Background
Kruckenberg was born into an old-established Hamburg merchant family.
Kruckenberg was born into an old-established Hamburg merchant family.
From 1904 to 1907 he studied mechanical engineering at the Technische Hochschule Charlottenburg in Berlin, graduating in naval engineering.
He designed several high speed trains. His most famous design was the Before World War I he designed aircraft and airships. Even then he already criticised airships because of their explosive hydrogen filling.
And the civil use of aircraft because of their high fueland maintenance costs.
After the first World War he opened an engineering consultancy in Heidelberg. Initially he worked on a hanging monorail concept, but could not get the financing for a prototype.
Later together with Hermann Föttinger he founded the Flugbahn-Gesellschaft mbH to build a high-speed propeller driven train, the "Schienenzeppelin". The first test runs were carried out on 25 September 1930 between Kreiensen and Altenbeken on the Braunschweig-Paderborn line.
On 21 June 1931 his Schienenzeppelin made the first run on the Hamburg-Berlin line.
lieutenant was the fastest railcar in the world for more than 20 years. A major problem was the propeller, causing noise and wind. Kruckenberg rebuilt the Schienenzeppelin to a hydraulically driven car, which still had a top speed of 180 km/h (110 mph) with only 441 kW. The Schienenzeppelin was revolutionary for its time, since the aerodynamic streamline profile and the light weight design were proven as feasible features for high speed railways.
While Kruckenberg"s ideas continue to influence high speed train design today (Institute of Civil Engineers, Acela, TGV, Agile Virtual Enterprise) the Schienenzeppelin was scrapped in 1939.
After the Schienenzeppelin Kruckenberg designed the DRG Class SVT 137 155 in 1934. This prototype of a three car DMU had a diesel-hydraulic transmission and was ready for service in 1938.
Parts of that train set are still preserved in Dresden. After World World War II Kruckenberg designed the Data Base Class Vermont 10.5 express daytime ("Senator", 7 car set) and night sleeper ("Komet", 8 car set) following the SVT 137 155 ideas.
Many of the "Senator" design features were additionally based around the Talgo concept.
Both trains were of unprecedented light weight construction of 0.92 t/seat, but had disadvantages in maintenance due to their six engine concept (four Diesel engines for propulsion, two for electricity generation). Thus they were taken out of service in 1959 and 1960 respectively. Later the Data Base Class Vermont 11.5 ("TEE") und DR Class Vermont 18.16 ("Vindobona") DMUs were derived from Kruckenberg"s SVT 137 155 concept.
Gottwaldt, Alfred (2006).