Gustave Trouvé

Gustave Trouvé (born January 2, 1839 in La Haye-Descartes , † July 27, 1902 in Paris ) was a French inventor , electrical engineer and chemist .

Gustave Trouvé

Gustave Trouvé's signature

youth

Trouvé's father Jacques was a cattle dealer. In 1850 he began training as a locksmith at Chinon College, which he continued from 1854 to 1855 at the École des Arts et Métiers in Angers. Due to health problems, he did not complete his training and moved to Paris, where he found employment with a watchmaker.

Paris

From 1865 Trouvé ran a workshop in the center of Paris, where he developed and patented a range of electrical devices for a wide variety of applications, which were regularly reported in popular scientific journals such as La Nature. He invented a pocket-sized zinc-carbon battery to power his miniature electric vending machine, which soon became very popular. A similar battery was developed and widely commercialized by Georges Leclanché .

The 1870s

Military Telegraph

Gustave Trouvé was instrumental in improving communication systems in the 1870s with several notable innovations. In 1872 he developed a portable telegraph for the military, which enabled rapid communication for sending orders to the front and reports back up to a distance of one kilometer. In 1874, he developed a device for detecting and extracting metallic particles e.g. B. from human bodies, which was the prototype of today's metal detectors . In 1878 he improved the sound intensity of the Bell telephone system by installing a double membrane . In the same year he invented a highly sensitive, portable microphone. With these inventions Trouvé soon became known and his talent for miniaturization was recognized. In 1878, too, he invented the “Polyscope”, the prototype of today's endoscope , which operated with a Gaston Planté battery and a small airtight light bulb.

Polyscope

The 1880s

In 1880 Trouvé improved the efficiency of a small electric motor developed by Siemens, which he then integrated, together with a newly developed battery, into a tricycle developed by the Englishman James Starley and built the Trouvé Tricycle, the world's first electric vehicle . Although this electric tricycle was successfully tested on April 19, 1881 along Rue Valois in central Paris, he was unable to patent his invention. Trouvé quickly adapted its electric propulsion system for boats. In order to enable the unit to be easily transported from his workshop to the nearby Seine , he made it portable and easily removable and thus invented the outboard motor. On May 26, 1881, Trouvé's prototype boat, the 5 m “Le Téléphone” reached a speed of 1 m / s (3.6 km / h) upstream and 2.5 m / s (9 km / h) downstream.

First boat with an electric outboard motor by Gustave Trouvé

Trouvé exhibited his boat (but not his tricycle) and a number of his electro-medical instruments at the International Electricity Exhibition in Paris in 1881, and soon after was awarded the prestigious Legion of Honor. By further miniaturizing his electric motor, he was able to operate a model airship, a dental drill, a sewing machine and a razor electrically. Next, Gustave Trouvé developed a "photophore", a battery-operated headlamp for Dr. Paul Helot , an ear, nose and throat doctor from Rouen. The focus of this portable lighting system could be adjusted by moving the head and you could work with both hands. Based on the correspondence between Trouvé and Hélot, this invention can be dated to the year 1883. Trouvé soon modified the headlamp for miners, rescue workers and later also for cave explorers. By tinting the light with different colors, the invention also found its way into Parisian and European theaters. Called “glowing electrical jewels”, this invention was the forerunner of today's wearable technology. In 1884, Trouvé mounted both an electric horn and headlight on an electric boat . That was the first time that such electrical accessories were used on a mode of transport. Then he developed a portable electric safety lamp and in 1887 his “Auxanoscope”, an electric slide projector for traveling teachers with the brand name Eureka (Greek εὕρηκα = "I have found", translated into French "J'ai trouvé"). Around the same time Trouvé, a bachelor who was uninterested in commercialization, oriented himself heavenward, convinced that the future was in the air with heavier-the-air machines, so he developed a model of a leashed electric helicopter.

Next he built a mechanical bird whose wings were moved by a rapid firing sequence of revolver cartridges.

Mechanical bird

This made a loud flight of an unbelievable 80 meters possible. In 1889 he mounted a headlight on a battery electric rifle that he had developed in 1866, which made it possible to hunt at night. He has also developed a battery-powered alarm system for night fishing.

The 1890s

In 1891, Trouvé developed multi-colored electric fountains for indoor and outdoor use. He saw the limits of a power supply without a reliable national grid company early on. In 1895 he quickly made the recent discovery of acetylene useful for home lighting. Among his 75 inventions are u. a. Find an electric massage machine, an electric keyboard instrument based on the Félix Savart wheel , a battery-powered portable life jacket, a water- jet powered boat and a streamlined bicycle, and several children's toys. In 1902, Trouvé was working on his latest innovation, a small portable UV device for treating skin conditions, the prototype of PUVA therapy, when he accidentally lost part of his thumb and index finger. He neglected the wounds, which resulted in blood poisoning . An amputation at the Saint-Louis Hospital in Paris also no longer helped and Trouvé died at the age of 63 on July 27, 1902.

Forgetting and rehabilitation

When the compulsory concession for his grave in the cemetery of his native La Haye-Descartes was not renewed, his bones were transferred to a communal grave . Its archives were destroyed in February 1980 during a fire in the town hall of La Haye-Descartes. In 2012, however, after the publication of a French Trouvé biography by the English transport historian Kevin Desmond, a plaque was unveiled in his hometown. Three years later, in 2015, following an extended English-language Trouvè biography, a memorial plaque was unveiled on his former workshop at 14 Rue Vivienne in the 2nd arrondissement of Paris.

Inventions and innovations in chronological order

• 1864: Geissler's electro-spherical tubular motor
• 1865: Sealed mini battery
• 1865: Electromedical devices
• 1865: Mobile electronic jewelry
• 1865: electro gyroscope
• 1866: electric rifle
• 1867: Electromedical kit
• 1869: Liquid-filled panorama camera
• 1870: Device for imitating bird flight
• 1872: Portable military telegraph
• 1873: Improved Zn-carbon battery with dichromate as cathode
• 1874: Bullet detector and extractor
• 1857: Electric yearbook and calendar
• 1875: Portable electromechanical machine
• 1875: Oxygen space suit for balloonists
• 1877: Muscle contraction simulator
• 1877: Electric paperweight
• 1878: Polyscope for probing cavities in human bodies
• 1878: Telephones and improved microphones
• 1880: Improved Siemens electric motor
• 1881: Manufacture of magnets
• 1881: Luminous electrical jewelry
• 1881: electric boat
• 1881: Miniaturized dental drills
• 1881: outboard engine
• 1881: electric tricycle
• 1883: underwater lighting
• 1883: Trouvé-Héliot head lamp
• 1883: Electric vehicle headlights
• 1884: electric safety lamp
• 1885: Electrical equipment for lighting physiology and chemistry laboratories
• 1885: Underwater lighting for the Suez Canal
• 1886: New system for the construction of propellers
• 1886: Electric siren as an alarm signal
• 1887: Working model of an electric helicopter (leashed)
• 1887: Electric auxanoscope (image projector)
• 1889: Electric counter
• 1889: Dynamo electric demonstrator
• 1889: Improvement of the electric rifle
• 1889: System for transporting glass plates
• 1890: Universal dynamometer
• 1890: Electric lighting for horse-drawn carriages
• 1890: Electric orygmatoscope for the inspection of geological layers
• 1890: Mobile electropneumatic street lamp
• 1891: 2nd mechanical bird
• 1891: Improvements to luminous electric fountains
• 1892: Electric shutter release for time-lapse photography
• 1892: Portable medical dynamometer
• 1892: Battery-powered hernia massager
• 1893: Electrical industrial ventilation system
• 1894: Automatic night fishing system
• 1894: Electric lance for hunting
• 1894: Luminous electrical jewelry band
• 1894: Electric keyboard instrument based on Savart's wheel
• 1894: Luminous electro skipping rope
• 1895: Acetylene lighting in private households
• 1895: Universal AC / DC motor
• 1895: Improved bicycle
• 1895: Manual / electric hybrid massage device
• 1897: Device for the automatic filling of acetylene
• 1897: Device for the hermetic sealing of acetylene containers
• 1897: Windmill toys for hats and sticks
• 1898:
• 1899: Carburettors for internal combustion engines
• 1900: Portable battery electric inflatable life jacket
• 1901: device for phototherapy
• 1902: Feather harpoons toys
• 1902: Propulsion of model or submarines with acetylene

Web links

• Personalities: Gustave Trouvé in his hometown Descartes

Individual evidence

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1. ↑ History of the City of Ville de Descartes - Indre-et-Loire - FRANCE. In: ville-descartes.fr. August 6, 2014, accessed July 6, 2015 . 
2. ↑ George Barral, "L'histoire d'un inventeur: Exposé des découvertes et des travaux de M. Gustave Trouve dans le domaine de l'électricité" (Paris: Georges Carré, 1891)
3. ↑ Reference ETP 812, Departmental Archives of Maine-et-Loire
4. ^ Archives de la Ville de Paris
5. ↑ Alf. Naudet: Télégraphie militaire: Systèmes Gustave Trouvé. In: La Nature, Revue des sciences et de leurs applications aux arts et à l'industrie. May 20, 1876, pp. 392–394 , accessed on July 6, 2015 (French, published by the Cnum - Conservatoire numérique des Arts et Métiers ). 
6. ^ Bijoux électriques lumineux. In: La Nature. September 13, 1879, pp. 229–230 , accessed on July 6, 2015 (French, published by Cnum - Conservatoire numérique des Arts et Métiers ). Abbé Moigno, in: Les Mondes , issue 14, 40th year, August 1, 1878. 
   
7. ↑ La Telephone de Trouvé, 'La Nature', 1878. In: Cnum - Conservatoire numérique des Arts et Métiers. Retrieved July 6, 2015 . 
8. ↑ Le XIXe Siècle August 12, 1874
9. ^ Ségal, Alain, “Place de l'Ingénieur Gustave Trouve dans l'histoire de l'endoscopie”, TOME XXIX, Histoire des Sciences Médicales, Organe Officiel de la Société Française d'Histoire de la Médecine, n ° 2, 1995
10. ^ Ernest Henry Wakefield, History of the Electric Automobile, 540 pp, Society of Automobile Engineers, USA, 1993
11. ↑ Un Vélocipède électrique, 'La Nature', 1881
12. ^ Desmond, "A Century of Outboard Racing," Van de Velde Maritime. 2000
13. ↑ Communication made by Trouvé to the Académie des Sciences de Paris, 1881
14. ^ Pantheon of the Legion d'Honneur, January 1882
15. ↑ Exposition Internationale de l'Electricité 1881, Administration-jury-rapports, Tome Premier, 1883, Paris
16. ↑ Publicity, "Overview of the prices of Trouvé luminous electric jewels, the sole inventor patented in France and abroad", in "L'Électricité au théâtre, bijoux électro-mobiles, nouveaux bijoux électriques lumineux, par G. Trouvé", 1885
17. ↑ “Overview of the prices of Trouvé luminous electric jewels, the sole inventor patented in France and abroad”, in “L'Électricité au théâtre, bijoux électro-mobiles, nouveaux bijoux électriques lumineux, par G. Trouvé”, 1885
18. ↑ Letter from G Trouvé to Paul Hélot, July 25, 1883
19. ^ Trouvé, Lampes électriques portatives, communication to the Académie des Sciences, November 10, 1884
20. ^ Mémoire presented by G. Trouvé, on August 24, 1891. Conserved at the Académie des Sciences, Paris, reference arch-2007/26
21. ^ Journal mensuel de l'Académie nationale de l'Industrie agricole manufacturière et commerciale, December 1895