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History of Technology 2: Wheels and Axels 367 Views


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Description:

Without wheels and axles, we'd be picking up our cars and running to work like Fred Flintstone. Which...come to think of it, would be a great arm day workout...

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:03

Those early log rolling techniques were pretty impressive for [caveman log rolling]

00:06

the time but let's get real nobody's going to ship goods across the continent

00:10

on a pile of rolling logs talk about splinters.. well in order to make a

00:15

transportation revolution happen people had to invent actual wheels and axles to us [man displaying the invention of the wheel to cavemen]

00:22

that sounds like no big deal because well wheels are a dime a dozen

00:24

seriously try to imagine a world without wheel it's tough and you know half 5[car driving by a quiet road]

00:30

traffic is even worse well when people invented boats they were copying

00:34

floating logs on the river there aren't any natural wheels out in the wild to a [Wheel floating out on a river]

00:39

copycat the wheel was a huge leap of imagination that may have started with

00:44

the lowly pottery wheel which even then was known to attract the ghosts of [Demi Moore using a pottery wheel]

00:48

former loved ones who still wanted to you know make out especially if that

00:53

loved one was some ancestor of Patrick Swayze even though after we got our

00:57

pottery game going it was another huge leap to think of turning a pottery wheel [Man using a pottery wheel to move a cow]

01:01

on its side, hitching it to a cow and going out for a spin.. Moo. The earliest

01:07

evidence of wheels and wagons comes from a few ancient scattered drawings a word [Evidence of wheels drawn on ancient clay tablet]

01:12

on an ancient clay tablet and some ancient ruts in an ancient road the key

01:17

word here is ancient people agree that wagons came into practical use in

01:21

modern-day Iraq around 3500 BCE the arrangement of wheel axle wagon is so [wagon wheels in Iraq 3,500 BCE]

01:27

complicated that most people don't think it was stumbled upon accidentally all

01:32

over the world more likely that one group of people came up with a wagon and [Group of people riding in a wagon pulled by a camel in the desert]

01:36

then everyone else was like man i gotta get me one of those things and

01:40

it was a great time to be a used wagon salesman all right well the exception is

01:44

the core isolated new world. People in the America's has also invented the wheel but

01:50

it was only used for children's toys and little clay figures and a bummer they [Child playing with a clay figure on a dusty road]

01:54

could have been contenders so what did ancient wagon wheels look like not like

01:59

a little red wagon at the city park that's for sure [A red wagon at the city park]

02:02

in fact that little red wagon would have looked like a Ferrari compared to the

02:06

earliest versions.. well the very first wagons had long poles for axles and they [An old-styled axles wagon]

02:12

poke through holes in the center of the wheel i know there were a few problems but

02:16

the wheels had to fit loosely over the axles because the axle didn't turn and the [Boy falls out of a wagon and lands on the concrete]

02:21

wheel just you know kind of rattled around it and there was a lot of

02:25

friction so the raw wood deteriorated pretty quickly [Wheel falling off the wagon]

02:29

plus it was super annoying to keep making axles over and over again and

02:33

turning around corners was really hard too - okay well there were more than a few

02:37

problems well over the next few thousand years wagons and wheels both evolved

02:42

wheels with spokes appeared around 1900 BCE in Egypt someone must've asked why [Wheels with spokes on a map of Egypt]

02:48

why does the wheel have to be huge solid and heavy and someone else must have said

02:53

uhh, it doesn't ..but much later iron bands were stretched around the modern wheel to [iron bands stretched around the wheels]

02:59

make them stronger and more durable axles became jointed so we could actually turn

03:03

the thing and at long last we could you know Tokyo Drift that's the real [Horse pulling a wagon and drifting around a corner]

03:10

blessing here

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