Georg Friedrich von Reichenbach
German scientific instrument maker
Georg Friedrich von Reichenbach (24 August 1771 – 21 May 1826) was a German scientific instrument maker.
Early life
Reichenbach's father was a master mechanic, and a master cannon-borer, who moved to Mannheim when Reichenbach was two, and became manager of the cannon-boring works there. At 14 Georg was admitted to the Military School at Mannheim where he got to know the astronomer at the Mannheim Observatory. He received a knowledge of mathematical instruments and was inspired to try to construct similar instruments in his father's workshop. The Director of the Observatory sent a sextant made by Reichenbach to Count Rumford.
When he was 19, Reichenbach received a grant of 500 gulden for a journey to London, and introductions to the engineers James Watt and Matthew Boulton. Reichenbach's first visit to England lasted from 1 June 1791 to January 1792, when he returned home for a short time before returning to England. He made drawings of Watt's steam engine despite Watt's attempts to keep it secret from him and also worked as an engineer in English ironworks and studied English instrument making.
He returned home in May 1793 and attempted improvements in the military workshops in Mannheim and Munich, with the help of his father.
Instrument making
In 1796 he moved to Munich where he began making his famous scientific instruments, including a dividing engine, in between carrying out military work, which included the invention of a breech-loading rifle which however did not prove popular.
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This entry incorporates text from “Georg Friedrich von Reichenbach” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.