Franz Pacher

The title of this article is ambiguous. For the entrepreneur born in 1950, see Franz Pacher (entrepreneur)

Franz Pacher at the Geomechanics Colloquium 2008 in Salzburg

Franz Pacher (born April 28, 1919 in Mitteluchau , Czechoslovakia ; † March 3, 2018 in Salzburg ) was an Austrian civil engineer and a pioneer of rock mechanics and modern tunnel construction , especially the new Austrian tunnel construction method.

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After graduating from the Landesoberrealgymnasium in Graz , Franz Pacher began his studies as a civil engineer at the Technical University of Graz , which he graduated in 1943 and worked there until 1945 as a scientific assistant in the field of hydraulic engineering. From 1946 to 1952, Pacher worked as a design engineer and site manager on power plant construction sites, where he made his first personal experience with rock mechanics and tunnel construction. In 1952 he joined Leopold Müller's “engineering office for geology and civil engineering” . The following years were characterized by the rapid development of rock mechanics , in which Franz Pacher played a key role as his closest colleague and from 1957 as a partner of Leopold Müller. In 1966 he took over the sole management of the engineering office. In the years up to 1975, the collaboration with Professor Ladislaus von Rabcewicz was of decisive importance for the development of tunneling . In 1983 Franz Pacher converted his office for "rock mechanics and tunneling" into the "engineering association for geotechnical engineering and tunneling" (IGT). After a continuous handover of his agendas, Franz Pacher retired in 1988. In his 45 professional years he was a project engineer and head of an engineering office, researcher, teacher and honorary member of institutions in the field of geomechanics and tunnel construction.

Corporate activity

With the start of modern tunnel construction in the mid-1960s, Franz Pacher began intensive work in the planning and consulting of tunnel construction projects. In particular, the Schwaikheim tunnel on the Waiblingen – Schwäbisch Hall-Hessental railway line should be mentioned here, the first tunnel in Germany to be constructed according to the principles of shotcrete construction. This was followed by planning and consulting activities for the construction of the Munich and Vienna subway networks. From 1968 to 1975 Pacher worked on the Tauern Tunnel and the Katschberg Tunnel . From 1981 to 1985 he was responsible for the tunnel statics and advice on site for the Deutsche Bundesbahn on the new Hanover-Würzburg line, among other things for the Landrückentunnel. In addition, Pacher works on many power plant constructions such as the Hirzmannsperre in Styria, the Dürrachsperre in Tyrol and the turbine system for the Reutte textile works. As a long-time employee of Leopold Müller, Pacher was also involved in monitoring the anchoring of the Vajont dam . In the years before his retirement, he was significantly involved in almost 90% of all tunnel constructions in Austria.

Research activity

Pacher's particular merits are in the area of ​​basic research, such as the definition of the level and spatial fracture area and the mountain characteristics. In a publication from 1964, Pacher presented a possibility for the first time to show and graphically depict the relationships between the rock pressure curve and expansion load. Then deformation measurements should provide the basis for the course. The so-called characteristic curve measurement method was developed on this basis. It was not until 2009 that Pacher expanded this graphic into a diagram in which both the rock pressure and the deformation are shown as a function of time. This diagram not only offers the possibility of a more precise representation of the events, but also enables the permissible deformation and the time limits for the expansion to be better estimated.

Teaching

• 1966 to 1987: Lecturer in rock mechanics at the Technical University of Munich
• 1979 to 1983: Lecturer for "Applied Rock Mechanics" at the Vienna University of Technology
• 1975 to 1987: Head of the "Tunnel Project Planning" working group of the "Tunneling" working group in the Research Association for Transport and Road Engineering

Memberships

• 1969 to 1999: Member of the sub-committee for dam monitoring in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management
• 1966 to 1988: Expert for rock mechanics in the reservoir commission in the Federal Ministry for Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management
• Since 1984 member of the road research advisory board in the Federal Ministry of Economics
• 1968: Founding member of the Austrian Society for Geomechanics
• 1975 to 1981: President of the Austrian Society for Geomechanics

Awards

• 1975: Honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Surveying at the University of Karlsruhe
• 1977: Appointment as honorary professor in the field of civil engineering and surveying at the Technical University of Munich
• 1979: Awarded the professional title " Baurat hc"
• 1994: Award of the Golden Medal of Honor of the State of Salzburg

Web links

• IGT geotechnics and tunneling
• Austrian Society for Geomechanics

Individual evidence

1. ^ Mourning for Franz Pacher , accessed on March 19, 2018.
2. ^ F. Pacher: Construction of the joint body. In: Geology and Civil Engineering. Vol. 21, Issue 1-2, 1954, pp. 87-89.
3. ↑ F. Pacher: Indicators of the surface structure. In: Geology and Civil Engineering. Vol. 24, Issue 3-4, 1959, pp. 223-227.
4. ↑ F. Pacher: Deformation measurements in the test tunnel as a means of researching the behavior of the mountains and dimensioning the expansion. In: rock mechanics and engineering geology. Soup I, 1964, pp. 149-161.
5. ↑ F. Pacher: Ground reactions and lining curves - mountain and expansion characteristics. In: Geomechanics and Tunneling. 3, No. 4, 2010, pp. 402-408.