Konrad Grebe

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Konrad Grebe at work on the drawing board in 1950.

Konrad Grebe (born June 7, 1907 in Heiligenwald , today a district of Schiffweiler ; † July 12, 1972 in Wuppertal ) was a German steiger and inventor . He is internationally known as the father of the coal plow .

Life

Origin, education and first years of employment

Born in the Saar district , the son of a mine inspector began his mining career at the age of fourteen in the workshops of the Reden mine in Landsweiler-Reden . After completing the pre-school for the mountain in Neunkirchen and the electrical climbing class at the mountain school in Bochum , he joined the coal mines Ibbenbüren of the Preussische Bergwerks- und Hütten AG (Preussag) as an assistant climber in 1931 . In 1933 he was promoted to Steiger, in 1935 to Reviersteiger and in 1938 to electric driver. As a machine and electrical climber, he managed underground machinery and electrical operations .

Inventor of the coal plane

Coal planer monument in Ibbenbueren

During these years Grebe had already made a name for himself in-house as a tinkerer and inventor, and held more than a dozen patents , including one for an electrical device that increased mine safety. Around 1937 he invented the coal plane in close collaboration with his team . The first attempts with a peeling coal extraction device were made at the turn of 1936/37. For this purpose, a folding conveyor trough had been developed in the Ibbenbüren mine as early as 1936. The first attempts with a cutting edge welded to a pit rail were not entirely satisfactory, however. There were also various technical problems with a construction made of a scraper box with cutting edges on both sides, built in 1939. At the beginning of 1940 there were also attempts with a plow-like ripper. From the findings of all these preliminary tests, a model was finally developed in June 1941 that almost corresponded to the later coal plane. The original planer built on the basis of this template was used for the first time in September 1941 in a remaining pillar of the Glücksburg seam and was further improved by the end of the year. This was the operational breakthrough, and on March 24, 1942, Preussag filed a patent application for a “mining and storage system, especially for low seams in ore, coal and salt mines” at the Reich Patent Office .

At that time, the coal association had started a competition to "promote mechanical coal production", in which they offered a price of 60,000 Reichsmarks for those who succeeded in building a machine that would allow three men to mine 100 tons of coal could be saved. Preussag registered Grebes coal planer for the competition in June 1942 and provided evidence that even nine men could be saved with its construction. Already at the end of August 1942 the inventor received the 60,000 marks and at the end of the year a further 60,000 marks from the Reichsvereinigung coal, because he had made his coal plane usable for very shallow seams through improvements. On May 1, 1943, Konrad Grebe was finally awarded the Pioneer of Work honorary mark as the ninth “creative German” at a meeting of the Reich Chamber of Labor in the mosaic hall of the New Reich Chancellery .

In 1943 he explained what had moved him to his invention with these words:

“As a Steiger I was very often on site and was always wondering why, in our technical age, the machine had not yet penetrated the face. I saw the tusks pounding coal with picks and jackhammers. I saw how they sweated and toiled and thought to myself: Everywhere the machine has made things easier for people. Why not here too? "

Grebe's invention immediately met with great interest in the mining industry, and as early as August 1942 there were initial meetings with the supplier industry so that they could include the new development in their production program. In the same year, successful experiments were started with self-made planes in 14 shafts in the Ruhr area . The plane received the name unit planer , but was also called the Prussian plane because of its development company . This marked the beginning of the triumphant advance of mechanized coal production, which continued in foreign mining after the end of the Second World War . Ibbenbüren became internationally known as the “cradle of the coal plow”.

Further career path after the end of the war

Grave of Konrad and Luise Grebe in the Ibbenbüren Central Cemetery

After the end of the war, Konrad Grebe continued his work as an inventor of mining machines in the supply industry and from 1949 in his own engineering office in Wuppertal- Elberfeld . Even his later inventions were almost all related to the rationalization of mining. In 1950 his office developed a circulating, curved endless conveyor for the Victor and Ickern collieries in Castrop-Rauxel. This Hemscheidt-Grebe curved belt was built under license by Salzgitter-Maschinen-AG. The inclined wedge method for coal extraction also became very well known.

In total, Grebe held well over 100 patents. In 1962, the German Institute for Invention (DIE) honored him with the award of the Rudolf Diesel Medal in gold .

Konrad Grebe died just a few weeks after his 65th birthday on July 12, 1972 in Wuppertal. He found his final resting place in the Ibbenbüren central cemetery .

Web links

Commons : Konrad Grebe  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
  • Klaus Rotte: Coal planer revolutionized mining: Konrad Grebe - pioneer of the work . In: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from December 30, 1998

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The family's obituary in the Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from July 18, 1972
  2. ↑ a b c N.N .: Konrad Grebe † . Short obituary in: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from July 19, 1972
  3. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: Short biography Grebes on the RAG Anthrazit Ibbenbüren website; Retrieved July 31, 2012@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.rag-anthrazit-ibbenbueren.de
  4. ↑ a b c d e f Hubert Rickelmann and Hans Röhrs: The Ibbenbürener hard coal mining from the beginning to the present . Schöningh, Paderborn, Munich, Vienna and Zurich 1987, p. 149
  5. ↑ a b c d note under Ibbenbüren mosaic . In: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from November 10, 1962
  6. ↑ Klaus Rotte: Coal planer revolutionized mining: Konrad Grebe - pioneer of work . In: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from December 30, 1998
  7. ↑ a b Hubert Rickelmann and Hans Röhrs: The Ibbenbürener hard coal mining from the beginning to the present . Schöningh, Paderborn, Munich, Vienna and Zurich 1987, p. 144
  8. ↑ a b Hubert Rickelmann and Hans Röhrs: The Ibbenbürener hard coal mining from the beginning to the present . Schöningh, Paderborn, Munich, Vienna and Zurich 1987, p. 147
  9. ↑ a b N.N .: Konrad Grebe. the inventor of the coal plow worked for a long time at Ibbenbürener Preussag . In: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung of November 24, 1962
  10. ↑ According to other sources, the money was awarded to the Ibbenbürener mine; see. Hubert Rickelmann and Hans Röhrs: Ibbenbürener hard coal mining from the beginning to the present . Schöningh, Paderborn, Munich, Vienna and Zurich 1987, p. 149
  11. ^ Konrad Grebe in 1943 to a journalist; quoted here from: Klaus Rotte: Coal planer revolutionized mining: Konrad Grebe - pioneer of work . In: Ibbenbürener Volkszeitung from December 30, 1998
  12. ↑ Information on the homepage on the history of the former Victor-Ickern coal mine ( memento of October 18, 2011 in the Internet Archive ); Retrieved July 31, 2012
personal data
SURNAME Grebe, Konrad
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German climber and inventor
DATE OF BIRTH June 7, 1907
PLACE OF BIRTH Heiligenwald , today part of Schiffweiler
DATE OF DEATH July 12, 1972
Place of death Wuppertal