Carl Benz's three-wheeled Motorwagen changed shape several times before sale
Carl Benz filed his patent for a motor carriage on 29 January 1886, but the machine in the drawings had already moved on. His three-wheeler kept evolving through at least three stages, and historians now argue the second version, not the first, deserves the title of first practical car.
Benz started work in 1884 and got his prototype moving under its own power in spring 1885. At first it managed only short hops around the factory yard; over that year its range grew until he risked quiet roads and night-time drives. Progress in lawsuits against Nicolaus Otto's four-stroke patent encouraged him to apply for his own, which was granted on 2 November 1886 as DRP37435. The name Patent-Motorwagen now covers the three-wheeled, single-cylinder, belt-driven cars Benz and Cie built from 1885 to 1893.
Around the turn of 1886 he began a new body with wooden wheels and a tougher drivetrain, then moved the engine across from the first machine. This second version, resembling a light horse-drawn gig, had two gears, better brakes, controls all within reach, a lower centre of gravity and iron-tyred wheels, making it far more roadworthy. A local newspaper described it in June 1886, and Benz drove it around Mannheim that summer with his company director beside him.
Sales came next. The first, in 1887, went privately to Émile Roger, a bicycle maker who became his French agent, while Mercedes-Benz dates public production from 1888. That September, Benz and his wife Bertha were pictured motoring around Munich. His memoir later captioned a photo of the first production car with its specifications: 1.5 horsepower, two speeds, roughly 16 kilometres per hour and a price of 3,000 marks. A later version added radiators, and around 1890 a second belt drive and an upright flywheel.
Production of the three-wheeler ended once Benz mastered steering both front wheels and switched to four-wheel models from late 1892. Around 1895 his sales manager rebuilt the original from salvaged parts, and in 1906 that reconstruction went to the Deutsches Museum.
Source: Benz Patent-Motorwagen
