Hybrids, alternative fuel, diagnostic scanners with your laptop, chip mods & navigation are what’s hot right now in automobile high-tech

Over 100 years ago, the birth of the automobile began when Nicolaus August Otto invented the first gasoline powered engine in 1876. The invention would lead Gottlieb Daimler to revolutionize the design in 1885 and Karl Benz in that same year would patent the world’s first automobile.

John Lambert would then launch his three wheel motor buggy in 1891, and bicycle manufacturers Charles and Frank Duryea would be the first to commercially manufacture four wheel automobiles in 1896.

With the success of his $950 1908 Model T, by 1914, Henry Ford would revolutionize the assembly line, mass producing complete chassis every 93 minutes. In 2006, automobile manufacturers, including Ford Motor Companies, are striving to perfect and mass produce alternative fuel engines to break America’s oil “addiction” and forever transform the combustion engine. Technology is changing the automobile.

Proof that a single invention can give rise to an entire industry is well demonstrated through the innovation that for over a century has been rooted in the automobile. It has changed how we live, work, and play; how we fight wars, construct cities, and how we travel. However, as we have also found, the source, process, and expense of obtaining gasoline itself has substantial, global political and economic impact. Yet, the closest boom to that of the age of Edison, Bell, Fleming, and Ford since has been the Technological Revolution and the ensuing dawn of the Information Age. Though the internet and personal computer may not impact our lives as fundamentally as the electric light bulb, telephone, penicillin, or automobile, it is within all likelihood that they have critical impact on the production and advancement of each of those industries today.

And the Revolution is still ongoing! Technology has changed how we do business, the speed of communication, and how we invent. No longer are pencils, paper, protractors, and rulers commonplace for the birth of new ideas. Rather, a keyboard, monitor, computer, and CAD systems have become tools of the trade.

Even as Simon Cowell’s American Inventor is averaging 14 million viewers and yielding such inventions as the “Sit and Shave” and “Tillow”, a new generation of inventors are using technology to create home automation, VoIP, and to decode the human genome. They also have set their sights on the automobile. Consider the many inventions that affect the automobile to date. Computerized fuel injection systems have replaced the carburetor, navigation systems have replaced maps, and our radios are tuned via iPods and satellites.

In the search for alternative fuels, inventors are trying compressed air, liquid nitrogen, alcohol, battery-electric, natural gas, solar power, hybrid technologies, biodiesel, hydrogen, and yes, even steam.

Hybrid automobiles that have thus far reached the consumer market include, among a growing variety, the popular Toyota Prius and Honda Insight, which are propelled by a combination of gasoline and batteries. Though touted for their fuel efficiency they are lambasted for their lack of power and differential maintenance costs across the life of the vehicle, and despite budding public embrace, they have proven little affect on SUV sales.

Still, a positive indicator that the commitment to identifying alternative fuel sources is indeed a priority is demonstrated in the millions of gallons of biodiesel fuel that has been consumed by the U.S. military for operational use in Iraq and Afghanistan (www.wired.com/news/technology/0,68969-0.html).

Nevertheless, it is hydrogen fuel cell technology that garners the most optimistic press (www.car anddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=19& article_id=4185), championed by California “Governator” Arnold Schwarzenegger and the automobile industry alike despite already existing controversy as to direction and infrastructure, frequency of topical mention bodes well for the cause of alternative fuels (www.motherjones.com/news/outfront/2003/05/ma_375_01.html). Meanwhile, car technology in the hands of the consumer has found a new breed of “gear head” who with an OBD-II scanner (www.autotap.com) in hand and management software on their laptops (www.drivewire.com/PerformanceParts/aem/toyotaelectronics. html), can tap into their car’s onboard computer, adjust the timing, fuel injection, and even decode that pesky Check Engine light. With a Palm adaptation or a PC-based version of AutoTap’s OBD-II diagnostic scanner software, users can use their laptops to interface with car computer systems, view a dashboard console, and drill down into real-time sensor data.

With separate model specific management software, performance settings can be tuned and in the event of mistake, restored to a backup set of programming instructions or default factory settings. In fact, in-car technologies are becoming so sophisticated that after market upgrades even include chip mods (http://performance.drivewire.com/enginemanagement/computerchip.html) that can increase horsepower!

Combine all of this techno know-how with your choice of navigation, entertainment systems, a dose of mobile internet, Bluetooth cell phone integration, mobile internet, and drive-by-wire technology for electronic brake and transmission control (http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Drive_by_wire); and when powered by a hybrid engine that retains sufficiently respectable speeds to earn the love car enthusiasts, the automobile is a merely a deflector shield and warp drive away from science fiction. Driving will never be the same.