The complete history of the development of The - The Linde Group

1893 1894 1895
Swedish physicist Anders Ångström measures
the total intensity of solar radiation.
Air liquefaction, “Linde Air,” rectification: into
new markets with new research findings
With air liquefaction, Carl von Linde created the conditions
needed to produce pure gases using low-temperature
processes. These gases include not only oxygen and nitrogen,
but also hydrogen and inert gases – a technology whose
future has only just begun.
An order from the Guinness Brewery in Dublin in 1892 to develop
and install a carbon dioxide liquefaction plant gave von Linde
the concrete impulse that started his work with low temperatures.
Carl von Linde accepted the project although his company
had never yet built any such plant. In 1894, von Linde began
developing an early air liquefaction machine based on the knowledge
gained from carbon dioxide liquefaction. He started from
the idea of using the air itself as a refrigerant – using the cold
generated when air moves from a higher pressure to a lower one
for the additional cooling. This effect had already been described
in 1862 by researchers Thomson and Joule.
The process
The more air is compressed, the more cold is generated when
it expands. This cooling effect increases exponentially when the
air is pre-cooled. However, von Linde could not achieve the
temperature Celsius needed to liquefy the air (about minus 190
degrees) from expansion from high to low pressure and precooling
alone. That required a cooling cycle in which the cold
generated by the expansion is transferred to the compressed,
pre-cooled air in the countercurrent. In a continuous process,
the cold given off from each cycle was multiplied until the air
was liquefied and could be collected in a container.
While proven technology was available for compression and
pre-cooling, the challenge for von Linde and his son Friedrich,
who worked in the refrigeration testing station after receiving
his Doctorate in physics, was to develop a suitable countercurrent
German engineer Rudolph Diesel introduces
the engine which will bear his name.
A small air liquefaction plant by Linde could be seen at the Bavarian Industrial
and Commercial Exhibition in Nuremberg as early as 1896.
apparatus. They decided on a 100-meter long double steel tube,
which was wound into a spiral and well insulated, encased in
wood.
If at first you succeed …
The first trial then began in May. In his memoir “Aus meinem
Leben und von meiner Arbeit,” Carl von Linde wrote: “Happy
and excited, we watched the temperature drop according to
the effect described by Thomson and Joule, even after we had
far surpassed the limits within which those researchers had
worked.”
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