From engines to hydraulics (eBook)

1901 - 1939

Combustion engines are the "new economy" in the early-20th century. We want to take a look at the history of one of the many "start-up companies" that were sprouting up like mushrooms everywhere at that time.

Heinrich Kämper is 25 years old when he finishes his engineering studies in Munich and Berlin in 1899 and he’s fascinated by this new technology. In the whole of Berlin at that time in 1899, there are only nineteen companies registered, specialized in combustion engines of all kinds (besides, of course, the car manufacturers, who mostly build their own engines). We find suppliers and manufacturers for gasoline or gas engines, for hot-air, for crude oil or petroleum engines: the field is huge and it is even not foreseeable at that time, where the major breakthrough would happen.

Suppliers of diesel engines are not even noticed or recorded separately at that time in Berlin. Further patents and improvements follow quickly step by step: a broad field with great opportunities for young engineers.

Only 1.5 years after completing his university studies, on January 2, 1901, Heinrich Kämper founded his own company for engine construction and manufacturing. He moves into rooms in the middle of the city, at Kurfürstenstraße 146.

In 1901, we already see 32 companies in Berlin that are looking for their fortune in the field of combustion engines. Once again, new applications and technologies have opened up, as can be seen from the Berlin directories at that time.

Two examples of these sections, listed brand-new: in 1901, for the first time, it was worthwhile to identify separately the specialized engine factories for next dedicated applications.

For automotive engines! Automotive engines are no longer summarized as “any other business.”

Then, apparently, an interesting technology has become more widespread: from now onwards we will find the suppliers of modern spirit engines in a separate section!

What will be the future of the automobiles? What is the future of the alcohol-based spirit engine? Progress is hardly predictable. This market is very dynamic, flexibility and speed are vital for one's own success.1

Heinrich Kämper Motorenfabrik presented their first product in the same year of the company’s setup:

A petrol engine with 3.5 horsepower at 1,000 rpm is the first baby in a long line of different products that we will encounter on our way while following this "start-up" company.

It’s with this machine that our story begins.

We see the first successes of these new developments mainly in ship building and agriculture applications. Here, technological development is proceeding at a breathtaking pace: locomobiles based on steam engines have only just begun to replace many horses on the farms. Now it’s already the modern, small motor plows that can be used even better than the large steam engines.

By the way, we will see the affinity for these two applications on several occasions in the company's history:

• 50 years later, Kämper's proximity to agriculture technology certainly brings the most spectacular attempt at product diversification.
• 100 years later, the proximity to ship building industry will leave its mark on InLine's product range, which completely changed in the meantime.

First of all, let's take a quick look at the products: increasingly more new models were quickly developed and built. Any demand from customer was Heinrich Kämpers kick-off for next enthusiastic engineering work.

Heinrich Kämper also pushed the motors aggressively into the market: already 1903, he presented his engines at the International Motor Show in Berlin.

Emperor Wilhelm himself opens the exhibition with a tour. Already at that times, the political celebrities were obviously looking for proximity to the high tech industry!

In fact, during this tour, even a visit to the Heinrich Kämper company is documented.

Our ancestor Heinrich welcomes the Emperor Wilhelm personally to his booth! I am not aware of any contact like that between the management and the later Chancellors from the following century!2

The automobile is Kämper's first target market and the newcomer attacks aggressively: large advertisements in the Allgemeine Automobil Zeitung (AAZ) are placed as early as July 1901, half a year after the company was founded.

Heinrich Kämper not only praises his new engines, but also carries out proper repairs of automobiles: Kämper is clearly aiming for this booming new automotive market.

In the summer of 1901, Heinrich Kämper buys an automobile chassis without an engine in Paris. This is to become his demonstration car: Kämper's own engine is installed in this chassis with belt transmission. Indeed, he’s successful!

Trial orders from Adlerwerke and Büssing are the result.

Soon the company has been in existence for two years and now employs eighteen workers. A respectable success, but the self-confidence and the products are available for an appearance on the big stage.

Kämper initially persists with 1-2 cylinder engines, but in 1904 they are already available in five different versions and outputs up to 16 hp. Experiments are also being carried out with air-cooled engines.

A rapid development?

Not in such a booming technology, not for a start-up that has to stake its claim in the explosively growing market: a really major step takes place in 1905: Kämper builds a six-cylinder engine with 150 hp at 300 rpm.

This is a remarkable achievement, not only for the small Kämper company, but also from a technological perspective: engines of this size are not yet common at that time and were surely no widely used state of the art. This leap in development shows how far ahead the design of the products is. However, unfortunately Kämper's production possibilities are limited: due to lack of money, this additional production can’t be maintained.

It isn’t the only risk: boat engines run quite successfully, but are missing something: boat gearboxes, reversible gears are absolutely necessary, but are not available in usable quality. Thus, around 1904, this accessory was quickly developed by himself. Even the larger engine factories Benz, Deutz and others buy this boat gearbox from their competitor!

Kämper’s products are very successful and this success brings new challenges: space is becoming bottleneck in the small workshop in the middle of the city and the capital requirement for the huge number of simultaneous new developments increases immensely.

Production can be quickly expanded: in 1906, the company is moved to a remote suburb of Berlin, to Mariendorf on the corner of Schöneberger Straße and Burggrafen Straße (today Gersdorfstraße on the corner of Seelbuschring), directly next to the Teltow Canal. Today, we perceive that former suburb in the countryside, Mariendorf, as a rather central part of the city.

The company is located in a factory building, the so-called Schultz’s House, which still exists today.

The need for capital isn’t so easy to solve, Heinrich Kämper has to reorganize himself. From 1902, Heinrich Kämper Motorenfabrik was run as a limited partnership. However, this structure isn’t yet sufficient for the company's development. Already 1904, the next change occurred: Heinrich Kämper operated his factory as a general partnership with his commercial partner Georg August Burmeister.3 This cooperation will continue until 1920.

Now we have space as well as money, as thus the company can grow!

Although Kämper continued to present at the Motor Show (1905), this application remained rather small for his business.

Boat building remains in the foreground in those first years. Here the greatest successes are celebrated.

This is made clear not least by the design of the advertisements in the aforementioned General Automobil Zeitung:

In addition to the ship's engines, agricultural machinery is the second major mainstay, which is becoming increasingly important after the move to the new premises. Heinrich Kämper doesn’t shy away from any major projects in this application either:

In 1907, an invention from Hungary roused the market: Karl Köszegi presented a new development, an "automobile tillage machine." The first prototypes of this rotary tiller were powered by a four-cylinder Kämper engine of 60/70 hp. A public demonstration of this machine in Mahlow, located just south of Berlin, is extremely positive.

The cooperation is going extraordinarily well, it’s even planned to carry out the production of the entire machine in the Kämper engine factory!

Now the response to this demonstration is probably a little too good, because competitors become interested. Ultimately the Lanz company from Mannheim wins the race: it receives the manufacturing rights from Köszegi and immediately takes over a design optimization of the machine. For Kämper, only delivery of engines for the first twenty units, which were built in Mannheim in 1911, remained.

Kämper was ideally suited for the production of the first special requests of the innovator from Hungary, but it was no longer possible to survive for the later large-scale...