Christian Hülsmeyer

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Christian Hülsmeyer (born December 25, 1881 in Eydelstedt , Lower Saxony , † January 31, 1957 in Ahrweiler ) was a German entrepreneur and inventor. He is considered the inventor of the radar .

biography

Hülsmeyer was born as the youngest of five children of Johann Heinrich Ernst Hülsmeyer and Elisabeth Wilhelmine Brenning. He attended the village school; his teacher recognized his talent and from 1896 made it possible for him to study at the Bremen teachers' college ; his career aspiration was a teacher.

First experiments on electromagnetic waves

Hülsmeyer was interested in physics , especially in Heinrich Hertz's research on electromagnetic waves . During experiments with Hertz's mirror experiments in the physics hall of the teachers' seminar in Bremen, he came up with a groundbreaking idea for the development of radar technology: he discovered that electrical waves emitted by a transmitter and reflected from metal surfaces can be used to detect distant metallic objects - his ships were of particular interest. He experimented and developed the theory that electrical waves are reflected back from metallic surfaces. His plan was to invent a system that would send and receive waves, for example to determine the position of ships or trains.

In 1899 he left school and started an apprenticeship at Siemens-Schuckert in Bremen .

Development of the telemobiloscope from 1902

In 1902 Hülsmeyer moved to Düsseldorf , where he continued to develop his system. To finance his plans, he founded the "Telemobiloskop-Gesellschaft Hülsmeyer und Mannheim" with his partner and financier Heinrich Mannheim and 5,000 Reichsmarks as start-up capital on May 5, 1904. With the money he was able to build the necessary equipment. He called his invention "Telemobiloskop": system for the detection of distant moving objects. On April 30, 1904, he applied for a patent for his invention in Germany.

On May 18, 1904, Hülsmeyer demonstrated his invention to a curious crowd under the cathedral bridge (popularly known as the mousetrap ) in Cologne. He set up his device there on the bank, which sent electric waves up to three kilometers into the water. When a ship approached, was caught by the waves and threw them back, a bell rang as confirmation in the receiver and a device called a compass could show the direction from which the ship was coming, comparable to a panoramic display. This would also have been possible at a location remote from the device, such as the ship's bridge.

On June 10, 1904, he presented his invention at congresses in Rotterdam and showed his system to the directors of international shipping lines in the port. However, it met with little interest, although the press even as far as the USA reported in detail about the successful demonstration. Hülsmeyer improved the performance of his system and even planned a range of up to 10,000 meters. In the autumn of 1904, however, the telemobiloscope is said to have not behaved as expected during a supplementary demonstration in the Netherlands. His hope of selling the telemobiloscope as a safety system to avoid ship collisions was therefore not fulfilled. Although such clashes were common, neither the shipbuilding industry, the newly emerging radio industry, shipping lines, nor the Imperial Navy were interested in his invention. The Navy's reasoning was that steam whistles could be heard over a greater distance than ships could be detected by the 'telemobiloscope'. The newly founded company Telefunken also announced on August 21, 1905 that it saw no possibility of using the patent. He spent a total of 25,000 Reichsmarks on development, patenting and marketing, but earned nothing with it.

The title of Patent Specification No. 165,546, dated April 30, 1904, reads: “Method for reporting removed metallic objects to an observer using electrical waves. The subject of the present invention is a device through which the approach or movement of distant metallic objects (ships, trains or the like) is reported to an observer by means of electrical waves through audible or visible signals ... “. On November 11, 1904, he submitted an application for an additional patent for distance measurement. It was granted on April 2, 1906 as a separate patent (DE 169154). In principle, it describes the use of two vertical measurements and trigonometric calculation of the approximate distance. He had his invention patented in several European countries (on June 10, 1904 in Great Britain under number 13.170) and in the USA. Parts of his 'telemobiloscope' have been exhibited in the shipping section of the Deutsches Museum in Munich since 1958 . One of his coherers has also been exhibited in the German Maritime Museum in Bremerhaven since 1990 .

On October 11, 1905, Christian Hülsmeyer ended his efforts to market the telemobiloscope, had the company "Telemobiloskop - Gesellschaft Hülsmeyer und Mannheim", which he operated with his partner Heinrich Mannheim, deleted from the company register at the royal district court in Cologne and turned to other tasks.

In 1904, the time was not yet ripe for his development, the telemobiloscope, which was later compared to a radar . The approach could only be made widely applicable in the course of the 1920s and 1930s by other people such as Rudolf Kühnhold , Hans Erich Hollmann or Robert Watson-Watt . Especially under the aspect of the increased occupancy of the radio frequencies, amplifier tubes, frequency-selective components and more pronounced directional antennas helped with the implementation.

Hot water and machine tool construction 1906 to 1953

In 1906, Hülsmeyer founded an agency for the production of light bulbs and machine tools in Düsseldorf, and in 1907 the company "Christian Hülsmeyer Kessel- und Apparatebau" at the same location, which manufactured rust protection filters, water filters for hot water devices, high-pressure fittings and other parts necessary for hot water devices. Around 1910 he bought company property in Düsseldorf-Flingern . In the same year he married Luise Petersen from Bremen, with whom he had six children between 1911 and 1924. Thanks to 180 other patents at home and abroad, he became a wealthy man. The company ran satisfactorily until 1953, despite small slumps during the inflation of 1923 and during the wars. Because of an illness he was not drafted during the war.

Late recognition

After the Second World War, which clearly demonstrated the importance of the radar, people in Germany began to remember his groundbreaking invention again. In 1948 the historian Franz Maria Feldhaus from Wilhelmshaven noticed the mention of the telemobiloscope from 1904 in his notes and on November 10, 1948, in an article in the "Rheinische Post", he connected Christian Hülsmeyer with the invention of the radar. Under the aspect that Winston Churchill wanted to give Robert Watson-Watt a title of nobility for the invention of the radar, this sparked discussions up to high government circles. In 1953 Robert Watson-Watt and Christian Hülsmeyer were guests of a radar conference in Frankfurt, and on this occasion the formulation was found that Robert Watson-Watt was at least not the sole founder of the radar. In 1957 Christian Hülsmeyer died in Ahrweiler and was buried in Düsseldorf's north cemetery.

Honors

literature

Web links

Commons : Christian Hülsmeyer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h Christian Hülsmeyer and about the early days of radar inventions by AO Bauer, Diemen, NL, January 15, 2005 (PDF; 1.7 MB) (English)
  2. ↑ Information page of the municipality of Eydelstedt, the birthplace of Hülsmeyer, with further interesting links ( Memento from September 9, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ↑ Excerpt from an event on the 100th anniversary of the radar, lecture by Wolfgang Holpp on April 30, 2004
  4. ↑ a b c Lecture on the occasion of the event for the 100th anniversary of the radar by Joachim Ender (FHR) on May 1, 2004 (PDF; 2.5 MB)
  5. ↑ a b Lecture by Joachim Ender (FGAN-FHR) on June 4, 2002 in Cologne at the Eusar 2002 on the occasion of the 98th anniversary of the invention (PDF; 1.1 MB)
  6. ↑ a b Who's who about Christian Hülsmeyer
  7. ↑ a b 1954 radio interview with Christian Hülsmeyer on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the invention of the radar (MP3; 653 kB)
personal data
SURNAME Hülsmeyer, Christian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German entrepreneur and inventor of the radar
DATE OF BIRTH December 25, 1881
PLACE OF BIRTH Eydelstedt , Lower Saxony
DATE OF DEATH January 31, 1957
Place of death Ahrweiler