Love ‘em, hate ‘em, the world wouldn’t turn without ‘em! Let’s see what you know about one of the most important types of tech out there… Will you pop a tyre or can you vroom into a drive out of five? Or six – we like cars so much we dropped in a bonus question!
#1. Bertha Benz completed the first ever cross-country road trip, driving the world’s first modern car. When did her 105-kilometre road trip happen?
Bertha Benz completed her record-breaking road trip in August 1888, just two years after her husband Karl Benz developed the first modern automobile. Bertha did the road trip without telling Karl!
#2. Which car maker is famous for deciding that workers should only work for eight hours a day, and only five days per week?
Believe it or not, but people used to work 70-hour workweeks in the mid-1800s! In 1926, Henry Ford instituted the 5-day, 40-hour workweek and because his company employed so many workers, the practice became much more common.
#3. True or false? Like petrol cars, hybrid cars have an internal combustion engine.
True. Both petrol and hybrid cars have an internal combustion engine to convert the chemical energy stored in fossil fuels into moving (kinetic) energy. Petrol cars and some hybrids use that energy to turn the wheels, but some hybrids use it to power an electric generator and drive using electric motors!
#4. Which of the following is a myth about fully electric vehicles (EVs)?
EVs don’t emit greenhouse gases directly but they do need to get electricity from somewhere. Almost everywhere in the world, some of this electricity comes from power plants burning fossil fuels. Plus, it still takes fossil fuels to make a new car – from mining and refining metals, making plastic, and putting it all together.
#5. Which of the following teamed-up tech companies are developing self-driving cars?
All of these are famous tech teams competing to create the first cars that can drive without any human assistance. Other famous self-driving car companies include Tesla, General Motors, Ford, Nissan and Mercedes-Benz. It’s quite the race!
#6. Which of the following car safety features became common first?
Brake lights have been part of cars for almost 100 years – before that, drivers used hand signals to tell people that they were slowing down! Seatbelts started to appear in the 1950s, and wearing them became the law in 1971. Reversing cameras and lane departure warning systems only became common in the last 15-20 years.
Results
Congratulations! You are a real science whiz!
Oh dear! Better brush up before the next quiz!
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