Beuchelt & Co.

Beuchelt & Co.
legal form	Owner-managed company
founding	1876
resolution	after 1945
Seat	Grünberg, Silesia
Number of employees	approx. 2000 (1911)
Branch	Bridge building and iron construction

The Beuchelt & Co. company was a German company that manufactured iron structures, bridges , cranes , turntables , railway wagons and automobiles and was based in Grünberg (Silesia) until 1945 .

history

General plan of the factory premises around 1910

On December 1, 1876, the engineers Georg Beuchelt and Albert Ribbeck, who had previously been employed by the Lower Silesian Mechanical Engineering Company, Conrad Schiedt in Görlitz , founded their own company, the Beuchelt u. Co. The company initially had only 20 employees and was involved in the construction of iron bridges. At first, the company grew only slowly, until between 1880 and 1881 a decisive increase to 83 employees took place. As early as 1911, the company had around 2000 employees and had earned a leading position in the ranks of German bridge construction companies. After the First World War, 400 workers had to be laid off as a result of the economic crisis.

In 1945 the company was relocated to Könnern . In the factory building in Grünberg, now called Zielona Góra, the Polish mechanical engineering company WAGMO was founded, which was renamed ZASTAL in 1948. From 1972 the VEB Stahlbrückenbau Könnern was a combine operation of the VEB Autobahnbaukombinat Magdeburg with several operational parts, u. a. in Frankfurt (Oder) .

Business areas

In addition to the business area initially focused only on the construction of bridges and iron structures, other corporate areas such as civil engineering and, from 1886, wagon construction developed over the years. In the years after 1925, vehicle construction was also added.

Bridge and iron construction

Badge with the name of the manufacturer Beuchelt & Co.

In the bridge construction department, both fixed and movable bridges were built according to our own designs. The company acquired special knowledge and qualifications during the construction of swing and bascule bridges for a wide variety of systems. By 1925, the company had built 403 bridges within the imperial borders , 42 of them over the Oder alone . So z. B. the Kaiserbrücke in Breslau , the Werderbrücke Nord in Breslau , the Oderbrücken in Stettin. Beuchelt also built individual bridges abroad and in the German colonies.

In addition to iron constructions such as platform halls and industrial buildings, the participation in the construction of the bridge construction of the Niederfinow ship lift should also be emphasized. Another production branch dealt with the construction of turntables and transfer platforms.

Civil engineering

The civil engineering department was founded as a logical addition to bridge construction. The main focus was on pillar foundations for bridge construction. As a specialty, this was carried out with compressed air ( compressed air foundation ). Foundation depths of up to 21 meters were reached.

Lowering of the pillars using compressed air

The advantage of the process was based on the fact that the main body was built above water and then lowered using compressed air. This allowed the building site to be inspected and examined. Pillar foundations according to this method were z. B. at the Oder bridges in Stettin, the Rendsburg high bridge and the old Holtenau high bridge over the Kiel Canal and the Rhine bridge near Wesel.

Wagon construction

From 1886 Beuchelt & Co. built railroad cars, including custom-made ones. Since the existing departments were mainly concerned with metal construction, it made sense to first deal with the construction of wagons with iron bodies . Very soon, however, the construction of closed and open freight cars and baggage cars with wooden car bodies was added. From 1890 the first passenger cars were also manufactured. This was accompanied by the expansion of the production facilities with an enlargement of the assembly halls and the construction of a saddlery and a large sawmill. In 1900 the first orders for express train wagons were acquired from the Prussian State Railways. As a result, Beuchelt's products also found buyers abroad, including the Turkish Empire, Austria, Italy, Denmark and other customers in Asia and Africa. Numerous deliveries were also made to the German colonies in Africa.

vehicle construction

Between 1925 and 1926, under the name Sablatnig-Beuchelt (in cooperation with the aviation pioneer Joseph Sablatnig produced a 6/30 hp car) with its engine from 1500 cc displacement , a power of 30 hp gave (22 kW).

Product gallery

Some samples are shown here as examples of the company's products. They come from the books on contemporary German railways in the 1911 edition.

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  Bridge of Swinemünderstr. via Gesundbrunnen train station, Berlin

• 

  Kaiserbrücke over the Oder in Breslau, span 126 meters

• 

  Queen Luise Bridge over the Memel in Tilsit

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  6-axle express train wagon, KPEV type Ia 6 (S3)

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  iron hinged lid wagon of the KPEV for transporting carcasses

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  Revision car of the German East Africa Railway

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  Bogie for 4-axle wagons

literature

• Hof: The German railway system of the present . Reimar Hobbing, Berlin 1911.
• Hof, Krumbier, Anger: The German Railway System of the Present . Reimar Hobbing, Berlin 1923.
• Werner Oswald : German Cars 1920–1945 . 10th edition. Motorbuch Verlag Stuttgart, (1996), ISBN 3-87943-519-7 , p. 455
• Z dziejów firmy Beuchelt & Co. Lebuser Landesmuseum Grünberg (Polish)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} The German railway system of the present . Hobbing Verlag, Berlin 1911, p. 263
2. ^ The new Werder Bridge in Breslau . In: Ostdeutsche Bauzeitung . tape 4 , no. 2 , January 6, 1906, p. 5-6 ( bibliotekacyfrowa.pl ).
3. ^ The German railway system of the present. Reimar Hobbing, Berlin 1911, p. 262.
4. ^ The German railway system of the present. 1923, p. 374 ff.
5. ^ The German railway system of the present . Hobbing Verlag, Berlin 1911, p. 262 f.