Niklaus Riggenbach (21 May 1817 – 25 July 1899) was the inventor of the
Riggenbach rack system and the counter-pressure brake. He was also an
engineerEngineers are concerned with developing economical and safe solutions to practical problems, by applying mathematics and scientific knowledge while considering technical constraints. The term is derived from the Latin root "ingenium," meaning "cleverness"...
and
locomotiveA locomotive is a railway vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. The word originates from the Latin loco – "from a place", ablative of locus, "place" + Medieval Latin motivus, "causing motion", and is a shortened form of the term locomotive engine, first used in the early 19th...
builder.
Niklaus Riggenbach, from
RünenbergRünenberg is a municipality in the district of Sissach in the canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland. The population was 772....
, Basel-Landschaft,
SwitzerlandSwitzerland , officially the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 states named cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities...
, was born in
GuebwillerGuebwiller is a commune in the Haut-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France.It is situated northwest of Mulhouse at the foot of the Vosges mountains...
,
AlsaceAlsace is the fourth-smallest of the 26 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the sixth-most densely populated region in France , with 222 inhabitants per km²...
. After the untimely death of his father, his mother returned to
BaselBasel is Switzerland's third most populous city . With 830000 inhabitants in the tri-national metropolitan area , Basel is Switzerland's second-largest urban area....
with her eight young children. At age 16 Riggenbach began an apprenticeship as a
mechanicA mechanic is a craftsman who uses tools to repair machinery.Many mechanics are specialized in a particular field such as auto mechanics, bicycle mechanics, boiler mechanics, industrial maintenance mechanics , air conditioning and refrigeration mechanics, aircraft mechanics, diesel mechanics, and...
, going abroad after completing his training. In 1837 he found his way to
ParisParis is the capital of France and the country's most populous city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, where he accepted employment. By taking technical courses in night school, he acquired considerable knowledge in
mathematicsMathematics is the science and study of quantity, structure, space, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns, formulate new conjectures, and establish truth by rigorous deduction from appropriately chosen axioms and definitions....
and
physicsPhysics is a natural science; it is the study of matter and its motion through spacetime and all that derives from these, such as energy and force...
. With the opening of the Paris-St. Germain railroad line in 1839 he found his vocation to build locomotives.
In June 1840 he moved to
KarlsruheKarlsruhe is a city in the south west of Germany, in the Bundesland Baden-Württemberg, located near the French-German border....
,
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium,...
, and found employment in the machine works of Emil Kessler. Here he soon rose to managing director and was involved in the construction of no less than 150 locomotives. One of these steam engines was the "
LimmatThe Limmat is a river in Switzerland. It is the continuation of the Linth river, known as Limmat from the point of effluence from Lake Zürich, in the city of Zürich. From Zürich it flows in a northwesterly direction, after 35 km reaching the river Aare...
" of the
Schweizerischen Nordbahn (Swiss Northern Railway), opened on 9 August 1847, also called the Spanisch-Brötli line, which he ferried to Switzerland in order to test it on the Zürich-Baden line.
As construction of the Basel-
OltenOlten is a town in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland and capital of the district of the same name.Olten's station is within 30 minutes of Zurich, Bern, Basel, and Lucerne by train, and is a rail hub of Switzerland.-History:...
line began in 1853, the board of directors of the
Schweizer Centralbahn Gesellschaft (Swiss Central Rail Association) appointed him chief of the machine works. He made several official trips to
EnglandEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and
AustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.3 million people in Central Europe. It borders both Germany and the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west...
, and crawled under a fair number of
steam locomotiveA steam locomotive is a locomotive powered by steam. The term usually refers to its use on railways, but can also refer to a "road locomotive" such as a traction engine or steamroller....
s and into their boilers, "to make the good even better." Various improvements in railroading bear his name. In 1856 he became a master machinist and boss of the new main workshop of the
Centralbahn in Olten. Under his direction this workshop evolved into a full-fledged engine works, building the company's own locomotives and bridges.
Track
gripFriction is the force resisting the relative lateral motion of solid surfaces, fluid layers, or material elements in contact. It is usually subdivided into several varieties:...
(
adhesionThe term adhesion railway or adhesion traction describes the most common type of railway, where power is applied by driving some or all of the wheels of the locomotive and thus it relies on the friction between a steel wheel and a steel rail....
) on the Hauenstein line caused him concern. The difficulties led Riggenbach to the concept of the
rack railwayA cog railway, pens and rails railway, rack-and-pinion railway or rack railway is a railway with a toothed rack rail, usually between the running rails. The trains are fitted with one or more cog wheels or pinions that mesh with this rack rail...
. After many attempts he discovered that one could negotiate
steeperIn mathematics, the slope or gradient of a line describes its steepness, incline, or grade. A higher slope value indicates a steeper incline....
stretches of
trackRail tracks are the surface structures that support and guide trains or other rail-guided transportation vehicles.Most familiarly they consist of* two steel rails on which the vehicle wheels run,...
by bolting a
rackA rack and pinion is a pair of gears which convert rotational motion into linear motion. The circular pinion engages teeth on a flat bar - the rack...
between the rails, which a toothed wheel or
cogA gear is a component within a transmission device that transmits rotational torque by applying a force to the teeth of another gear or device. A gear is different from a pulley in that a gear is a round wheel that has linkages that mesh with other gear teeth, allowing force to be fully...
on the underside of the locomotive could engage. He built his first locomotive in 1862, and on 12 August 1863 France awarded him
PatentA patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for a public disclosure of an invention....
No. 59625 for the invention. The
VitznauVitznau is a municipality in the district of Lucerne in the canton of Lucerne in Switzerland.-History:Vitznau was first mentioned in 998. In the 19th century it became a popular destination for tourism, especially from England; the imposing Park Hotel Vitznau west of town dates from the...
-
RigiRigi is a mountain in central Switzerland and part of the Swiss Alps. It's also known as the "Queen of the Mountains."The mountain is easily accessible by public transportation. It offers many winter and summer excursions such as skiing or sledding. Hiking there is also a favorite...
line was inaugurated in 1871 as the first
mountain railwayA mountain railway is a railway that ascends and descends a mountain slope that has a steep grade. Such railways can use a number of different technologies to overcome the steepness of the grade...
to use the Riggenbach system in Europe. The locomotives were equipped with his
counter-pressure braking systemThe counter-pressure brake , also named the Riggenbach counter-pressure brake after its inventor, Niklaus Riggenbach, is a dynamic railway brake on steam locomotives that, through a combination of means, brakes the locomotive in the driving cylinders...
.