The evolution of automobile construction
played a significant role in Buckminster Fuller’s design of the Dymaxion House,
specifically in the fields of available construction systems and materials.
1900: At the beginning of the 20th
century, automobiles were first built entirely out of wood, and soon gained steel body
panels that covered a wooden frame. In the first few years of vehicle
production, the idea of body-on-frame design was introduced, and the machines
were built with a load-bearing wooden chassis that supported all their
mechanical parts, covered with steel sheathing on the exterior. Unlike its
popularity in the Dymaxion House, aluminum was not used in car production until
the end of the 20th century.
Body-on-frame construction was a process in
which a separate body was mounted onto the rigid frame that supported the
vehicle’s working components. Originally, the frames were made out of wood,
commonly ash, but the material was replaced by steel in the 1930s. The frames
in these structures were ladder frames,
not the later monocoque, and differed
from the later development by being made out of numerous wooden parts assembled
together as opposed to a single molded piece of the material. Although not as
strong as the later monocoque, ladder framing had the benefit of easy
part replacement and repair. Monocoque
framing did not appear in the car industry until the 1960s.
1901: Olds
Automobile Factory in Detroit begins to make car
parts for larger vehicle companies, introducing the beginnings of mass
production into the car industry.
1903: The
Electric Ignition System is introduced.
1905-1914: Over the course of World War One, the Brass
Era, also known as the Edwardian Era, of vehicles emerged. Cars were characterized by their front
rear-wheel drive internal combustion engines, sliding gear transmissions, and
less expensive body materials. The covers were known as tonneau, steel hard covers opened by hinges or folding mechanisms.
The systems used in these vehicles may have had an impact on Fuller’s design of
the Dymaion House and his principles of tensegrity and synergetics, as they
enabled leaf springs in a suspensions system to hold the wheels in place.
1905: Safety glass was introduced as a vehicle
material. This may have influenced Fuller’s design of the window’s in his
Dymaxion Houses.
1906: The
Steam Car is developed.
1908: With
their Ford Model T, the vehicle company introduced assembly line
production, replacing the earlier handcrafting methods, and producing the first
ever mass produced car.
The development used
machines more than people in the production of a vehicle for the first time in
history. The vehicle had features like completely interchangeable parts, financially
benefiting middle-class customers. The model also evolved on the suspension
systems used in cars, by including a semi-elliptical spring in the front and
rear axis of the wheel. Again, this most likely affected Buckminster Fuller’s
own developments of a suspended home.
1913: The first moving assembly line for vehicles is developed by Ford.
1911: The car industry moves away from using wood frame
and metal panel structures, and instead turns to wood frame and reinforced
steel construction, producing vehicles with more rigidity. This is named armoured wood construction.
This move towards an entirely metal frame
is reflected in the material’s chosen by Fuller’s design.
1914: All-steel bodies are introduced by Budd Company.
1915: The Unibody
is created. This structure involves body members fashioned into a tubular form
to provide metal rigidity without using an interior frame. It is also referred
to as the Ruler Frameless process.
This development influenced Fuller’s concept of lightweight, self-supportive
structure that did not require any traditional, internal support.
1919-1929: The vehicle market experiences a radical shift in popularity from open to
closed roof cars.
1930: Car manufacturing greatly decreases on account of
the Great Depression. Factories experience an abundance of unsold products,
useless machinery, workers, and materials. Buckminster Fuller’s concept of mass
production was even more grounded with this development, as he now had an
abundance of factories in which his house would be a welcome product to
produce. Also, the extreme low cost of his home greatly appealed to the
majority of the American population, which was now experiencing great poverty.
The Saloon or Sedan body
style becomes the most popularly produced design for many years.
1931: The first modern independent suspension system in wheel design is
created, minimizing road shock and creating a more sturdy, long-lasting
vehicle. In the Dymaxion House, this development can be seen in the suspension
system it uses as well as its impressive weather resistance, which Fuller may
have achieved perhaps by referencing these very developments.
1936: the Rolls-Royce
Phantom III is produced with an aluminum-alloy engine, cylinder banks,
independent front suspension spring-based system, and a carryover
semielliptical sprint rear unit. Both the materials (aluminum) and systems
(suspension) used in this design are reflected in Fuller’s Dymaxion House.
1930-1940: Tempered glass is invented and now used
standardly in car window.
Automobile companies are now used to
produce wartime products like trucks, shells, guns, recoil mechanism, gun
carriages, tractors, and aircraft engines.
This multi-use of a facility pushed
Fuller’s idea of similarly taking advantage of aircraft and vehicle production
lines in order to efficiently produce his own invention.
1950’s: The common car materials of this time were steel (used as a base
material as well as for components like the doors, hood, and rigid frame), chrome
(used for the bezel that encompassed the headlights and the car’s front and
rear bumpers), wood (used mainly in the steering wheel but no longer in the
car’s frame), fiberglass (used as a lightweight alternative to steel), and
safety plate glass (an alternative to earlier window materials, now with a
layer of polyvinyl butyral for added strength).
Fuller was obviously affected by the
materials used in similar industries during his time, in example also using
stainless steel for the construction of his central mast.
1953: Fiberglass
body construction is finally realized on a practical level, with prototypes
dating back to 1938.