De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile manufacturer and railcar manufacturer, which operated from 1883 to 1953. The company was founded by the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton, and Bouton's brother-in-law Charles Trépardoux.
Steam cars
The company was formed in 1883 after de Dion saw a toy locomotive in a store window in 1881 and asked the toymakers to build another. Engineers Bouton and Trépardoux had been eking out a living with scientific toys at a shop in the Passage de Léon, near the rue de la Chapelle in Paris. Trépardoux had long dreamed of building a steam car, but neither he nor Bouton could afford it.
De Dion, already inspired by steam in the form of railway locomotives, and with ample money, agreed to back them, and De Dion, Bouton et Trépardoux was formed in Paris in 1883. That became the De Dion-Bouton automobile company, the world's largest automobile manufacturer for a time, well-known for the quality, reliability, and durability of their vehicles.
Before 1883 was over, the company had set up shop in larger premises in the Passage de Léon, Paris, tried and dropped steam engines for boats, and produced a steam car. With the boiler and engine mounted at the front, driving the front wheels by belts and steering with the rear, it burned to the ground on trials. A second, La Marquise, was built the next year, with a more conventional steering and rear-wheel drive, capable of seating four.
The Marquis de Dion entered one of them in an 1887 trial, "Europe's first motoring competition", the brainchild of one M. Fossier of cycling magazine Le Vélocipède. Evidently, the promotion was insufficient, because De Dion was the sole entrant. It completed the course, with de Dion at the tiller, and was clocked at . That figure must be viewed with considerable care, because the first official land speed record, set in 1898, was . The vehicle survives, is in road-worthy condition, and has been a regular entry in the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run.
Following that singular success, the company offered steam tricycles, with boilers between the front wheels and two-cylinder engines. They were built in small numbers, and were evidently a favorite of young playboys. They were later joined by a larger tractor, able to pull trailers (sometimes called a "steam drag"). That larger vehicle introduced the so-called De Dion or "dead" axle. An axle beam carried the weight of the vehicle with the non-weight-bearing driveshafts or drive chains articulated separately alongside it.
On 22 July 1894, during the Paris–Rouen race, it averaged over the 126 km (78 mi) route, but was disqualified because it needed both a driver and a stoker.
Two more cars were made in 1885, followed by a series of lightweight two-cylinder tricars which, from 1892, had Michelin pneumatic tyres. In 1893, steam tractors were introduced which were designed to tow horse-drawn carriages for passengers or freight (sometimes called "steam drags") which used an innovative axle design that became known as the De Dion tube, where the location and drive function of the axle are separated.
The company manufactured steam buses and trucks until 1904. Trépardoux, a staunch supporter of steam, resigned in 1894 as the company turned to internal combustion vehicles. However, the steam car remained in production more or less unchanged for ten years more.
Internal combustion engines
Tricycles
By 1889, de Dion was becoming convinced the future lay in the internal combustion engine, and the company had built a ten-cylinder two-row rotary engine. After Trépardoux resigned in 1894, the company became De Dion, Bouton et Compagnie. For 1895, Bouton created a new one-cylinder engine with trembler coil ignition. Proving troublesome at its designed speed of 900 rpm (throwing bearings and running rough), when Bouton increased the revs, the problems vanished. In trials, it achieved an unprecedented 3500 rpm, and was usually run at 2,000 rpm, a limit imposed by its atmospheric valves and surface carburettor. Inlet and exhaust valves were overhead, and a flywheel was fitted to each end of the crankshaft.
This engine was fitted behind the rear axle of a tricycle frame bought from Decauville, fitted with the new Michelin pneumatic tires. It showed superb performance, and went on the market in 1896 with the engine enlarged to 1¼ CV (horsepower) (932 W) , with 1¾ CV (1.3 kW) in 1897. By the time production of the petite voiture tricar stopped in 1901, it had 2¾ CV (2 kW), while racers had as much as 8 CV (6 kW).
In 1898, Louis Renault had a De Dion-Bouton modified with fixed drive shaft and ring and pinion gear, making "perhaps the first hot rod in history".