David Shearer designs and builds Australia's first motor car – steam-powered – at Mannum, South Australia, 1890s

David Shearer's steam-driven motor car, invented and built at Mannum, South Australia, the mid 1890s.
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia

David Shearer designed and built Australia’s first motor car. A blacksmith and farm machinery maker with his brother John at Mannum on the River Murray, Shearer began working day and night in 1894 on his “horseless carriage” powered by steam with mallee wood firing the engine. It was driven in 1897 with the world’s first differential.

Shearer got special permission for his “automobile” to be driven in Adelaide city streets in 1900 when he brought it to the Adelaide Chamber of Manufacturers Exhibition.

Shearer’s vehicle travelled at 15 miles an hour, faster than England’s first car two years later that reached 10-12 mph.

Shearer wasn’t interested in making cars. He just wanted to prove the horseless carriage was workable. After his success, he returned to making agricultural machinery.

After early experience in blacksmithing and wagon building, David joined his brother in 1877 in making farm implements. The Shearers were invited to Mannum where the farmers needed tough equipment to clear land covered with mallee and pine.

The Shearers came up with rugged machines – adding stump jump ploughs to the grubbing machines, fixed ploughs, scarifiers and harrows – that found a ready market in the district and other parts of South Australia.

In 1888, they invented a virtually unbreakable wrought steel plough share at one quarter the price of the old forged share. These shares swept Australia in popularity and saved farmers millions in plough-share costs.

By 1895, the Shearers expanded their business but kept improving to produce a popular lighter, stronger stripper with a wider cut in 1902. The steam car project was just a background to all this. 

Shearer's restored car became an exhibit at the National Motor Museum in Birdwood, South Australia.