ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Hotchkiss drive

Okay kiddo, have you ever ridden a bike with gears? When you switch gears, you make it easier or harder to pedal, right? Well, cars work kind of the same way!

In a car, there's a part called the driveshaft that helps transfer the power from the engine to the wheels so the car can move. But how does the driveshaft work?

That's where the Hotchkiss drive comes in! It's a special setup that helps transfer the power from the driveshaft to the back wheels of the car.

Imagine you're playing with Legos. You have two Lego blocks, one big and one small. If you put the big one on top of the small one, and then spin the big one, the small one will spin too! That's kind of like how the Hotchkiss drive works.

The big Lego block is like the driveshaft, and the small one is like a special part called the differential. The differential is what helps the wheels turn at different speeds when you go around corners or curves.

So the driveshaft spins, which makes the differential spin, and then the wheels spin too! And that's how the car moves forward.

The Hotchkiss drive is cool because it's been around for a long time and has helped lots of cars move around. But there are other ways to transfer power to the wheels too, like front-wheel drive, rear-wheel drive, or all-wheel drive. So next time you take a car ride, maybe you can try to spot which one your car has!