Heinrich Wilhelmi

This article covers the engineer and professor. For genre and animal painter see Heinrich Wilhelmi (painter) .

Heinrich Wilhelmi (TH Magdeburg, 1963)

Karl Heinrich Hermann Wilhelmi (born April 27, 1906 in Berlin-Schöneberg ; † March 1, 2005 in Kleinmachnow near Berlin ) was a German engineer and professor . He is a co-founder of the training of qualified engineers for control engineering in Germany.

Life

Heinrich Wilhelmi was the eldest son of the teacher Heinrich Wilhelmi and his wife Auguste. From 1912 to 1924 he attended pre-school and upper level of the Realgymnasium Zehlendorf . In 1924 he graduated from high school and began studying mechanical engineering at the Technical University of Berlin-Charlottenburg . To finance his studies, he worked as an intern and working student at Berlin companies and as a locomotive heater for the Berlin Stadtbahn .

Working as an engineer in industry

In 1930 Wilhelmi completed his studies with a degree in engineering. At that time the economy was in a deep depression, a secure job was out of the question. So he initially carried out occasional jobs such as the design of capsule pumps and the calculation of heating systems. His first inventions for piston-less motors and pumps date from this time.

Mechanical calculating machine Mercedes Euclid . Manufacturer: Mercedes Büromaschinenwerk Zella-Mehlis (1937); Designer: Christel Hamann , Berlin (Place of exhibition: Rechenwerk Computer- & Technikmuseum Halle )

In 1932 Wilhelmi came into contact with Mercedes office machines, which at that time represented the highest level of technology. He made suggestions and inventions to improve them. In 1934 he designed a new type of adding machine at Tasma-Addiermaschinen GmbH . This led him to Zella-Mehlis in Thuringia in 1935 , where he took on the position of a designer for calculating machines at Walther and was also responsible for the company's own generation of energy and water.

He then started working as a calculating machine designer at Deutsche Telephonwerke und Kabelindustrie AG ( DeTeWe ) in Berlin. Together with the chief designer Christel Hamann , a pioneer in the field of calculating machines, he developed the basis for the DeTeWe calculating machines, as they were built into the 1960s, before electronics replaced electromechanics.

From 1938 he turned to new types of analog computing devices, which were primarily needed for civil and military aviation and at the same time represented a root of analog computers . During this time, fundamental patents were created that were later used by the Allies . This special work on electronic analog computing technology also formed the basis of his dissertation at the Technical University of Berlin , which made him Dr.-Ing. PhD . From 1941 to 1943 he taught part-time at the Gauß engineering school in Berlin, the subject of "precision engineering equipment". As early as 1939 he had married the chief secretary Erna Kuntz from the Rhine Palatinate . In 1941 their son Wolfgang was born as the only child.

During the war in 1943, the DeTeWe department, which had meanwhile become a vital part of the war effort, was relocated from Berlin to Sagan in Lower Silesia , where Heinrich Wilhelmi expanded and managed it as a company for analog electronic control and regulation devices for aviation with 500 employees. In February 1945 this DeTeWe company was relocated to Bleicherode near Nordhausen in the southern Harz region , where the Peenemünder rocket builders were also housed ( unit 4 , known as A4 or V2, developed by Wernher von Braun ). The Americans occupied Bleicherode in the spring of 1945 without a fight and were later replaced by the Soviet occupying forces. Immediately after the end of the war, some of the rocket specialists reached Huntsville in Alabama ( USA ) via intermediate stations , the others later in October 1946 in the Soviet Union .

After the war, Wilhelmi worked until October 1946 in the "Institut Rabe" (rocket construction) founded by the Soviet occupying forces in Bleicherode on control problems for the A4 rocket. This used an electronic analog computer in tube technology, a so-called "mixing device", which was created by Helmut Hölzer in Peenemünde in 1941 as the central unit of the control technology for the A4, which was developed by Helmut Gröttrup responsible. Wilhelmi had also worked in this field of analog computing technology since 1938 and received his doctorate in 1941 and gained extensive industrial experience in the manufacture of corresponding devices for aviation. The chief designer Sergei Pawlowitsch Korolev, who later became famous as the father of Soviet space travel , was in charge of the Rabe Institute .

On October 22, 1946 Wilhelmi was under the operation osoaviakhim such as so-called specialist together with other professionals. For example, the fluid engineer Werner Albring was forced to work in the Soviet Union, where he continued to work in his field as well as in related areas. He lived with his family in Ilyinskaya near Moscow for more than five years .

After his return from the Soviet Union in the spring of 1952, Wilhelmi joined VEB Mechanik Askania Teltow, a company located in Teltow on the southwestern edge of Berlin , which was renamed VEB Geräte- und Steuerung-Werke Teltow in 1954. There he became head of development for the entire device area, which included balancing machines, vibrating tables, vibration measuring devices, nautical-geophysical, oceanographic and traffic control devices. One result of this diverse development work was the globally unique automated balancing technology in which electrical sparks remove the unbalanced material fully automatically during balancing.

In 1956 Wilhelmi founded the working group "Devices for Mechanical Vibration Technology ", of which he became chairman. He was also a member of the Physical Society and the Applied Mathematics and Mechanics section of the German Academy of Sciences, as well as a long-time scientific advisor to the Technisches Zentralblatt in Berlin.

Wilhelmi was the owner of numerous domestic and foreign patents.

professor

In mid-1959 Wilhelmi was appointed professor with a full teaching assignment for technical mechanics at the Magdeburg University of Heavy Mechanical Engineering and at the same time director of the Institute for Technical Mechanics. In addition, in the spring of 1960 he was appointed provisional director of the newly established Institute for Control Engineering .

Control engineering building, later automation engineering, on the campus of Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg

Herbert Ehrlich - Founding Assistant at the Institute for Automatic Control (2008)

During the establishment of this institute for control engineering, Wilhelmi was supported for many years by his first assistant Herbert Ehrlich , who came in 1959 as a graduate of Heinrich Kindler from the TH Dresden and later in 1975 was appointed professor at the TH Leipzig to the chair of control engineering. The development work was actively supported by numerous employees, one of whom was Christian Döschner , who was later also appointed professor for automation / process modeling in Magdeburg.

From 1961 Wilhelmi was also the head of the newly established control engineering department at the Faculty of Mathematics , Natural Sciences and Basic Technical Sciences at the TH Magdeburg . This made him one of the pioneers in the academic training of automation engineers in Germany.

In 1963 his professorship was expanded to include the field of measurement and control technology, and at the same time he was appointed director of the Institute for Measurement, Control and Regulation Technology. In 1964 he was reappointed from the chair for technical mechanics to the chair for measurement and control technology . Under his direction, the training took place primarily on the basis of all-German specialist books from the academic schools of Winfried Oppelt (Darmstadt) and Heinrich Kindler (Dresden) as well as international specialist literature including the associated specialist journals.

Heinrich Wilhelmi, Heinz Töpfer , Siegfried Rudert at the TH Magdeburg at a scientific event in 1973 (first row, from left); Christian Döschner , Peter Bernert , Herbert Ehrlich (2nd row, from left)

He achieved a significant strengthening of his institute in particular through visiting scholars from Heinrich Kindler's school in Dresden: Karl Reinisch , Siegfried Pilz (both later professors in Ilmenau), Hans-Joachim Zander and Heinz Töpfer , who was appointed professor for control engineering in Magdeburg in 1967 .

With the establishment of the technical cybernetics and electrical engineering section at the TH Magdeburg by Heinz Töpfer in the course of the so-called 3rd university reform in 1968, Wilhelmi took over the development of the teaching group for automation technology equipment systems and the process analysis and system design research group . Together with the Berlin doctor Moritz Mebel , he developed surgical tools for the kidney transplant that was newly introduced at the time .

During his entire activity as a university lecturer , Heinrich Wilhelmi, first as the institute director, later as dean of the faculty for basic sciences, as vice dean of the faculty for electrical engineering and as teaching and research group leader in the technical cybernetics and electrical engineering section, supported the further expansion of the Magdeburg facility a technical university with a broad and contemporary specialist profile.

50 years of automation technology in Magdeburg (2011); first students: Ulrich Korn , Werner Kriesel , Peter R. Asche , Wolfgang Wilhelmi (from left to right)

Ifak ​​building in the Magdeburg Science Harbor

When Wilhelmi reached the age limit in 1971, he retired. He is one of the pioneers in computing, measurement and control technology as well as paving the way for the training of qualified engineers for control technology in Germany. From the seven students in the first year of graduates in control engineering in 1964/65 who were fully trained in Magdeburg alone, three professors emerged: Ulrich Korn (1978, TH Magdeburg ), Werner Kriesel (1979, TH Leipzig ) and Wolfgang Wilhelmi (1984, Academy of Sciences) Berlin ).

His rich experience and high professional qualification found u. a. This is reflected in numerous patents registered and used at home and abroad as well as recognition as an Honored Technician of the People in 1954.

It is thanks to his early work in the 1960s that the field of automation technology, particularly in Magdeburg, was able to develop successfully to the current state: Institute for Automation Technology at Otto von Guericke University (IFAT, founded in 1990) and Institute for Automation and Communication (ifak, founded and directed since 1991 by Peter Neumann , since 2005 directed by Ulrich Jumar ) as a well-known and internationally recognized affiliated institute of Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg .

Wilhelmi experienced the years of the First World War , the Great Depression and the Second World War with their consequences, as well as the upheavals in the GDR ( construction of the Wall in 1961, university reform in 1968) and the process of German reunification ( fall of the Wall in 1989, unity in 1990) consciously and critically. In particular, he unreservedly affirmed the project of the reunification of Germany, which was not yet completed at the time, although unjustified claims for repatriation to his home and unjustified pension cuts initially affected him.

In 2005 he died at the old age of almost 99 in his home in Kleinmachnow; he had already survived his wife Erna Wilhelmi.

Fonts (selection)

• Vibration control devices from VEB equipment and regulator works Teltow as aids in research and technology . In: Scientific journal of the Technical University Otto von Guericke Magdeburg 7, 1963, p. 261 ff.
• The Institute for Technical Mechanics / The Institute for Control Engineering . In: Festschrift of the Technical University Otto von Guericke Magdeburg, 1963, pp. 158–160.
• International conference methods and devices of mechanical vibration technology Magdeburg 27. – 29. September 1965, (2 volumes) 1965.

literature

• Archives: Magdeburg University Archives: PA, Carmen Schäfer , last change: March 2, 2005.
• Wolfgang Wilhelmi: Funeral speech for Prof. Dr. Heinrich Wilhelmi. Unpublished manuscript, Kleinmachnow March 24, 2005.
• Hans-Joachim Zander , Georg Bretthauer : Prof. Heinz Töpfer on his 80th birthday. In: Automation technology, Munich. Vol. 58, No. 7, 2010, pp. 413-415.
• Peter Neumann : Automation technology at the Magdeburg alma mater. In: Mechanical and plant engineering in the Magdeburg region at the beginning of the 21st century. Future based on tradition. Delta-D publishing house, Axel Kühling, Magdeburg 2014, pp. 215-219, ISBN 978-3-935831-51-2 .
• Peter Neumann (Hrsg.): Magdeburg's automation technology in transition - from industrial to research location. Authors: Christian Diedrich , Rolf Höltge, Ulrich Jumar , Achim Kienle, Reinhold Krampitz, Günter Müller, Peter Neumann, Konrad Pusch, Helga Rokosch, Barbara Schmidt, Ulrich Schmucker, Gerhard Unger, Günter Wolf. Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg ; Institute for Automation and Communication Magdeburg (ifak), Magdeburg 2018, production: Grafisches Centrum Cuno GmbH & Co. KG, Calbe (Saale), ISBN 978-3-944722-75-7 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Werner Albring : Gorodomlia. German rocket researchers in Russia . Luchterhand Literaturverlag, Hamburg; Zurich 1991, pp. 43–55, ISBN 3-630-86773-1 .
2. ↑ Lothar Starke: From hydraulic regulators to process control systems. The success story of the Askania works in Berlin and the device and controller works in Teltow. 140 years of industrial history, tradition and future. Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, Berlin 2009, pp. 58–66, ISBN 978-3-8305-1715-3 .
3. ^ Winfried Oppelt : Small manual of technical control processes. Verlag Chemie, Weinheim 1954, 4th edition Verlag Chemie, Weinheim and Verlag Technik, Berlin 1964, 5th edition 1972, ISBN 3-527-25347-5 .
4. ^ Heinrich Kindler : Collection of exercises on control engineering. Verlag Technik Berlin and R. Oldenbourg-Verlag, Munich; Vienna 1964 (with H. Buchta and H.-H. Wilfert).
5. ↑ JC Gille, M. Pelegrin, P. Decaulne: Course of control engineering (from the French). Vol. 1: Theory of the regulations. Vol. 2: Components of the control loops. Verlag Technik, Berlin and R. Oldenbourg-Verlag, Munich 1960/1962.
6. ↑ WW Solodownikow (general editor): Basics of the automatic regulation (from Russian; German adaptation under H. Kindler). Verlag Technik, Berlin and R. Oldenbourg-Verlag, Munich 1958.
7. ↑ Werner Kriesel , Hans Rohr, Andreas Koch: History and future of measurement and automation technology. VDI-Verlag, Düsseldorf 1995, pp. 33-132, ISBN 3-18-150047-X .
8. ↑ Wolfgang Weller : Automation technology through the ages - development history of a fascinating subject. Verlag epubli GmbH, Berlin 2013, pp. 7-14, ISBN 978-3-8442-5487-7 .