Fritz Fiedler (born

Potsdam Potsdam () is the capital and, with around 183,000 inhabitants, largest city of the German state of Brandenburg. It is part of the Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region. Potsdam sits on the River Havel, a tributary of the Elbe, downstream of ...

9 January 1899: died

Schliersee Schliersee is a small town (Markt) and a municipality in the district of Miesbach in Bavaria in Germany. It is named after the nearby Lake Schliersee. It comprises the districts Schliersee (town), , , , Josefsthal and Spitzingsee. Among the p ...

8 July 1972), was an automotive engineer. His projects included the

BMW 328 The BMW 328 was a sports car offered by BMW from 1936 to 1940, with the body design credited to Peter Szymanowski, who became BMW chief of design after World War II (although technically the car was designed by Fritz Fiedler). Specifications ...

sports car, the ex-BMW Bristol straight-six engine, and the

BMW New Class The BMW New Class (german: Neue Klasse) was a line of sedans and coupes produced by German automaker BMW between 1962 and 1977. These models ensured BMW's solvency after the company's financial crisis of the 1950s and established the identity of ...

sedan.

Career to 1945

Fiedler began his career in

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...

Stoewer Stoewer was a German automobile manufacturer before World War II whose headquarters were in Stettin (Now Szczecin, Poland). History The first company was founded by the Stoewer brothers, Emil (lived 1873 - 1942) and Bernhard (1875 - 1937) in ...

and moved to

Horch Horch () was a car brand manufacturer, founded in Germany by August Horch & Cie at the beginning of the 20th century. It is one of the predecessors of the present day Audi company, which itself resulted from the merger of Auto Union Aktieng ...

in 1924, where he eventually became chief engineer. He designed 8-cylinder and 12-cylinder cars at Horch. He left in 1932 when Horch became part of

Auto Union Auto Union AG, was an amalgamation of four German automobile manufacturers, founded in 1932 and established in 1936 in Chemnitz, Saxony. It is the immediate predecessor of Audi as it is known today. As well as acting as an umbrella firm f ...

. He then went to BMW on the recommendation of his former assistant Rudolf Schleicher, who had joined Horch from BMW in 1927 and returned to BMW in 1931. Fiedler became chief engineer at the age of 32 over former chief engineer Alfred Böning who became head of the automotive drawing office. In 1933 Fiedler was given the project to design the M78 six-cylinder engine for the

BMW 303 The BMW 303 was a small family saloon produced by BMW in 1933 and 1934. It was the first BMW motor car with a six-cylinder engine and the first BMW motor car with the "kidney grille" associated with the brand. The platform developed for the 3 ...

. The first car that Fiedler was fully responsible for was the BMW 326 saloon that was shown at the International Automobile Ausstellung in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

in 1936. While Schleicher was at

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...

on motorcycle development and the competition side of BMW motor car activity, Fiedler was at

Eisenach Eisenach () is a town in Thuringia, Germany with 42,000 inhabitants, located west of Erfurt, southeast of Kassel and northeast of Frankfurt. It is the main urban centre of western Thuringia and bordering northeastern Hessian regions, situat ...

in overall command of the car side of BMW, specialising in

chassis A chassis (, ; plural ''chassis'' from French châssis ) is the load-bearing framework of an artificial object, which structurally supports the object in its construction and function. An example of a chassis is a vehicle frame, the underpar ...

, suspension and aerodynamic design and development. His last automotive design from Eisenach was the 3.5-litre 6

cylinder A cylinder (from ) has traditionally been a three-dimensional solid, one of the most basic of curvilinear geometric shapes. In elementary geometry, it is considered a prism with a circle as its base. A cylinder may also be defined as an ...

BMW 335 saloon, a fine 90 mph car for the German

autobahn The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track' ...

s. During the war he was occupied with

military vehicle A military vehicle is any vehicle for land-based military transport and activity, including combat vehicles; both specifically designed for, or significantly used by military and armed forces. Most military vehicles require off-road capabil ...

design and development and finished up at Munich, so that after the war he was in the American zone. During the war he was a Director of BMW, but left the board in 1945.

In England

In 1947 Fiedler joined AFN Ltd at the persuasion of H.J. Aldington. Although he was

lent Lent ( la, Quadragesima, 'Fortieth') is a solemn religious moveable feast#Lent, observance in the liturgical calendar commemorating the 40 days Jesus spent fasting in the desert and enduring Temptation of Jesus, temptation by Satan, according ...

Bristol Bristol () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city, Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, Bristol, River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Glouces ...

as a consultant on their Type 400 project, he did most of his work in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

Isleworth Isleworth ( ) is a town located within the London Borough of Hounslow in West London, England. It lies immediately east of the town of Hounslow and west of the River Thames and its tributary the River Crane. Isleworth's original area of se ...

, where he was always known as Dr Fiedler, although he did not have that title in Germany. He was very popular with the workforce at AFN, most people describing him as a kindly and charming man, and everyone admired his engineering qualities. He took charge of the development of the post-war

Frazer Nash Frazer Nash was a brand of British sports car manufactured from 1922 first by Frazer Nash Limited founded by engineer Archibald Frazer-Nash. On its financial collapse in 1927 a new company, AFN Limited, was incorporated. Control of AFN passed t ...

, dealing with chassis, suspension, body design and

construction Construction is a general term meaning the art and science to form objects, systems, or organizations,"Construction" def. 1.a. 1.b. and 1.c. ''Oxford English Dictionary'' Second Edition on CD-ROM (v. 4.0) Oxford University Press 2009 and ...

and development of the FNS Bristol

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ...

. On the Isleworth

dynamometer A dynamometer or "dyno" for short, is a device for simultaneously measuring the torque and rotational speed ( RPM) of an engine, motor or other rotating prime mover so that its instantaneous power may be calculated, and usually displayed by ...

he got over 100 bhp from the Bristol engine before the Bristol men did.

Return to Germany and BMW

After three years with AFN Ltd, Fiedler returned to Germany. He returned to BMW as chief engineer in 1952 after working at

Opel Opel Automobile GmbH (), usually shortened to Opel, is a German automobile manufacturer which has been a subsidiary of Stellantis since 16 January 2021. It was owned by the American automaker General Motors from 1929 until 2017 and the PSA Grou ...

for a short time. He took over responsibility for the ongoing

V8 engine A V8 engine is an eight-cylinder piston engine in which two banks of four cylinders share a common crankshaft and are arranged in a V configuration. The first V8 engine was produced by the French Antoinette company in 1904, developed and u ...

project and was responsible for the

BMW 503 The BMW 503 is a two-door 2+2 gran turismo in both Coupé and Cabriolet form manufactured by German automaker BMW from 1956 until 1959. The company developed the 503 alongside the 507 roadster in an attempt to sell a significant number of lux ...

and BMW 507. He was

chairman The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the group ...

of BMW AG from 1955 to 1956 and he finally retired in 1966, after a long and active life devoted to BMW, but he attended the firm each day as a consultant for a further two years and died in 1972.

Notes

References

*“From Chain Drive to Turbocharger- The AFN Story”, Denis Jenkinson, 1984. *

External links

''BMW Designers''
''Fritz Fiedler among the BMW automotive designers''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Fiedler, Fritz German automobile designers BMW people 1972 deaths 1899 births