Ludwig Hotopp

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Ludwig Hotopp (1900)

Friedrich Ludwig August Hotopp (born February 1, 1854 in Üfingen ( Wolfenbüttel district ), † January 16, 1934 in Hanover ) was a German civil engineer . He invented the principle named after him for the operation of locks simply by using the water level difference.

Life

Hotopp was born on February 1, 1854 in Üfingen ( Wolfenbüttel district , today the city of Salzgitter ). During his studies in 1874 he became a member of the Braunschweig fraternity Germania . After working in industry and as a Brunswick government builder , he came to the building authorities of the city of Lübeck on April 1, 1892 . Here he worked under Lübeck's director of hydraulic engineering, Peter Rehder , primarily in the planning and implementation of the Elbe-Lübeck Canal ; after its completion, he was appointed building officer on June 13, 1900 . From October 1st, 1901, he was professor for statics of building structures in the civil engineering department of the Technical University of Hanover and until 1921 he represented the teaching area “Mechanics for civil engineers and movable bridges”. He died on January 16, 1934 in Hanover.

Hotoppsche locks

At the time of its construction (1896–1900) there was no power supply along the Elbe-Lübeck Canal . The mechanized operation of the locks (moving the lock gates and water slide ) was carried out pneumatically according to the proposal by Hotopp . The compressed air for the lock gates and the vacuum for the "starting" of jacks (as a replacement for mechanical slides) was generated with the help of water columns, which fall from the upper water to the lower water , and collected in special tanks.

To fill and empty the sluice, three small valves - relative to the siphon cross-section - in the pipelines between the suction tank and siphons are sufficient. In addition to the locks of the Elbe-Lübeck Canal and the Oder-Spree Canal , the Hotopp siphon was also used at the Kleinmachnow lock . With the emergence of power supply, it was no longer taken up in later canal construction.

The systems on the Elbe-Lübeck Canal are still in use today and represent a monument to early industrialization . So far, only the Lauenburg lock has been replaced in 2006 by a new building with modern oil hydraulic technology; however, the other locks are also acutely threatened by the planned canal expansion.

The Hotoppsche lifter is an alternative to modern hydraulics, because a lock that runs exclusively with water power and is nevertheless very fast with a lock time of 9 minutes can also be viewed as trend-setting today. In addition, this technology has been working continuously for 110 years. However, a calculation of the Hotopp siphon is classified as complicated.

Fonts (selection)

  • Diving. Elevation work under water , from F. Lincke (Ed.) Handbuch der Ingenieur-Wissenschaften , part 4, volume 3, 2nd edition, Leipzig: Engelmann, 1908, pp. 678–756
  • Movable bridges. A handbook and textbook for engineers and civil engineering students , Hanover: Helwingsche Verlagsbuchhandlung,
    • Volume 1: The Bascule Bridges , 1913
    • Volume 2: The slewing, lifting and rolling bridges , bridge ferries , 1926
  • Lectures on elasticity theory as a basis for the strength calculation of buildings , Hanover: Helwing,
    • Part 1, 2nd increased edition, revised by Ludwig Hotopp, 1913; contents
    • Part 2: Mechanics of elastic-solid and liquid bodies , 4th edition, 1920; contents
    • Part 3: General Mechanics , 2nd edition, Hanover: Helwing, 1915; contents

Center for Canal History in the Möllner Museum

In its permanent exhibition on the history of the city, the Möllner Museum Historisches Rathaus presents u. a. also the history of the medieval Stecknitzfahrt and the Elbe-Lübeck / Trave canal .

swell

  • Festschrift for the 175th anniversary of the University of Hanover . 3 volumes. Olms, Hildesheim 2006. ISBN 3-487-13113-7

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ernst Elsheimer (ed.): Directory of the old fraternity members according to the status of the winter semester 1927/28. Frankfurt am Main 1928, p. 219.
personal data
SURNAME Hotopp, Ludwig
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hotopp, Friedrich Ludwig August (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German civil engineer, construction officer and university professor, inventor of a type of lock
DATE OF BIRTH February 1, 1854
PLACE OF BIRTH Üfingen , Wolfenbüttel district
DATE OF DEATH January 16, 1934
Place of death Hanover