In the early days of automobile design, none of the standards we’re used to had emerged yet. Most very early cars didn’t have steering wheels; you steered them with a lever, which was called a “tiller.”
English has two “tiller” words. The first has to do with farming; a tiller in that sense is either a person doing some cultivating or the tool they use to do it. That “tiller” comes from the Middle English word “tiliere.” The “tiller” that was once part of cars is newer (late 1300s) but also from Middle English. In those days it meant the steering mechanism for a boat (it still has that meaning), and came from “tieler,” which was originally a part of a loom. It’s not clear why a part of a boat got its name from a part of a loom, but language — particularly English — isn’t required to make sense.
Oddly enough, another word for a part of a car — “brake” — also comes from a kind of a stick or lever. This version of “brake” (there are several other “brakes”) was originally from the Old French word “brac.” “Brac” was a form of “bras” (arm) and meant a lever or a handle. At about the same time “tiller” entered English, “brake” also showed up as the word for a handle that was used somehow in connection with the bridle of a horse. I’m informed that it’s used to tell the horse to slow down and stop. Around the late 1700s somebody (possibly a horse) thought it might also be a good idea for the wagon behind the horse to slow down too. They applied a lever to one of the wheels and since they already had the word “brake”, that’s what they called it. By the time of automobiles, brakes were already in general use on wagons and trains, so it was a natural progression to apply the word to cars as well. But they didn’t work via the foot pedal we’re used to; just like on a wagon, the first automobile brakes were operated by a lever.
The idea of controlling automobile functions with your feet didn’t always occur to the first inventors; most controls were hand-operated. If it was an internal-combustion car, the device that made the engine — and hence the car — go faster was one of them. It wasn’t necessarily a “throttle,” which is the word we used for decades until “accelerator” came into wider use. By the way, one reason for “throttle’s” sagging usage might be technical; most cars haven’t had a device called a “throttle” for a long time.
But in some areas the thing you step on to go faster wasn’t called a throttle or an accelerator; it was called, oddly enough, a “footfeet.” The reason goes back to the early automobiles and their hand controls. One of the ways you’d make those original cars go faster was to control the fuel supply (the “feed”). You’d do this with a lever (or sometimes a knob) operated by hand. Now, there were other controls related to engine speed too; there was the spark timing, which was another lever, and in some cars you could control the flow of the air/fuel mixture (the original “throttle” mechanism). Along with steering, brakes, and the miscellaneous other controls you might need, that was an awful lot for your hands to do all by themselves. So some of the controls began to be designed for your feet. It wasn’t immediately clear which things your feet would be good at, either. On some early cars, the control for the fuel feed was designed as a pedal. So naturally instead of a “hand feed” it was called a “foot feed.” Supposedly, the term sometimes morphed into “footfeet,” which once again makes no sense.
Then there are the words some automobile manufacturers make up for characteristics of their own products. These seldom have any staying power at all; they’re mostly just marketing hype. For instance, Buick-brand cars for many years included completely nonfunctional markings along the side of the hood or front fender — they were supposed to look like (or just suggest) a series of three or four holes on each side, WAY back in the olden days, some cars — especially cars intended to be very fast — vented the engine exhaust that way. But on Buicks it was nothing but a decoration. Every Buick had these marks, though, and they had a name: “ventiports.” Also, if you look at nearly any BMW car, you’ll notice the rearmost window on the side has at its back an upward angle (once you notice this you’ll see it constantly). That angle has a name too, it’s the “Hofmeister kink,“ and BMW designs it into virtually every car they’ve made since 1961. It’s named after the original designer, Wilhelm Hofmeister.
Another detail named after its designer is the “Kammback”. That’s a car design that’s very sleek and aerodynamic until the rear, where it appears to be cut off abruptly. This one is actually functional; it’s based on the work of Wunibald_Kamm, who studied aerodynamics in the 1930s. Kamm discovered that although a long “teardrop” shape produced the least drag, abruptly cutting off the tail of the teardrop shape was very nearly as good; the air continued to flow as if the rest of the structure was still there. And your car didn’t need to be an extra three feet long. The Kammback works so well you can still see it designed into lots of cars today, but the term has nearly disappeared.
