George Huebner

George John Huebner Jr. (September 8, 1910 – September 4, 1996) was an American executive engineer who worked for the Chrysler Corporation. While in his twenties he worked for the Central Engineering Division at Chrysler developing new technology in mechanical engineering using science. It was long-term concepts he worked on that didn't come to fruition for some ten to twenty years. He researched an experimental gas turbine engine for passenger automobiles. A version of this engine was later installed and used as the main motorization for certain military tanks worldwide.

Huebner was put in charge of Chrysler's new Missile Branch division in the 1950s as executive engineer. He organized a missile research and development facility. The Corporation ultimately engineered out the Redstone rocket, which was used in the United States aerospace industry to place permanent satellites in orbit and for space travel. He worked with the rocket scientist Wernher von Braun on these developments.

Early-life and education

Huebner was born in Detroit, Michigan, on September 8, 1910. He was the son of George John Huebner (Sr) and Ruth Reigel Huebner. His father was a stockbroker and published ''Tooling and Production'' magazine. His grandfather was an automobile parts dealer and many times sold parts and material to Henry Ford. His great-grandfather immigrated to America from Germany in 1815 bringing old sea chests with him.

Huebner was a high achiever in the Detroit public schools and attended Principia High School of Missouri. He enrolled at the University of Michigan when sixteen years old. His first classes were in economics, taken with an intention to follow in his father's footsteps as a stockbroker. He was for a while a stock broker with his own firm starting in 1930. He later became interested in mechanical engineering with the association of his father's friend Harold S. Ellington, a consulting engineer. He changed his major at the University of Michigan which extended his studies. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in engineering in 1932.

Career

Huebner joined Chrysler Corporation in Detroit part-time in 1931 before graduating from the university a year later. He was, at first, a research engineer and, in 1936, became assistant chief engineer at the age of 26. He held that position until 1939 when he went to the Central Engineering Division within Chrysler Corporation to work as assistant to Carl Breer, one of the core engineers of 15 years before. Breer inspired him to look into future technology, which lead him into technology that involved mechanical engineering enhanced by science. Huebner worked on advanced concepts with longer-term objectives that were expected to take ten to twenty years to achieve. This eventually lead him to the idea of developing a gas turbine engine because of the pure and applied science involved in such a sophisticated machine.

One of Huebner's first jobs at the Central Engineering Division within Chrysler was working on aircraft turbine engines. He designed in May 1940, with a group of engineers he directed, a liquid-cooled V-16 fighter aircraft engine called the XI-2220 that had 2,500 horsepower. It was flight tested in a Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighter aircraft, but never manufactured and its development was discontinued in 1945 because World War II ended and it was no longer needed.

Chrysler reorganized their research department in 1946 and Huebner was made chief engineer. Chrysler then started research on a regenerative recuperative turbine design after the XI-2220 engine development came to a stop. The new engine was given the designation A-86. The U.S. Navy gave Chrysler a contract for the design of a 1,000-horsepower turboprop aircraft engine based on the A-86 of which Huebner was the main engineer in charge of its research and development. Four test engines were built by 1949 but never used in a Navy aircraft and no further progress came about.

Rocket engines

Chrysler was awarded a contract from the United States Army Ordnance Corps in 1952 to produce a guided missile. Huebner served as executive engineer in charge of Chrysler's Missile Branch beginning in 1953, while still assigned to Chrysler's automotive research division. He developed in Detroit a complete research and development missile facility that included engineering, testing, and production of the Redstone rocket. These rockets ultimately launched into orbit the first U.S. satellites and the first manned space flights. Huebner worked closely with Wernher von Braun on the space program. For two years he worked on this rocket project and then went back to automotive research. Huebner described his rocket days in a 1959 ''Boys' Life'' magazine article titled "Rehearsal for Space" that was spread out over 3 pages for his complete story.

Turbine engines

Huebner, as chief engineer of Chrysler's research division developing experimental automobiles, was in charge of gas turbine engine design for road vehicles. He became Director of Research in 1955. His main job was the design of an automobile V-8 engine with a hemispherical combustion chamber. Huebner, as research engineer at the Chrysler Corporation, directed a project in 1956 of the first transcontinental trip in a gas-turbine automobile. A production sedan automobile was used and fitted with a gas turbine engine of his design. It became known as the Chrysler Turbine Special. It was a converted 1956 Plymouth Belvedere.

Huebner drove the special turbine engine automobile himself across the United States. He left New York City with his driving crew on Monday March 26, 1956 and traveled on the nation's highways with a support caravan of station wagons of equipment. The trip involved going through Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Amarillo, Albuquerque, and Flagstaff. Huebner arrived four days later in Los Angeles on Friday evening March 30. The trip of the gas turbine car ran on white gasoline, fuel oil, and diesel oil. Sometimes normal leaded gasoline, as used in piston automobiles, was burned as a fuel. It was driven at most of the time and averaged for the total trip. Using conventional gasoline it averaged , but with kerosene usage it was claimed that it could have averaged .

Chrysler, with Huebner as their director of research, displayed an experimental turbine-driven automobile in 1961. The company made 50 experimental turbine-powered automobiles in 1963. The two-year test had inconclusive results and several problems noted. A complaint from the test drivers was that the engine had an annoying whine to it when driven below . Another complaint was that there was a lag in acceleration. The major stumbling block to mass production was its poor fuel economy of . There were six generations of experimental turbine automobiles between 1950 and 1970 where Huebner was the director.

Huebner's research included that of the development of adhesives, radioactive isotopes, sonic oil well drills, exhaust catalysts, and instruments to measure hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide in exhaust emissions. He held forty patents on various inventions related to turbine engines. He wrote seventeen technical engineering papers. Huebner took on the additional duty of becoming president of the Chrysler Institute of Engineering in 1960, a postgraduate school for engineers that he had until his retirement.

Huebner was honored with a 1960 Buckendale Award of 7,000 Society of Automobile Engineers meeting in January 1960 based on his computer-based technology he developed for the industry. In 1962 he was honored at a special celebration of American Society of Mechanical Engineers for his leadership in developing the technology for potential mass-produced turbine passenger automobiles.

Other research

Huebner believed he had put in motion the idea that a gas turbine car was going to be the trend and the conventional automobile would be replaced by this technology. Chrysler continued to develop the automobile turbine engine through the mid-1960s thinking it would revolutionize passenger car design. During Huebner's career a gas turbine automobile of his design was never mass-produced for the public. They were too expensive for the average car owner. Chrysler had a version of Huebner's turbine engine installed into the Abrams military tank that is the main battle tank for the United States and other countries.

Later life, legacy, and death

Huebner retired from Chrysler in 1975 when he was 65 years old. He had developed the first practical gas turbine engine for a passenger car through the use of science and the early use of computer assisted engineering. He continued to advance technology until his death. Huebner was known by historians as the father of the automotive gas turbine engine and the father of Chrysler's turbine program. He died of pulmonary edema in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on September 4, 1996.

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External links

Article by George Huebner

{{DEFAULTSORT:Huebner, George
1910 births
1996 deaths
People from Detroit
University of Michigan College of Engineering alumni
American automotive engineers
Chrysler people
Engineers from Michigan
20th-century American engineers