Karl Rapp

Karl Rapp (born September 24, 1882 in Ehingen an der Donau ; † May 26, 1962 in Locarno ) was the founder and owner of Rapp Motorenwerke GmbH in Munich .

After his training as an engineer, he worked in Cannstatt at the Württemberg railway workshop inspection. After he was employed in the technical office of the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft from 1904 to 1907, he worked at Züst . When the Kaiserpreis for aircraft engines was advertised in 1912, he worked at Flugwerk Germany, which was liquidated in the summer of 1913.

Rapp Motorenwerke GmbH, founded by Rapp in Munich in 1913, worked during the First World War in the field of aircraft and aircraft engine construction with Gustav Otto Flugmaschinenwerke owned by the mechanical engineer Gustav Otto (1883–1926, son of Nicolaus August Otto ) However, in 1916 ran into financial difficulties and then apparently without direct involvement Rapp to the Bayerische Flugzeug-Werke AG (BFW) .

The Rapp Motorenwerke GmbH was the engineer in 1917 Franz Josef Popp and major investor Camillo Castiglioni for Bayerische Motoren Werke GmbH (BMW) expanded. Karl Rapp left the company at this point and from then on apparently devoted himself exclusively to scientific studies. Together with Auguste Piccard , he conducted altitude research , and he also owned a private observatory in Locarno , from which the Specola Solare solar observatory later developed.

The successor company Bayerische Motorenwerke GmbH (BMW) became a stock corporation in 1918 and, with a changed production spectrum, operated as Süddeutsche Bremsen-AG from 1920 (as a subsidiary of today's Knorr-Bremse AG ). The engine construction department and the old company name (company) were sold in 1922, the former Bayerische Flugzeugwerke AG (BFW) has been called Bayerische Motorenwerke AG (BMW) since then .

Web links

Karl Rapp. In: BMW history. BMW AG, accessed on January 25, 2018 (dossier on Karl Rapp in the BMW Group Archive).

Individual evidence

↑ Sergio Cortesi et al .: Sunspot observations and counting at Specola Solare Ticinese in Locarno since 1957. In: Solar Physics , 2016, arxiv : 1602.07998 , doi : 10.1007 / s11207-016-0872-7 .

personal data
SURNAME	Rapp, Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German entrepreneur and high-altitude researcher
DATE OF BIRTH	September 24, 1882
PLACE OF BIRTH	Ehingen on the Danube
DATE OF DEATH	May 26, 1962
Place of death	Locarno

[1] Sergio Cortesi et al .: Sunspot observations and counting at Specola Solare Ticinese in Locarno since 1957. In: Solar Physics , 2016, arxiv : 1602.07998 , doi : 10.1007 / s11207-016-0872-7 .