page_title: Odometer
section_title: Subsequent developments
hierarchical_section_title: Odometer / History / Subsequent developments
caption_attribution_description: English: A Hubodometer on a wheel of a semitrailer. It can measure the running performance of the semitrailer. Deutsch: Nabenodometer an einem Rad eines Sattelaufliegers. Mit ihm kann die Laufleistung des Sattelaufliegers ermittelt werden.
context_page_description: An odometer or odograph is an instrument used for measuring the distance traveled by a vehicle, such as a bicycle or car. The device may be electronic, mechanical, or a combination of the two. The noun derives from ancient Greek ὁδόμετρον, hodómetron, from ὁδός, hodós and μέτρον, métron. Early forms of the odometer existed in the ancient Greco-Roman world as well as in ancient China. In countries using Imperial units or US customary units it is sometimes called a mileometer or milometer, the former name especially being prevalent in the United Kingdom and among members of the Commonwealth.
context_section_description: Odometers were first developed in the 1600s for wagons and other horse-drawn vehicles in order to measure distances traveled.
  Levinus Hulsius published the odometer in 1604 in his work Gründtliche Beschreibung deß Diensthafften und Nutzbahrn Instruments Viatorii oder Wegzählers, So zu Fuß, zu Pferdt unnd zu Fußen gebraucht werden kann, damit mit geringer mühe zu wissen, wie weit man gegangen, geritten, oder gefahren sey: als auch zu erfahren, ohne messen oder zehlen, wie weit von einem Orth zum andern. Daneben wird auch der grosse verborgene Wegweiser angezeiget und vermeldet.
  In 1645, the French mathematician Blaise Pascal invented the pascaline. Though not an odometer, the pascaline utilized gears to compute measurements.  Each gear contained 10 teeth.  The first gear advanced the next gear one position when moved one complete revolution, the same principle employed on modern mechanical odometers.
  Odometers were developed for ships in 1698 with the odometer invented by the Englishman Thomas Savery.  Benjamin Franklin, U.S. statesman and the first Postmaster General, built a prototype odometer in 1775 that he attached to his carriage to help measure the mileage of postal routes.  In 1847, William Clayton, a Mormon pioneer, invented the Roadometer, which he attached to a wagon used by American settlers heading west.  The Roadometer recorded the distance traveled each day by the wagon trains.   The Roadometer used two gears and was an early example of an odometer with pascaline-style gears in actual use.
  In 1895, Curtis Hussey Veeder invented the Cyclometer.  The Cyclometer was a mechanical device that counted the number of rotations of a bicycle wheel.  A flexible cable transmitted the number of rotations of the wheel to an analog odometer visible to the rider, which converted the wheel rotations into the number of miles traveled according to a predetermined formula.
  In 1903 Arthur P. and Charles H. Warner, two brothers from Beloit, Wisconsin, introduced their patented Auto-meter.  The Auto-Meter used a magnet attached to a rotating shaft to induce a magnetic pull upon a thin metal disk.  Measuring this pull provided accurate measurements of both distance and speed information to automobile drivers in a single instrument.  The Warners sold their company in 1912 to the Stewart & Clark Company of Chicago.  The new firm was renamed the Stewart-Warner Corporation. By 1925, Stewart-Warner odometers and trip meters were standard equipment on the vast majority of automobiles and motorcycles manufactured in the United States.
  By the early 2000s, mechanical odometers would be phased out on cars from major manufacturers. The Pontiac Grand Prix was the last GM car sold in the US to offer a mechanical odometer in 2003, the Canadian-built Ford Crown Victoria and Mercury Grand Marquis were the very last Fords sold with one in 2005.
caption: A Hubodometer on a wheel of a semitrailer
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