Engine
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A car's traditional engine burns fuel (usually petrol or diesel) to make power. In the pictures here, the engine is the vertical silver part.
Power produced twists one end of a shaft, like a ship's propeller used to drive it through water. The shaft here is also silver. The other end of that shaft joins to the driving wheels. When these turn, tyres on them "drag the road under the car", moving it forward. |
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Between engine and driving wheels are a clutch ( = a link, which allows the front part of the shaft to keep turning if the rear part stops), and some gears ( = a set of cogs like a bike's, to change how fast the rear half turns when the front half turns). Starving an engine of fuel makes it run slower, hence acting like a brake.
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