Machine factory Oerlikon

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Machine factory Oerlikon
legal form Corporation
founding 1876
resolution 1967
Reason for dissolution Takeover by the BBC
Seat Zurich Oerlikon
Branch Mechanical engineering , electrical engineering

The Oerlikon machine factory in 1930
The generator of the power station in Lauffen am Neckar, contemporary wood engraving
The company founder and then head of the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon, Peter Emil Huber-Werdmüller , (2nd row, 4th from right) visited the first three-phase power plant in Lauffen am Neckar on September 12, 1891 with other celebrities, which was for the International Electrotechnical Exhibition in Frankfurt was installed on the main .
Zurich-Oerlikon on an aerial photograph by Walter Mittelholzer , at the lower edge of the picture the Oerlikon train station with the MFO area, around 1920

The Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon ( MFO ) was a Swiss company, which in 1876 by Peter Emil Huber Werdmüller under the name Tool and Machine Factory Oerlikon , based in Oerlikon was founded. The MFO mainly produced tools, machines, turbines and the electrical part of locomotives , including that of the legendary SBB crocodile . The Oerlikon-Bührle company, later known for building cannons, split off in 1906. In 1967 the MFO was acquired by Brown, Boveri & Cie. (BBC), which later became part of ABB . The ABB company is still based in Zurich Oerlikon today.

history

Charles Brown led the establishment of an electrical engineering department in 1884/85. He brought his sons Charles Eugene Lancelot and Sidney William into the company. The name Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon MFO was adopted in 1886. Charles EL Brown and Walter Boveri worked at MFO as chief electricians and later as head of the assembly department until they founded Brown, Boveri & Cie (BBC) in Baden in 1891 .

In 1891, the MFO presented the first high-voltage line over a distance of 175 kilometers at the electricity exhibition in Frankfurt . The hydropower plant specially installed for this purpose was in Lauffen am Neckar .

At the end of October 1897, the Zurich – Oerlikon – Seebach tram , built by MFO, went into operation.

The MFO led from 1905 to 1909 on the SBB -distance Seebach-Wettingen their internationally recognized tests for electric traction with single-phase alternating current by. The voltage of the contact line was 15 kV with a frequency of 50 Hz initially, which was reduced to 15 Hz on November 11, 1905. Before the frequency change, the locomotives were equipped with rotating converters and direct current traction motors, then with single-phase direct motors. The tests took place under the direction of Emil Huber-Stockar , the then director of the MFO, the technology was overseen by Hans Behn-Eschenburg , who later became the technical director general of the MFO.

For a long time, MFO was the largest employer in the Zurich area. After the First World War , the so-called crocodile locomotives were built.

In 1906 the production of machine tools and railway brake equipment was outsourced to the newly founded machine tool factory Oerlikon (SWO), which was later popularly referred to as Oerlikon-Bührle . The SWO in 1937 by the German industrialist Emil Georg Buehrle adopted and in & Machine Tools Co. O. renamed. In the interwar period, it rose to become the leading armaments company in Switzerland and the well-known 20 mm and 35 mm anti-aircraft guns. MFO, on the other hand, took over the electrotechnical department of the Rieter company in 1906.

In 1967 the MFO was acquired by Brown, Boveri & Cie. , the company founded by the previous employees, which in turn merged with ASEA in 1988 to form global ABB . In 1996, ABB and Daimler-Chrysler Rail Systems became ABB Daimler Benz Transportation. After the complete withdrawal from ABB, the company was renamed Daimler-Chrysler Rail Systems in 1999 and finally sold to Bombardier in 2001 .

The memory of the former locomotive construction of the MFO is to be preserved by a memorial locomotive from a crocodile engine from 1920. It was installed on June 15, 2020 on Birchstrasse on the forecourt of the PWC building.

Building relocation

In the meantime, the MFO Park is located on the site of the former machine factory Oerlikon .

The former MFO administration building at Oerlikon station, which has meanwhile been converted , was moved 60 meters to a new location as part of the expansion of the Zurich cross-city link at the end of May 2012, as the largest building ever moved in Europe.

The entire relocation of the building was followed with great attention by various media outlets in Switzerland and by a large number of visitors. Switzerland currently broadcast the building relocation live on TV on SF Zwei in several special programs during the two days. Today's restaurant Perron 9 shows films of the shift on its website.

  • Former MFO administration building at Oerlikon train station (today Restaurant Perron 9 and Bistro Gleis 9 )

  • View from the MFO park

  • Facade of the MFO building (2010)

  • Historic and modern buildings in the MFO park

  • Nameplate of an accumulator-operated MFO tractor (1921)

literature

  • Yvonne Aellen, Ella Kienast: Parks in Neu-Oerlikon. Oerliker Park, MFO Park, Louis-Häfliger-Park, Wahlenpark, Gustav-Ammann-Park. Green City of Zurich, Zurich 2004.
  • Hans-Peter Bärtschi: Industrial culture in the canton of Zurich. From the Middle Ages to today. 2nd Edition. Verlag Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Zurich 1995, ISBN 3-85823-587-3 .
  • Fritz Maurer: Shift change in Neu-Oerlikon. Self-published, Bassersdorf 2006, ISBN 3-033-00761-9 .
  • Martin Pally: The electrification of the railways as a “national goal”: The Oerlikon machine factory in the First World War. In: Roman Rossfeld, Tobias Straumann (Hrsg.): The forgotten economic war. Swiss company in the First World War. Chronos-Verlag, Zurich 2008, ISBN 978-3-0340-0882-2 , pp. 117-147.

Web links

Commons : Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon  - collection of images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ according to several contemporary articles in the Schweizerische Bauzeitung, see sources in the article Single-phase alternating current test operation Seebach-Wettingen
  2. ↑ C. Bodmer: Full line operation with single-phase alternating current of 50 periods . In: Schweizerische Bauzeitung . tape 69 , no. 6 , February 10, 1951, p. 67-72 , doi : 10.5169 / seals-58803 .
  3. ^ Historical archive of ABB Switzerland
  4. ↑ A “crocodile” comes to Oerlikon. In: tagesanzeiger.ch/. Retrieved December 12, 2015 .
  5. ↑ SWISS PRIME SITE | Translocation of the MFO building, Zurich , project website of the real estate operator.
  6. ^ "Moving the MFO building in Neu-Oerlikon" , media release by the City Council of Zurich from September 15, 2010
  7. ^ Moving house In: Tagesschau (SF) , May 23, 2012.
  8. ^ Bistro Gleis 9 & Restaurant Perron 9 - Zurich. In: www.perron9.ch. Retrieved March 12, 2016 .