Mission - Manual Transmission
||edHelper's suggested reading level:
||grades 5 to 7
||Flesch-Kincaid grade level:
||crankshaft, disengage, flywheel, gasoline-fueled, gearwheels, indicator, nonmoving, output, self-propelled, tachometer, torque, input, operate, generate, transmit, mechanical
||First Gear, Second Gear, Third Gear, Fourth Gear, Fifth Gear, New York City, Automatic Transmission
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Mission - Manual Transmission
By Trista L. Pollard
1 An automobile's ultimate mission is to use gasoline-fueled mechanical energy to move forward. The engine uses the gasoline to generate the power necessary for a vehicle to move. However, it is the transmission that is responsible for the movement of an automobile's wheels.
2 A transmission is a system of parts that connects the engine to the drive wheels of the vehicle. It helps to transfer torque or turning force from the engine to the wheels. The engine has a crankshaft attached to one end with the other end attached to the wheels of the vehicle. As the engine produces power, the crankshaft rotates. The engine's speed is referred to as crankshaft revolutions per minute. The engine only produces a narrow range of speeds. The wheels of the automobile, however, need to turn over a wider range of speeds. This is the mission of the transmission! As the engine's speed stays constant or the same, it turns an input shaft on the transmission. The torque taken in by the input shaft of the transmission is adjusted as it travels through the output shaft to the wheels. This allows the speed that the wheels turn to be changed depending on the driving conditions (i.e., speed limits, road conditions, etc.). There are two types of transmissions called manual transmission and automatic transmission. For this article we will shift through the world of manual transmissions.
3 Manual transmission began with the first self-propelled vehicles. This type of transmission is the simplest form because the driver controls the change in the vehicle's speed. Manual transmissions have a system of interlocking gearwheels. These toothed wheels transmit motion from one part of a machine to another part of the machine. In this case the gearwheels transmit torque from the engine (the driving part of the vehicle) to the wheels (the driven part of the vehicle). The gearwheels are attached to a stick shift or lever that is operated by the driver. Through the arrangement of these gearwheels, the driver can choose one of many ratios of speeds (the relationship between torque and speed) between the input shaft and the output shaft. The ratios, called gears, range from first gear which gives the lowest output of speed to fifth gear which gives the highest output of speed. Some vehicles, like race cars, may have a sixth gear.
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