Wilhelm Schmidt, known as Hot Steam Schmidt (German: Heißdampf-Schmidt) (1858 - 1924) was a German engineer and inventor who achieved the breakthrough in the development of superheated steam

Superheated steam

Superheated steam is steam at a temperature higher than water's boiling point. If saturated steam is heated at constant pressure, its temperature will also remain constant as the steam quality increases towards 100% Dry Saturated Steam. Continued heat input will then generate superheated steam...

 technology for steam engines.

Wilhelm Schmidt was born in Wegeleben

Wegeleben

Wegeleben is a town in the district of Harz, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is situated on the river Bode, east of Halberstadt. It is part of the Verbandsgemeinde Vorharz. The town was the birthplace of Martin Bormann in 1900. It has a station on the Magdeburg–Thale railway....

, Germany, on 18 February 1858 and began his professional career as a machine fitter. He studied at the technical high school in Dresden

Dresden

Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....

 under Gustav Zeuner

Gustav Zeuner

Gustav Anton Zeuner was a German physicist, engineer and epistemologist, considered the founder of technical thermodynamics and of the Dresden School of Thermodynamics.-University and Revolution:...

.

In 1883 he took a post as a civil engineer

Civil engineer

A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering; the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructures while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing infrastructures that have been neglected.Originally, a...

 in Kassel

Kassel

Kassel is a town located on the Fulda River in northern Hesse, Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Kassel Regierungsbezirk and the Kreis of the same name and has approximately 195,000 inhabitants.- History :...

, where he developed superheated steam technology to the point where it could be practically used. In 1908 he transferred his home and the base of his firm to Benneckenstein

Benneckenstein

Benneckenstein is a town in the district of Harz, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Since 1 January 2010, it has been part of the town Oberharz am Brocken. Benneckenstein is in the eastern Harz, 14 km southeast of Braunlage, and 24 km south of Wernigerode....

 in the Harz. He was not the first person to work with superheated steam, but his predecessors had only used steam temperatures up to 250 °C; Schmidt was the first to risk increasing this to 350 °C. For further trials with superheated steam the Ilsenburg

Ilsenburg

Ilsenburg is a town in the district of Harz, in Saxony-Anhalt in Germany. It is situated under the north foot of the Harz Mountains, at the entrance to the Ilsetal valley of the small Ilse river, a tributary of the Oker, about six north-west of the town of Wernigerode. It received town privileges...

 – Wernigerode

Wernigerode

Wernigerode is a town in the district of Harz, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Until 2007, it was the capital of the district of Wernigerode. Its population was 35,500 in 1999....

 railway, there was a trials organisation near Wernigerode station. It was here that Schmidt founded the Schmidt Superheated Steam Company (Schmidtsche Heissdampfgesellschaft).

By using superheated steam

Steam

Steam is the technical term for water vapor, the gaseous phase of water, which is formed when water boils. In common language it is often used to refer to the visible mist of water droplets formed as this water vapor condenses in the presence of cooler air...

 the thermal efficiency

Thermal efficiency

In thermodynamics, the thermal efficiency is a dimensionless performance measure of a device that uses thermal energy, such as an internal combustion engine, a boiler, a furnace, or a refrigerator for example.-Overview:...

 of a steam engine could be raised by up to about 50 %. This technology had a decisive influence on the development of the steam locomotive

Steam locomotive

A steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...

 and steamship, as well as all other applications where steam engines were used.

Numerous smaller inventions by Wilhelm Schmidt, like for example the Schmidt superheater

Superheater

A superheater is a device used to convert saturated steam or wet steam into dry steam used for power generation or processes. There are three types of superheaters namely: radiant, convection, and separately fired...

 (around 1890) or the piston valve

Piston valve

A piston valve is a device used to control the motion of a fluid along a tube or pipe by means of the linear motion of a piston within a chamber or cylinder.Examples of piston valves are:...

, which he developed together with Robert Garbe

Robert Garbe

Robert Hermann Garbe was a German railway engineer and chief engineer of the Berlin division in the Prussian state railways from 1895 to 1917...

 of the Prussian state railways

Prussian state railways

The term Prussian state railways encompasses those railway organisations that were owned or managed by the State of Prussia...

, brought the technology of the superheated steam engine to perfection.

Even today, his successor company - Schmidt'schen Heissdampf GmbH, survives under the name of ALSTOM Power Energy Recovery GmbH, in Kassel-Bettenhausen. It develops and builds apparatus for the processes involving the transfer of heat in the petrochemical, chemical and metallurgical industrie, e.g. cracked gas coolers for the manufacture of ethylene, gas coolers for the manufacture of methanol, ammoniac and hydrogen and a multitude of equipment for special purposes. The company continues to be highly innovative and a market leader in its field.

Schmidt viewed his inventions however as rather unimportant in view of "a world which is badly lost". He held a strong faith and distributed Warning Cry to the People (Mahnrufe an das Volk) from Bethel, near Bielefeld

Bielefeld

Bielefeld is an independent city in the Ostwestfalen-Lippe Region in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population of 323,000, it is also the most populous city in the Regierungsbezirk Detmold...

. He was friends with Friedrich von Bodelschwingh

Friedrich von Bodelschwingh

Friedrich von Bodelschwingh, Junior was a German theologian and public health advocate. His father was Friedrich von Bodelschwingh, Senior , founder of the Bodelschwinghsche Anstalten Bethel charitable foundations.-Public health activities:Friedrich was the son of Reverend Friedrich von...

. He held the view that Anglo-Saxon Christianity had weakened German Christianity. He died on 16 February 1924 in Bethel.

External links

• There is an English-language discussion forum at Railways of Germany