Robert Durrer (Metallurgist)

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Robert Durrer (born November 18, 1890 in Arbon , † February 13, 1978 in Zumikon ) was a Swiss metallurgist .

Life

Durrer studied metallurgy at RWTH Aachen . After practical work in industry, he was appointed to the chair for iron and steel engineering at the Technical University of Berlin in 1928 (as successor to Walther Mathesius ), which he held until 1942. In the war year 1943 he accepted the position as professor of metallurgy at the ETH Zurich , where he stayed until 1961, and at the same time he became a member of the board of directors of Ludwig von Roll'schen Eisenwerke AG with a leading position in Gerlafingen .

Durrer recognized the advantage of using pure oxygen in the wind-freshening process in steel production with the Bessemer process or the Thomas process early on . Together with his assistant Heinrich Hellbrügge , he made his first experiments with a water-cooled oxygen lance in a small induction furnace in his laboratory at ETH Zurich. Further attempts at the Gerlafingen plant followed, and in May 1948 the company magazine reported that for the first time steel could be produced in Switzerland by blowing in pure oxygen.

Durrer and Hellbrügge then presented their new steelmaking method to VÖEST plant director Helmut Trenkler in Linz , whereupon Von Roll, VÖEST and Alpine in Donawitz signed a contract to further develop the process. This resulted in the Linz-Donawitz process , with which steels of higher quality than before could be produced. Since Durrer's work formed the basis, the process was originally to be called the Linz-Durrer process , but then the name Linz-Donawitz process - or LD process for short - prevailed.

In 1960 Durrer received the Carl Lueg Memorial Medal from the Association of German Ironworkers . In 1966 he received the Benjamin F. Fairless Award from the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers (AIME) . He was editor and co-author of the many-volume work Gmelin-Durrer: Metallurgie des Eisens .

In memory of Hermann Staudinger and Durrer, the Department of Materials Science at ETH Zurich honors outstanding materials scientists with the Staudinger Durrer Prize in the form of a silver medal.

Works

  • Basics of iron production . Verlag Francke AG, Bern 1947, pp. 56-58.

literature

  • Walter Ulrich Guyan (Ed.): Vita pro ferro (Festschrift for Robert Durrer on his 75th birthday on November 18, 1965). Publishing house Guyan, Schaffhausen 1965.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Antek Schwarz: Stahl writes history . stahl und eisen 135 (2015) No. 10, pp. 89–90.
  2. ^ German National Library: Durrer, Robert (accessed on November 16, 2015)
  3. ^ A b c d e f g Heinrich Feichtinger, ETH Zurich, Department of Materials Science: Prof. Robert Durrer . (accessed on November 15, 2015)
  4. ↑ ETH Zurich, Department of Materials Science: Staudinger-Durrer Prize (accessed November 15, 2015)
personal data
SURNAME Durrer, Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss metallurgist
DATE OF BIRTH November 18, 1890
PLACE OF BIRTH Arbon
DATE OF DEATH February 13, 1978
Place of death Zumikon