Imanuel Lauster (28 January 1873 – 15 March 1948) was a German engineer and businessman, who designed the
first Diesel engine for
Rudolf Diesel,
and served as the head of
M.A.N.'s board of directors from 1932 to 1934.
Life and career
Lauster was born in , a small municipality then just to the north-east of
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...
(into which it was subsumed in 1923). He lived a youth "full of privation". On 1 April 1888, he joined ''Gottlieb Kuhn Maschinen- und Kesselfabrik'' in
Stuttgart-Berg. The firm's workshop did not need
fitter apprentices at the time, therefore, Lauster was taught
technical drawing at the design bureau before he started working as a fitter at the workshop in 1889. Later, Lauster also assembled steam engines, and tested them on a dynamometer. In 1891, Lauster was assigned to the newly founded internal combustion engine workshop of ''G. Kuhn'', where he had to build 6 PS and 8 PS Langensiepen engines with glowtube ignition. He was also responsible for demonstrating and explaining these engines to customers.
After his G. Kuhn apprenticeship, Lauster studied mechanical engineering at
Königliche Baugewerkschule in Stuttgart. Lauster was a good student who had excellent grades. In 1894, after his graduation, Lauster began working as the assistant of
Georg Lindner, who was, at the time, professor at
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT)
The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT; german: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie) is a public research university in Karlsruhe, Germany. The institute is a national research center of the Helmholtz Association.
KIT was created in 2009 w ...
.
While working as Lindner's assistant, Lauster studied electronics and also attended lectures about petroleum at KIT. In December 1895, Lauster applied for a job as an engineer in
Rudolf Diesel's engine laboratory at
Maschinenfabrik Augsburg (later M.A.N.), where he started working on 2 January 1896.
Lauster's first assigned task was to design Rudolf Diesel's third prototype engine
Motor 250/400
The Motor 250/400 is the first functional diesel engine. It was designed by Rudolf Diesel, and drawn by Imanuel Lauster. The workshop of the Maschinenfabrik Augsburg built two units, the ''A-Motor'', and the ''B-Motor''. The latter has been on s ...
, which would later prove to be the first functional Diesel engine; by 30 April 1896, he had completed the drawings.
Friedrich Sass
Friedrich Sass (6 January 1883 – 26 February 1968) was a German engineer, university professor and historian.
Life and career
Friedrich Sass was born in Koldenbüttel and attended the ''Gymnasium'' (grammar school) in Schleswig. He studied ...
argues that Lauster might have received help from Diesel's assistant Nadrowski, but Sass believes that Lauster did most of the design work himself.
In December 1896, Lauster received a pay rise and a bonus of 3000
Mark – an unusually high amount of money for a junior engineer – for designing this engine.
In 1898, Lauster was ordered to modify the first commercial Diesel engine at a match factory in Kempten.
On 3 March 1899, Lauster became the successor of Vogt at M.A.N.; in 1902, he was assigned the position of a senior engineer, and in 1904, he became head of M.A.N.'s Diesel engine department. In 1913, Lauster joined M.A.N.'s board of directors, whose head he became in 1932.
In July 1934, Lauster was forced to resign, after his son-in-law made deals for M.A.N. that led to confiscation of payments made to M.A.N..
From 1931 until 9 May 1933, Lauster was a member of the
German Association of Engineer's board of directors.
Inventions and works
Lauster's most notable work is the design of the first functional Diesel engine. Among other modifications, he designed an improved governor for the first commercially used Diesel engine.
Friedrich Sass also believes that Lauster designed an improved fuel injector vaporiser for the Diesel engine.
In 1901, Lauster designed the first
trunk piston Diesel engine – the
MAN DM series
A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromos ...
– together with Wilhelm Eberle,
and in 1904, they designed the first submarine Diesel engine;
however, it was never built.
Lauster and Diesel
Soon after Lauster had join his team, Rudolf Diesel realised that Lauster was a great engineer. In 1896, Diesel initiated Lauster's bonus and pay rise at Maschinenfabrik Augsburg, and in July 1900, Diesel sent Lauster a "gratification" of 500 Mark.
However, Lauster and Diesel never became friends. Later in his life, Diesel developed animosity towards Lauster, possibly caused by Diesel's mental health problems. At the end of his life, Diesel had the delusion that Lauster tried to hinder the Diesel engine's success, which made Diesel express in his journal that Lauster's contribution towards the Diesel engine was only minor.
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Lauster, Imanuel
1873 births
1948 deaths
19th-century German engineers
20th-century German engineers
Engineers from Stuttgart
20th-century German inventors
People associated with the internal combustion engine