Replica of world's first production car goes on display at the German Auto Day

It's called a Benz Patent-Motorwagen, and it will be coming to Canberra for display for the first time in about two decades.

The curious open two-seater machine is a replica because the original from 1886, and regarded as the world's first production car, is far too precious to travel.

This replica is one of 25 cars built to the exact, painstaking specifications as the three-wheeled original, under a Mercedes-Benz apprenticeship program.

The first person to field-test Karl Benz's new contraption, for which he applied German patent number 37435, was his wife, Bertha.

And rightfully so, some would argue, because she financed the project.

With her sons Eugen, 15, and Richard 14, alongside, Bertha Benz drove Patent-Motorwagen Number 3 on its first long distance journey from Mannheim to Heidelberg, stopping off at a pharmacy along the way to purchase a solvent, ligroin, as fuel.

There were a few minor mechanical issues along the 194km round trip but none that could halt the resourceful and indubitable Mrs Benz. At one point she had to clean the carburettor out with her hat pin and use a garter to insulate a wire.

When the brake lining wore down, she asked a shoemaker along the way to nail some leather on the brake blocks.

Canberra Mercedes specialist John Green, who was helped organise the car's display, drove one in Albury some years ago and dips his metaphorical hat to Bertha Benz and her ground-breaking journey.

"It's a shocker to drive," he said.

"There's hardly any suspension travel, the accelerator and brake are on the same lever, the solid rubber tyres have no grip and it wobbles because of the gyro effect from the big horizontal flywheel."

With its single piston engine and tiller steering, the Benz offers an interesting insight into just how much the modern motor car has developed over 133 years.