We want to see the car under certain other aspects than the pure technology. For example only in individual cases, how fast it is. Then not the engine power would be interesting for us, but perhaps a certain aesthetics of the body shape, which more or less harmonizes with low air resistance.

It is difficult to determine from when a car has a value, which goes far beyond the actual transport task of a vehicle. Was it there already when the car was not even a car, but a drawn sled? Or has the invention of the wheel probably 3000 BC. given it this value?

He was certainly already in the carriage time. As otherwise, e.g. golden coaches were to be explained? And as soon as the car turned away from the pure purpose form it was not only with four wheels, at least two of which were driven. This factor has contributed to the fact that initially only rich people could afford a car.

We want to try to trace the reasons why hundreds of thousands pay at various trade fairs in order to be able to walk past exhibited old cars. Actually an absurdity: One moves, the car stands.

In doing so, we deliberately limit ourselves to motor vehicles, which are looking for their way on land, only briefly to water and even shorter in the air. Wheels should keep contact with the road, only in very rare cases skids up front. However, these do not always have to forward the vehicle. This can, in rare cases, also be done by jets.

We will begin with the year of the invention of the first automobile in 1886. It is sometimes possible to return back to the carriage time. Let's give it a certain time of consolidation and then ask ourselves if there are similarities between the products of different manufacturers. For the question will be whether the co-architects, who were not specified as designers at that time, were able to assert themselves against technicians and bean counters.

However, we do not underestimate the function of the latter. They do not put the remaining profit into their own pocket, worry themselves in principle around all the employees. The world is full of offers that almost nobody wants to make use of. This in turn leads to waste of resources.

Because we are just talking about wasting. This also affects the amount of energy the car itself needs in order to move. Even if the industry is concerned with efficiency in this area. With the transport organized by humans themselves on a light bike, a car will never be able to compete.

The first implication of the importance of the motor vehicle beyond the pure transport task is shown by e.g. the concept of 'vehicle design'. The 'figure' is in contrast to the 'design' asssined to the human beings. One also likes to speak of the headlights as the 'eyes' of the car. Some vehicles receive human names from their owners.

Designers often speak of what is sensually perceptible. In itself no unreasonable desire. But the human senses include not only seeing, hearing and feeling but also smelling and even tasting. Clearly, there are designers which exaggerate the importance of virtues not directly related to the transportation task.

Here a form is described as 'aesthetic', probably reflecting that here not only possible beauty, but also striking ugliness can prevail. 'Aesthetic' is all that 'moves the senses'. And if we denote the values in 'value creation' as ideal, then a car is the right addressee?

Since only the material value added can be meant, which equates the sale of automobiles with that of furniture or garden tools. We promise each other, in the course of this book to abandon unnecessary and partly even false exaggerations, but rather to question them critically.

Does the underlying transport task affect the design? Absolutely yes. A single-seater racing car (Monoposto) looks different than a box wagon. Is the duration of the transport task of similar importance? Rather not. There is much evidence that the durability within groups of vehicles is approaching each other. There is no car available only for the city.

And what about the speed of transport? In principle, there are outliers upwards thinkable only in case of the railroad. The ordinary land vehicle sneaks up often with truck speed across the highway, glad enough to be able to hold it. Example USA: Here the trucks are often among the fastest, even without traffic jam.

And are transport tasks more commercial or private? A traffic jam on the autobahn on the highway at Saturdays suggests the latter. Also the fact that the cockpits of light commercial vehicles earlier aggravating the driving now look similar to those of normal passenger cars. Even with these cars, driving seems to be fun.

Is the car more and more important? Rather no. For the older generation it retains this, while the younger one is clearly turning to the virtual transport. Clearly, for some, the self-propelled vehicle, at that time slowly spreading out, was something special. The younger ones use a car more or less like a washing machine.

There are still launderettes. Thus, the car, which is only rented for a short time, has a chance, especially with the ease of operation of the virtual world. And here the importance of the car, which goes beyond the pure transport task, slowly disappears.

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