Heated-surface carburetor

A carburetor (American English) or carburettor (British English; see spelling differences) is a device that blends air and fuel for an internal combustion engine in the proper ratio for combustion. It is sometimes colloquially shortened to carb in the UK and North America or carby in Australia. To carburate or carburet (and thus carburation or carburetion, respectively) is to blend the air and fuel or to equip (an engine) with a carburetor for that purpose. A buret or burette is equipment for measuring liquids accurately.

Carburetors have largely been supplanted in the automotive and, to a lesser extent, aviation industries by fuel injection. They are still common on small engines for lawn mowers, rototillers and other equipment.

The word carburetor comes from the French carbure meaning "carbide".Carburer means to combine with carbon (compare also carburizing). In fuel chemistry, the term has the more specific meaning of increasing the carbon (and therefore energy) content of a fluid by mixing it with a volatile hydrocarbon.

The first carburetor was invented by Samuel Morey in 1826.

A carburetor was invented by an Italian, Luigi De Cristoforis, in 1876. Another carburetor was developed by Enrico Bernardi at the University of Padua in 1882, for his Motrice Pia, the first petrol combustion engine (one cylinder, 121.6 cc) prototyped on 5 August 1882.

A carburetor was among the early patents by Karl Benz (1888) as he developed internal combustion engines and their components.

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