The innovators: air-conditioning
The cars we drive today were influenced by these pioneers
First vehicle to feature air-conditioning Packard One-eighty 1940
While the invention of a condenser pump-driven air-con can be traced back to 1902, its mobile application happened surprisingly recently. Detroit automaker Packard rst shoehorned a primitive air-con into a 1939 One-twenty sedan to better equip its closed-bodied cars for hot-weather conditions.
It was the following year that a more re ned system was offered as an aftermarket option on the One-eighty. The cars were sent to Bishop & Babcock Co. of Cleveland, Ohio, which installed the system into the rear luggage compartment.
It did a good job of transforming the One-eighty’s cabin from a stultifying summer greenhouse but Packard’s Weather Conditioner system was not without some glaring issues. Firstly, its installation was complex and involved the tment of a condenser behind the existing radiator and a good deal of plumbing to channel the cool air from the front of the car to the blower unit at the back. This made it prohibitively expensive, sometimes adding up to a third of the vehicle’s price, and the blower unit’s location in the rear luggage compartment took a big bite out of boot space. Then there was the issue of the vent’s location on the parcel shelf that blasted the rear occupants’ scalps with icy air.
Far from today’s simple push-button systems, turning off the Weather Conditioner system required a decent amount of expert spanner-work. Because the compressor was powered by an engine-fed drive pulley, it could never be completely switched off; any movement of the car saw cold air ltering into the cabin. This arrangement – along with the lack of a thermostat and shut-off mechanism – meant that to switch the system off, the compressor’s drive pulley had to be physically disconnected from the engine. Later systems bypassed this issue by utilising a series of electrically operated clutches to engage and disengage the pulley feed.
It never gained traction with customers as a result of these compromises and was ultimately dropped in 1942, returning only in a more re ned version in 1953-model year Packards and proliferating across a number of America’s big carmakers.
It’s a far cry from today’s systems that are voice activated, integrated into the seats and waft occupants with hints of sandalwood and patchouli...