The world of motoring is hurtling headlong into a bright new future of all-electric, automated, connected technology - and Marty McFly is not behind the wheel! But what were the cars that were ‘back to the future’ of years gone by?

There have been many different trailblazing motors which were seen by the critics to be ahead of their time, and in this series, we will investigate and showcase many of the best in class.

Daimler Motorised Carriage

Though Karl Benz is largely credited as producing the world’s first production car way back in 1886, two other household motoring names were also pursuing their vision of a future for motor-driven carriages - Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach.

The two German engineers had worked across a range of companies and came together at Cologne’s Deutz-AG-Gasmotorenfabrik, an engine manufacturer. Daimler was fired from the company in 1880 and from this point on formed a partnership with Maybach.

Unbeknownst to Daimler and Maybach, across Germany, Karl Benz had produced his own patent for an internal combustion engine in 1878, but the three visionaries worked independent of each other’s plans and though Daimler and Maybach worked on a two-wheel motorcycle, and later added the engine to a stagecoach, which was shown to the public in 1886, Benz had beaten them to the punch having built and tested a motorwagon in 1885 and thus was awarded the patent as the first true automobile.

Though Daimler and Maybach’s engine driven stagecoach was not actually classified as an automobile, however, Benz’s innovative trailblazer only had three wheels, so there was some work to be done to decide who would build the world’s first four wheel car.

Daimler and Maybach adapted their engine to a boat named the Neckar in 1889 and then built the first four wheel classification automobile which was presented to the public in Paris in 1889.

In 1890 the Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft (DMG) company was formed and the first Daimler Motorised Carriage was sold in 1892.

Both Daimler and Maybach are recognised today with their names attached to the highest luxury car designs on the market.

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