Hermann Föttinger

Hermann Föttinger (9 February 1877 in Nuremberg – 28 April 1945 in Berlin) was a German engineer and inventor. In the course of his life he submitted over 100 patent applications, but he is most notable for inventing fluid coupling.

Career

From 1895 to 1899 Hermann Föttinger studied electrical engineering at the Technical University of Munich.

AG Vulcan Stettin

From 1904 he worked as a chief designer in the shipyard AG Vulcan Stettin. He was responsible for the introduction and testing of new steam turbines. During this time he developed the fluid coupling consisting of a pump and a turbine in a unit that in further development resulted in the automatic automobile transmission.

Technische Hochschule in Danzig

In 1909 he obtained a position at the Technische Hochschule in Danzig where he started the institute for fluid dynamics technology.

Technische Hochschule Berlin

In 1924 he took up a position as head of the current department of physics and turbines at Technische Hochschule Berlin (now Technische Universität Berlin). Here he remained until his death from grenade fragments in April 1945.

Achievements

Fluid dynamics

Föttinger laid the basis of the fluid dynamics from Euler over Rankine and Hermann von Helmholtz to its current uses in the boundary layer of airplane wings and propulsion theory.

Railcars

Together with Franz Kruckenberg he started the Flugbahn-Gesellschaft mbH to develop the Schienenzeppelins (railroad cars).

Internal combustion engines

Föttinger's patents for internal combustion engines include:

• US1636050, Device for damping the oscillations of multiple crank shafts^[1]
• US2244453, Scavenging of two-stroke cycle internal combustion engines^[2]

Literature

• Hans Jürgen Reuß: ' 'Hermann Föttinger' '. In: Journal (2008) internationally maritime HANSA, 6, S.  58-59. Hamburg: Navigation publishing house "Hansa" C. Schroedter & Co. (Gmbh & Co. KG), 2008.

References

1. "Espacenet - Original document". Worldwide.espacenet.com. 1927-07-19. Retrieved 2014-07-19.
2. "Espacenet - Original document". Worldwide.espacenet.com. 1941-06-03. Retrieved 2014-07-19.

External links

• http://www.hfi.tu-berlin.de/Foettinger/Projekte/SVT137155/svt137155.pdf^{[permanent dead link‍]} description of SVT 137 155
• Hermann Föttinger in the German National Library catalogue
• Georg Schnadel (1961), "Hermann Föttinger", Neue Deutsche Biographie (in German), vol. 5, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 283–284
• detailed representation Föttingers life and creating Archived 2009-03-24 at the Wayback Machine the institute for current mechanics and technical acoustics of the TU Berlin, ehem. Hermann-Föttinger-institute for current mechanics
• in/volltexte/2008/2012/html/festschrift/foettinger.htm biography in the commemorative volume ' '125 years Technische Universität Berlin' '^{[permanent dead link‍]}