Viktor Kaplan
In the service of science
| The Styrian-born Viktor Kaplan was one of the most gifted engineers of his time. His greatest achievement, the Kaplan turbine, became a triumphant success all over the world.
1876 Viktor Kaplan is born in Mürzzuschlag in Styria.
1895 After taking his school-leaving examination („Matura“), the young man’s enthusiasm for engineering leads him to register at the Vienna University of Technology.
1909 Kaplan receives a PhD in Engineering after spending several years working as an engineer and researcher. In the same year, he qualifies as a university lecturer at the German Technology School in Brno, now in the Czech Republic, and marries his fiancée, Margarethe Strasser.
1912 After years of intensive research at the turbine laboratory in Brno, Kaplan patents his first turbine.
However, the Kaplan turbine does not yet live up to all its creator’s expectations.
1922 Kaplan’s long years of turbine research bear fruit with the completion of the improved Kaplan turbine. Owing to health problems, however, Viktor Kaplan is forced to leave his team to work without him in the last stage of development.
1925 A few Kaplan turbines are already in operation in Austria. Now Sweden, too, discovers the power of this turbine and uses it in large power plants.
1931 Kaplan retires because of poor health and spends most of his time at his country estate of Rochuspoint on Lake Attersee.
1934 Viktor Kaplan dies at his estate on Lake Attersee.
Viktor Kaplan (*27.11.1876 +23.08.1934)
| Viktor Kaplan, the inventor of the Kaplan turbine, was born in Mürzzuschlag on 27 November 1876. Viktor was fascinated by technology from his earliest childhood and built water wheels while still at elementary school. These were followed shortly afterwards by an electric motor and a steam engine built from an old tin can. His next creation too was impressive: a camera, which he made using a few household utensils. At this time, the Kaplan family was already living in Vienna, where Viktor attended secondary school.
Practice and theory
| After taking his school-leaving examination („Matura“) in 1895, he registered at the University of Technology in the Austrian capital, where he received his PhD in 1909. However, he also took his first job (in an engineering works in Leobersdorf, Lower Austria) even before completing his studies. Two years later, the young engineer received a post at the German Technology School in Brno. There, his researches focused mainly on theoretical physics.
In 1909, shortly after his graduation, Kaplan obtained his qualification as a university lecturer in Brno and was promoted to deputy department head. In the same year, he married Margarethe Strasser, a young woman whom he had met a year earlier on a cruise in Scandinavia.
The Kaplan turbine
| A few months after Kaplan’s wedding, the first turbine laboratory opened in Brno. Here Kaplan continued with his research. He registered a patent for his turbine in 1912, although the turbine still had several flaws at the time. For years he continued to investigate the causes of his turbine’s problems, which he finally eliminated in 1922. However, while these researches were in progress, Viktor Kaplan became so ill that his assistants had to finish the work alone.
In 1931, Kaplan was forced to retire because of the poor state of his health. Until his death as the result of a stroke in 1934, he lived with his wife, Margarethe, at his country estate of Rochuspoint on Lake Attersee.