Helmut Hölzer
| Helmut Hölzer (English: Hoelzer) | |
|---|---|
|
Helmut Hoelzer looking around left shoulder of General Medaris (in uniform) | |
| Born |
February 27, 1912 Bad Liebenstein, Thüringen, German Empire |
| Died |
October 12, 1996 (aged 84) Huntsville, Alabama, United States |
| Fields | Electrical Engineering,[1] Applied mathematics |
| Institutions |
1933-tbd: teaching |
| Alma mater | Darmstadt |
| Known for | Designing an electronic simulator for the V-2 rocket control system.[3][4] |
Helmut Hoelzer[5] was a Nazi Germany V-2 rocket engineer who was brought to the United States under Operation Paperclip.
Life
In October 1939, while working for the Telefunken electronics firm in Berlin, Hoelzer met with Ernst Steinhoff,[6] Hermann Steuding, and Wernher von Braun regarding guide beams for a flying body.[Neufeld 1] In late 1940 at Peenemünde, Hoelzer was head of the guide beam division[Neufeld 2] (assistant Henry Otto Hirschler[7]), which developed a guide-plane system which alternates a transmitted signal from two antennas a short distance apart, as well as a vacuum tube mixing device (German: Mischgerät)[8] which corrected for momentum that would perturb an object that had been moved back on-track.[Neufeld 3] By the Fall of 1941, Hoelzer's "mixing device" was used to provide V-2 rocket rate measurement instead of rate gyros.[Neufeld 4]
Then at the beginning of 1942, Hoelzer built an analog computer to calculate and simulate[7] V-2 rocket trajectories[Neufeld 5][9] Hoelzer's team also developed the Messina telemetry system.[1] After evacuating Peenemünde for the Alpenfestung (Alpine Fortress), Hoelzer returned to Peenemünde via motorcycle to look for portions of his PhD dissertation[5] prior to surrendering to United States forces at the end of World War II.
Family
One of his grandchildren is Olympic swimmer Margaret Hoelzer.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Wade, Mark. "Hoelzer". Astronautix. Retrieved October 19, 2008.
- ↑ June 6, 1960
- ↑ Tomayko, James E. "Computers Take Flight: A History of NASA's Pioneering Digital Fly-by-Wire Project" (PDF). p. 13. Archived from the original on 2004-07-19. Retrieved October 18, 2008.
- ↑ Tomayko, James E. (July 1985). "Helmut Hoelzer's Fully Electronic Analog Computer". Annals of the History of Computing 7 (3): 227–240.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Ordway, Frederick I, III; Sharpe, Mitchell R (1979). The Rocket Team. Apogee Books Space Series 36. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell. pp. 46,294. ISBN 1-894959-00-0.
- ↑ Ernst Steinhoff
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 H. Otto Hirschler, 87, Aided Space Program
- ↑ Ley, Willy (1951) [1944]. Rockets, Missiles and Space Travel (Revised edition 1958). New York: The Viking Press. pp. p257.
- ↑ http://www.computer.org/portal/web/csdl/doi/10.1109/MAHC.1985.10025
Sources
- Neufeld, Michael J (1995). The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemünde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era. New York: The Free Press. pp. p104,106, 107, 140.