Sollinger Hut
| RW Sollinger Hütte GmbH now mageba sa
|
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|---|---|
 |
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| legal form | GmbH |
| founding | 1715 |
| resolution | 2014 |
| Seat | Uslar |
| Branch | Construction supplier |
The Sollinger Hütte in Uslar was a metallurgical and metal construction company. It was one of the most important bridge bearings and expansion joint manufacturers . The area of responsibility also included engineering services in the ( bridge ) construction area.
Located in the western part of the city center, it was founded in 1715 as a royal ironworks to offer the needy population additional employment. Due to the iron ore deposits as well as the water (through the brook Ahle ) and wood abundance in the region (through the Solling forest ), this was an essential resource for such an operation. The proximity to the Weser in Bodenfelde as a transport route also allowed this ironworks to prosper in the 18th century . Integrated into the Electoral Hanover Ironworks Association, mainly cast steel, model iron, rod iron, but also end products such as scythe blades , ovens and oven plates and other household appliances such as waffle irons , mortars and pots were manufactured here.
In 1915 the smelter was privatized and was an important armaments company in both world wars . Some time before the official opening of the Uslar – Schönhagen (Han) railway line , a branch of this branch line of the Solling Railway also opened up the railway as a transport route. In the “golden days” of the city in the 1950s and 1960s, the company under Hans A. Kampmann had over 500 employees (over 600 at times). The world-famous Ilse-Möbelwerke also flourished at that time as the second major local employer (with more than 2000 employees on site). In 1966, components for bridge construction were manufactured for the first time. At the same time work was being carried out on the design of the world's first disc brake axles for trucks. And a series of motorized draisines (with 30 HP VW Boxer industrial engines) were delivered to New Guinea.
Between 1959 and 1973, the Sollinger Hütte built a total of 17 Porscheloks , park railways for operation in federal horticultural shows , on behalf of Henry Escher KG Dortmund . The superstructures were made by the company "PIO Karosseriebau" in Hamburg-Fischbek. The trains went to Planten un Blomen (Hamburg) and Westfalenpark (Dortmund). Trains are currently running in Amsterdam (Amstelpark), Karlsruhe (Schlossgartenpark), Cologne (Rheinpark) and Saarbrücken (German-French garden).
At the beginning of the 1980s, the company had one of the few VW buses converted for rail transport . The hut also used the aforementioned railway line as a test track for the railway construction machines that were also manufactured there. In 1983, due to a decline in orders, bankruptcy was finally filed and the foundry closed. Since 1984 the company has been dealing exclusively with the development, manufacture, installation and repair of bearings and lane crossings for bridges and structures. Today, the company operates under the name "RW Sollinger Hütte GmbH" and belongs to the group of companies "Reisner & Wolff (RW)", which is headquartered in the Austrian Wels has, after the operation in the meantime was also one of "Federal Mogul". The Sollinger Hütte is not to be confused with the iron and metal foundry "FASchneider GmbH", which is also located in the west of Uslar.
At the time, production was divided into three locations: The so-called Oberhütte in the west of Uslar at the exit towards Sohlingen and Höxter or Holzminden . This included a blast furnace and an iron hammer. At the lower hut around the south of Uslar, at the exit towards Bodenfelde and Kassel , there were two fresh fires and a few Zain hammers. A third part was on the copper hammer in northwest Uslar. Metal had been processed here for a long time before it was founded. Systems are now only located at the Oberhütte, where the company is still based today. In the 1990s, small businesses were temporarily located in an office building on the company premises at Bundesstrasse 241 that was vacant after bankruptcy . On the other hand, various small companies have set up shop in a side street since the mid-1980s. The names Oberhütte, Unterhütte and Kupferhammer are still used today by the local population to denote the corresponding parts of the Uslar core city, which is not officially further subdivided. The employees were called "die Hüttjer" at the time and for a long time they formed the working elite in Uslar because of their high qualifications and wages. A street on the Oberhütte is named after the former head of the company, Kampmann. At the Weser quay on the Schlagd in Bodenfelde, a warehouse has been maintained for many years for transport on the Weser.
In 2014 the company was taken over by mageba sa. Mageba is a manufacturer of bridge bearings, carriageway crossings and other products and services for civil engineering with its headquarters in Bülach, Switzerland.
Web links
- Homepage of mageba sa: http://www.mageba.ch/
- Hessisch-Niedersächsische Allgemeine (HNA): Iron from the Solling , January 7, 2011.
- Josef Högemann: secondary and narrow-gauge railways in Germany: Uslar – Schönhagen (Han). 21st supplementary edition , GeraNova-Verlag, 1998, ISSN 0949-2143 .
- Homepage of the Porschelok fan group: http://www.porschelok.de