Hanns Hörbiger was an Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n engineer

Engineer

An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...

 from Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 with roots in Tyrol

Tyrol (state)

Tyrol is a state or Bundesland, located in the west of Austria. It comprises the Austrian part of the historical region of Tyrol.The state is split into two parts–called North Tyrol and East Tyrol–by a -wide strip of land where the state of Salzburg borders directly on the Italian province of...

. He took part in the construction of the Budapest

Budapest

Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...

 subway and in 1894 invented a new type of valve essential for compressors still in widespread use today.

He is also remembered today for his pseudoscientific

Pseudoscience

Pseudoscience is a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status...

 Welteislehre

Welteislehre

Welteislehre , also known as Glazial-Kosmogonie is a pseudoscientific cosmological theory proposed by Hans Hörbiger, an Austrian engineer and inventor and respected steam engine designer, whose invention of the Hörbiger valve made him a wealthy man.Hörbiger did not arrive at his theory through...

 ("World Ice") theory.

Early life

Hanns Hörbiger was born in Atzgersdorf, a suburb of Liesing

Liesing

Liesing is the 23rd district of Vienna . It is on the southwest edge of Vienna, Austria.It was formed after Austria's Anschluss with Germany, when Vienna expanded from 21 districts to 26...

, Vienna and studied engineering at the local Technical College.

In 1894 Hörbiger had an idea for a new design of blast furnace blowing engine: he replaced the old and easily-damaged leather flap valves with a steel valve. Opening and closing automatically, and light and frictionless guided, the disk valve eliminated all the drawbacks of previous valve designs.

Hörbiger registered a patent for his invention, which smoothed the way for efficient steel production and greater productivity in mining. High-pressure chemistry and the global network of gas exchange – none of these would be possible without the Hörbiger Valve.

In 1900, Hanns Hörbiger and the engineer Friedrich Wilhelm Rogler founded an engineer’s office in Budapest

Budapest

Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...

, which was moved to Vienna in 1903. By 1925 it had developed into the Hörbiger & Co. company. Alfred Hörbiger, one of Hörbiger’s sons, joined the company in 1925 and assumed the management, while Hanns Hörbiger devoted himself to scientific study until his death in 1931.

The company developed rapidly under Alfred Hörbiger’s management: a production facility was taken into service in Vienna and an affiliated company was set up in Düsseldorf. Hörbiger expanded into England and concluded numerous licensing agreements with leading manufacturers of piston blowers, compressors and ships’ Diesel engines in Europe and North America.

The success was driven by originality and inventive genius. The disk valve became more sophisticated: Hörbiger developed highlift or high-pressure valves, compressor control systems and damper plates. By 1937, 98 percent of production was destined for export. The name Hörbiger had become a dependable trademark in valve and control technology for compressors.

Welteislehre

Hörbiger is nowadays chiefly remembered for his Welteislehre

Welteislehre

Welteislehre , also known as Glazial-Kosmogonie is a pseudoscientific cosmological theory proposed by Hans Hörbiger, an Austrian engineer and inventor and respected steam engine designer, whose invention of the Hörbiger valve made him a wealthy man.Hörbiger did not arrive at his theory through...

("World Ice") theory, which he first put forward in the 1913 book, Glazial Kosmologie

Welteislehre

Welteislehre , also known as Glazial-Kosmogonie is a pseudoscientific cosmological theory proposed by Hans Hörbiger, an Austrian engineer and inventor and respected steam engine designer, whose invention of the Hörbiger valve made him a wealthy man.Hörbiger did not arrive at his theory through...

, written in collaboration with amateur astronomer Philipp Fauth. Hörbiger's theories were later popularized by H.S. Bellamy

Hans Schindler Bellamy

Hans Schindler Bellamy was a researcher and author. His books investigate the work of Austrian cosmologist, Hans Hoerbiger and German selenographer, Philipp Fauth, whose now-defunct Cosmic Ice Theory :Bellamy's first book, Moons, Myths and Man, describes Hoerbiger's theory in detail, and its...

, and influenced Hans Robert Scultetus

Hans Robert Scultetus

Hans Robert Scultetus was a German meteorologist, who headed the Pflegestätte für Wetterkunde of the Nazi Ahnenerbe think tank....

, head of the Pflegestätte für Wetterkunde (Meteorology Section) of the SS-Ahnenerbe

Ahnenerbe

The Ahnenerbe was a Nazi German think tank that promoted itself as a "study society for Intellectual Ancient History." Founded on July 1, 1935, by Heinrich Himmler, Herman Wirth, and Richard Walther Darré, the Ahnenerbe's goal was to research the anthropological and cultural history of the Aryan...

, who believed that Welteislehre could be used to provide accurate long-range weather forecasts.

Family

Two of Hörbiger's sons, Paul and Attila, were matineé idols in the interwar years, and Paul Hoerbiger's daughter Mavie Hörbiger also went on to become a celebrated actress. His two other sons devoted themselves to promoting their father's theory.

Honors

The Deslandres

Deslandres (crater)

Deslandres is the heavily worn and distorted remains of a lunar impact crater. It is located to the southeast of the Mare Nubium, in the rugged southern highlands of the Moon. In dimension it is the second-largest crater formation on the visible Moon, being beaten only by the 303-kilometer-diameter...

 crater on the moon was designated Hörbiger by Philipp Fauth

Philipp Johann Heinrich Fauth

Philipp Johann Heinrich Fauth was a German selenographer. Born in Bad Dürkheim, he worked as a schoolteacher. As an amateur astronomer, he studied the formations on the Moon with great intensity and meticulousness...

 on his private lunar chart; it subsequently received the official name of Deslandres, following a 1942 suggestion by E. M. Antoniadi in 1942, which was approved at the International Astronomical Union

International Astronomical Union

The International Astronomical Union IAU is a collection of professional astronomers, at the Ph.D. level and beyond, active in professional research and education in astronomy...

's 1948 General Assembly.