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Lange, Kurt - Germany

Professor Kurt Lange

13 December 1919 - 1 August 2009 - Germany

Affiliation to CIRP

Active Member - 1966
President - 1985 – 1986
Honorary Member - 1992

Contributions

Contributed to STC Forming and STC Dictionary; Member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the German Academic Group of Manufacturing (HGF later denominated WGP), Founder of the International Cold Forging Group (ICFG) and the German Forming Association (AGU).

Distinctions

  • SME Gold Medal of Manufacturing Engineering;

  • International Prize for Research and Development of the Japan Society for Technology of Plasticity (JSTP);

  • Georg-Schlesinger-Prize of the State Berlin;

  • Herwart-Opitz-Medal of the German Engineering Association (VDI);

  • Honorary doctorate of the Technology University of Budapest.

Accomplishments

Professor Lange started 1945 as personal assistant to Professor Otto Kienzle at the Forging Research Unit of Technische Hochschule Hannover. He published his doctoral dissertation in 1953 entitled "Accuracy in Forging with Hammers" and was promoted to leading engineer in the same forging department.

Four years later he completed his habilitation on "Forging" and gave lectures in Hannover on forging and also at Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe on "Machines and Tools of Metal Forming Technology". At the end of 1957 he joined the Daimler-Benz AG / Stuttgart; two years later, he started to manage the entire Forging Department of Daimler-Benz / Stuttgart.

In March 1963 he was appointed as chair for Metal Forming Technology at Technische Hochschule Stuttgart. Under his leadership his chair evolved to become the Institute for Metal Forming Technology (IFU) and during these decades more than 110 doctoral thesis and habilitations have been completed. Despite his retirement in 1988, Professor Lange continued to work in his office at the institute until last day of life. Prof. Lange dedicated his entire working life to his students and scientific organisations in the field metal forming.

For many years his diligent systematic work contributed to fundamental and novel research work at an international level. During 70ies he became an international highly honored teacher in metal forming community and published about 15 books until 2006 which have been translated to English, Japanese and Chinese language.