Gustaf Dalén
Encyclopedia
Nils Gustaf Dalén was a Swedish
Nobel Laureate and industrialist, the founder of the AGA
company and inventor of the AGA cooker
and the Dalén light
. In 1912 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics
for his "invention of automatic regulators
for use in conjunction with gas accumulators for illuminating lighthouse
s and buoy
s".
, Västra Götaland County
. He managed the family farm, which he expanded to include a market garden, a seed merchants and a dairy. In 1892 he invented a milk-fat tester to check milk quality of the milk delivered and went to Stockholm
to show his new invention for Gustaf de Laval
. de Laval was impressed by the self-taught Dalén and the invention and encouraged him to get a basic technical education. He was admitted to the Chalmers University of Technology
where he earned his Master's degree
and a Doctorate
on leaving in 1896. Dalén was much the same type of inventor as Gustaf de Laval, not afraid of testing "impossible" ideas, but Dalén was much more careful with the company economy. The products should have a solid market place before he introduced a new product.
In 1909 he ascended to the position of Managing Director of the renamed company Svenska Aktiebolaget Gasaccumulator (AGA). AGA developed lighthouses using Dalén's products. 1910 the company bought a large real estate in Lidingö
and built a production plant that was completed around 1912, when they moved out from the facilities in Stockholm.
(IUPAC: ethyne), an extremely explosive hydrocarbon
gas. Dalén invented Agamassan
(Aga), a substrate used to absorb the gas allowing safe storage and hence commercial exploitation.
Acetylene produced an ultra-bright white-light and immediately superseded the duller-flamed LPG as the fuel of choice in lighthouse illuminations.
Dalén exploited the new fuel, developing the Dalén light
which incorporated another invention, the 'sun valve
'. This device allowed the light to operate only at night, conserving fuel, and extending their service life to over a year.
The 'Dalen Flasher' was a device that, except for a small pilot light, only consumed gas during the flash stage. This reduced gas consumption by more than 90%. The AGA lighthouse equipment worked without any type of electric supply and was thus extremely reliable.
To a rugged coastal area like Scandinavia
, his mass-produced, robust, minimal maintenance buoys were a significant boon to safety and livelihood. AGA Lighthouses covered the entire Panama Canal
.
. Most of the testing for the cooker was made in his private kitchen in his Villa Ekbacken that was built when AGA moved to Lidingö in 1912 but that he never actually had a chance to see with his own eyes. His family helped him with the development work, checking temperatures, airflow etc., as the development work proceeded.
ed in an acetylene explosion during a test of maximum pressure for the accumultors. Later the same year he was awarded the Nobel Prize for physics. Too ill to attend the presentation, Dalén had his brother, ophthalmologist Professor Albin Dalén of the Caroline Institute, stand in his place.
The presentation speech praised the quality of sacrificing personal safety in scientific experimentation, a compliment that compared Dalén with Nobel
himself. Despite his blindness, Dalén controlled AGA until his death in 1937. He received over 100 patents during his lifetime.
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
Nobel Laureate and industrialist, the founder of the AGA
AGA AB
AGA AB, previously AB Gasaccumulator and AB Svenska Gasaccumulator, was a Swedish industrial gas company founded in 1904. Nobel Prize laureate Gustaf Dalén was instrumental in the success of the company. Important inventions included the AGA cooker and the Dalén light. In the 1990's AGA conceived...
company and inventor of the AGA cooker
AGA cooker
The AGA cooker is a stored-heat stove and cooker invented in 1929 by the Nobel Prize-winning Swedish physicist Gustaf Dalén , who was employed first as the chief engineer of the Swedish AGA company...
and the Dalén light
Dalén light
The Dalén light was the predominant form of light source in lighthouses from the 1900s through the 1960s, when electric lighting had become dominant. The system was invented by Gustaf Dalén and marketed by his company AGA. Dalén later invented the AGA cooker in 1922. The Dalén light is notable...
. In 1912 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded once a year by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895 and awarded since 1901; the others are the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, and...
for his "invention of automatic regulators
Sun valve
A sun valve is a form of flow control valve, notable because it earned its inventor Gustaf Dalén the Nobel prize in physics....
for use in conjunction with gas accumulators for illuminating lighthouse
Lighthouse
A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses or, in older times, from a fire, and used as an aid to navigation for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways....
s and buoy
Buoy
A buoy is a floating device that can have many different purposes. It can be anchored or allowed to drift. The word, of Old French or Middle Dutch origin, is now most commonly in UK English, although some orthoepists have traditionally prescribed the pronunciation...
s".
Early years
Dalén was born in Stenstorp, a small village in Falköping MunicipalityFalköping Municipality
Falköping Municipality is a municipality in Västra Götaland County in western Sweden. Its seat is located in the city of Falköping....
, Västra Götaland County
Västra Götaland County
Västra Götaland County is a county or län on the western coast of Sweden.The county is the second largest of Sweden's counties and it is subdivided into 49 municipalities . Its population of 1,550,000 amounts to 17% of Sweden's population...
. He managed the family farm, which he expanded to include a market garden, a seed merchants and a dairy. In 1892 he invented a milk-fat tester to check milk quality of the milk delivered and went to Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
to show his new invention for Gustaf de Laval
Gustaf de Laval
Karl Gustaf Patrik de Laval was a Swedish engineer and inventor who made important contributions to the design of steam turbines and dairy machinery.-Life:De Laval was born at Orsa in Dalarna...
. de Laval was impressed by the self-taught Dalén and the invention and encouraged him to get a basic technical education. He was admitted to the Chalmers University of Technology
Chalmers University of Technology
Chalmers University of Technology , is a Swedish university located in Gothenburg that focuses on research and education in technology, natural science and architecture.-History:...
where he earned his Master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
and a Doctorate
Doctorate
A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder to teach in a specific field, A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder...
on leaving in 1896. Dalén was much the same type of inventor as Gustaf de Laval, not afraid of testing "impossible" ideas, but Dalén was much more careful with the company economy. The products should have a solid market place before he introduced a new product.
Career with AGA
In 1906 Dalén became chief engineer at the Gas Accumulator Company (manufacturer and distributor of acetylene) and in 1909 when AGA was founded, he was appointed the managing director for the company. During his life, AGA was one of the most innovative companies in Sweden and produced a large variety of products that grew every year. Finally in the early 1970s AGA was forced to reduce the number of markets it was involved in and concentrate on the production of gases for industrial use.In 1909 he ascended to the position of Managing Director of the renamed company Svenska Aktiebolaget Gasaccumulator (AGA). AGA developed lighthouses using Dalén's products. 1910 the company bought a large real estate in Lidingö
Lidingö Municipality
Lidingö Municipality is a municipality just east of Stockholm in Stockholm County in east central Sweden. Its seat is located in the city of Lidingö...
and built a production plant that was completed around 1912, when they moved out from the facilities in Stockholm.
Dalen light
Initially Dalén worked with acetyleneAcetylene
Acetylene is the chemical compound with the formula C2H2. It is a hydrocarbon and the simplest alkyne. This colorless gas is widely used as a fuel and a chemical building block. It is unstable in pure form and thus is usually handled as a solution.As an alkyne, acetylene is unsaturated because...
(IUPAC: ethyne), an extremely explosive hydrocarbon
Hydrocarbon
In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons from which one hydrogen atom has been removed are functional groups, called hydrocarbyls....
gas. Dalén invented Agamassan
Agamassan
Agamassan is a porous substrate used to safely absorb acetylene and thus allow the transport, storage and commercial exploitation of the otherwise unstable gas. It was developed and patented by the Swedish Nobel Laureate and industrialist Gustaf Dalén...
(Aga), a substrate used to absorb the gas allowing safe storage and hence commercial exploitation.
Acetylene produced an ultra-bright white-light and immediately superseded the duller-flamed LPG as the fuel of choice in lighthouse illuminations.
Dalén exploited the new fuel, developing the Dalén light
Dalén light
The Dalén light was the predominant form of light source in lighthouses from the 1900s through the 1960s, when electric lighting had become dominant. The system was invented by Gustaf Dalén and marketed by his company AGA. Dalén later invented the AGA cooker in 1922. The Dalén light is notable...
which incorporated another invention, the 'sun valve
Sun valve
A sun valve is a form of flow control valve, notable because it earned its inventor Gustaf Dalén the Nobel prize in physics....
'. This device allowed the light to operate only at night, conserving fuel, and extending their service life to over a year.
The 'Dalen Flasher' was a device that, except for a small pilot light, only consumed gas during the flash stage. This reduced gas consumption by more than 90%. The AGA lighthouse equipment worked without any type of electric supply and was thus extremely reliable.
To a rugged coastal area like Scandinavia
Scandinavia
Scandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...
, his mass-produced, robust, minimal maintenance buoys were a significant boon to safety and livelihood. AGA Lighthouses covered the entire Panama Canal
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal is a ship canal in Panama that joins the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. Built from 1904 to 1914, the canal has seen annual traffic rise from about 1,000 ships early on to 14,702 vessels measuring a total of 309.6...
.
AGA cooker
In 1929 he invented the AGA cookerAGA cooker
The AGA cooker is a stored-heat stove and cooker invented in 1929 by the Nobel Prize-winning Swedish physicist Gustaf Dalén , who was employed first as the chief engineer of the Swedish AGA company...
. Most of the testing for the cooker was made in his private kitchen in his Villa Ekbacken that was built when AGA moved to Lidingö in 1912 but that he never actually had a chance to see with his own eyes. His family helped him with the development work, checking temperatures, airflow etc., as the development work proceeded.
Personal life
His parents were Anders and Lovisa Dalén. He married Elma Persson in 1901. They had four children, two daughters and two sons;- Maja, married Silfverstolpe (1904–1995)
- Gunnar (1905–1970)
- Anders (1907–1994)
- Inga-Lisa, married Keen (1910–2006)
The accident in 1912
Early in 1912, Dalén was blindBlindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
ed in an acetylene explosion during a test of maximum pressure for the accumultors. Later the same year he was awarded the Nobel Prize for physics. Too ill to attend the presentation, Dalén had his brother, ophthalmologist Professor Albin Dalén of the Caroline Institute, stand in his place.
The presentation speech praised the quality of sacrificing personal safety in scientific experimentation, a compliment that compared Dalén with Nobel
Alfred Nobel
Alfred Bernhard Nobel was a Swedish chemist, engineer, innovator, and armaments manufacturer. He is the inventor of dynamite. Nobel also owned Bofors, which he had redirected from its previous role as primarily an iron and steel producer to a major manufacturer of cannon and other armaments...
himself. Despite his blindness, Dalén controlled AGA until his death in 1937. He received over 100 patents during his lifetime.
Honours and awards
- Nobel Prize for Physics 1912
- Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of SciencesRoyal Swedish Academy of SciencesThe Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences or Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. The Academy is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization which acts to promote the sciences, primarily the natural sciences and mathematics.The Academy was founded on 2...
- Member of the Academy of Science and Engineering
Further reading
- Clark, R.N. "Nils Gustaf Dalén (1869-1937): Inventor, experimenter, engineer, and nobel laureate." IEEE control systems magazine (2003). v. 23 (4), pp. 68–70.
External links
- nobelprize.org: Gustaf Dalén biography
- Gustaf Dalén biography from the AGA corporation The Dalén Museum, a museum in StenstorpStenstorpStenstorp is a locality situated in Falköping Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden. It had 1,630 inhabitants in 2005....
celebrating Dalén