Hans Hörbiger
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Han(n)s Hörbiger (29 November 1860 – 11 October 1931) was an Austrian engineer from Vienna with roots in the Tyrol. He took part in the construction of the Budapest subway and in 1894 invented a new type of valve essential for compressors still in widespread use today.
1894: Hanns Hörbiger, a young engineer from Vienna, who was interested in a great variety of things, had an idea for a new design of blast furnace blowing engine: he replaced the old and susceptible leather flap valves with a steel valve. Opening and closing automatically, light and frictionless guided, the disk valve eliminated all the drawbacks of previous valve designs.
Hanns Hörbiger registered his idea for patent; thus making a decisive contribution to the development of the modern industrial society. His valve smoothed the way for efficient steel production and greater productivity in mining. High-pressure chemistry and the global network of gas exchange – none of these would be possible without the HOERBIGER valve.
In 1900, Hanns Hörbiger and the engineer Friedrich Wilhelm Rogler founded an engineer’s office in Budapest; this was moved to Vienna in 1903. By 1925 it had developed into the HOERBIGER & CO trading company. Alfred Hörbiger, one of Hörbiger’s sons, joined the company in 1925 and assumed the management. Hanns Hörbiger devoted himself to scientific study until his death in 1931.
The company developed rapidly under Alfred Hörbiger’s management: a production facility was taken into service in Vienna and an affiliated company was set up in Düsseldorf. HOERBIGER expanded into England and concluded numerous licensing agreements with leading manufacturers of piston blowers, compressors and ships’ diesel engines in Europe and North America.
The success was driven by originality and inventive genius. The disk valve became more sophisticated: HOERBIGER developed highlift or high-pressure valves, compressor control systems and damper plates. By 1937, 98 percent of production was destined for export. The name HOERBIGER had become a dependable trademark in valve and control technology for compressors.
He was the earliest advocate of the pseudoscientific Welteislehre theory, putting the idea forward in his 1913 book Glazial Kosmologie. The book later served as inspiration for an SS-Ahnenerbe-institute headed by Hans Robert Scultetus to investigate.
The Deslandres crater on the moon was named Hörbiger for him, until it was renamed under 1942 conventions.
Hörbiger's theories were popularized in the middle of the 20th century as the core subject of the writings of H.S. Bellamy.
