nearly the entire 20th century until electric and diesel motorcycles grew in prominence and were accepted as true motorcycles without question.
A different tack in favor of the internal combustion Reitwagen is that it was the prototype for virtually all successful designs that followed, in so far as the powerplant is concerned. Cameron said, "History follows things that succeed, not things that fail." Design columnist Glynn Kerr, ignoring the Michaux-Perraux altogether and championing the Roper, feels it would be more accurate to call the Daimler Reitwagen, "the predecessor of all gasoline-driven vehicles on land, sea, or air," but not a true motorcycle because it used two outrigger wheels to remain upright and could not lean. Further, Kerr notes the design was not up to the standards Daimler and Maybach's engineering skill, because they had no interest at the time in motorcycles, but only wanted an expedient test bed for their engine, and immediately dropped the Reitwagen in favor of a four wheeled stagecoach, a hot air balloon and a boat for their ongoing research. David Burgess-Wise called the Daimler-Maybach test bed "a crude makeshift", saying that "as a bicycle, it was 20 years out of date."
Development
Pierre Michaux's son Ernest is credited by L. J. K. Setright and David Burgess-Wise as having first fitted the Perreaux patented engine to the velocipede, while Charles M. Falco says it was Louis-Guillaume Perreaux. The Michaux-Perreaux machine was constructed using the first commercially successful pedal bicycle, a boneshaker which Michaux had been building over 400 of annually since 1863, and the single cylinder alcohol fueled Perreaux engine, which used twin flexible leather belt drives to the rear wheel. A steam pressure gauge was mounted in the rider's view above the front wheel, and steam to the cylinder was engaged and regulated with a hand control. The base Michaux velocipede came with a spoon brake but the steam version had no brakes. The engine weighed 62 kg (136.7 lb), and the total weight of the steam velocipede was 87–88 kg (191.8–194 ). A 14 June 1871 addition to Perreaux's patent included the removal of the cranks and pedals from the front wheel, and using an arched instead of straight downtube to allow space for the engine. Although the steam velocipede was functional, it did not have any commercial successors.Only one example of the original 1867–1871 machine was ever made, but by 1884, Perreaux exhibited a tricycle version of his steam velocipede, with two rear wheels and the belt driving the front wheel, at the Industrial Exhibition on the Champs-Élysées
Champs-Élysées
The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is a prestigious avenue in Paris, France. With its cinemas, cafés, luxury specialty shops and clipped horse-chestnut trees, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets and one of the most expensive strip of real estate in the world. The name is...
, Paris. The alcohol fueled engine had a similar bore and stroke to the original, and developed a steam pressure of 3½ atm
Atmosphere (unit)
The standard atmosphere is an international reference pressure defined as 101325 Pa and formerly used as unit of pressure. For practical purposes it has been replaced by the bar which is 105 Pa...
(250 kPa) in its 3 USqt boiler, resulting in a speed of 15 mile per hour. The water tanks were sufficient for two to three hours of operation, resulting in a range of 30–54 mi (48.3–86.9 ).