Peter Ritter von Rittinger or Peter von Rittinger (see styling variants at '' Ritter'') (23 January 1811 Nový Jičín / Neutitschein – 7 December 1872 Vienna) was an Austrian pioneer of mineral processing.

Life

After completion of legal studies, von Rittinger studied in the mining department at the Mining and Forestry Academy in Schemnitz (

Banská Štiavnica Banská Štiavnica (; german: Schemnitz; hu, Selmecbánya (Selmec), ) is a town in central Slovakia, in the middle of an immense caldera created by the collapse of an ancient volcano. For its size, the caldera is known as the Štiavnica Mountai ...

, Slovakia). After completing his studies in 1840, he immediately became a stamp mill inspector in the civil service. In this role, he led a number of improvements in mineral processing. In 1849, he was appointed the head of the Office to the

Jáchymov Jáchymov (); german: Sankt Joachimsthal or ''Joachimsthal'') is a spa town in Karlovy Vary District in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 2,300 inhabitants. The historical core of the town from the 16th century is we ...

district. That year also witnessed the invention of the continuous transverse shock outbreak. The introduction of this innovation in processing technology constituted a major advance. Continuous operation was made possible by the surge range. This separation process was based on differing specific gravities of minerals in the slurry, which in Rittinger's structure, along with other solids and water, continuously moved down a slightly inclined plane in parabolic paths. A common method of obtaining salt in Austria is also due to Peter Rittinger. In 1856 he recognized the principle of the heat pump while conducting experiments on the use of water vapor's latent heat for the evaporation of salt brine. As a result, in Austria the heat pump was used to dry salt in salt marshes. In 1850, as a Section Council for the structure of art and conditioning specialist at the Ministry of Mining and Landescultur, he was summoned to Vienna. In 1863 he was awarded the Order of the Iron Crown, 3rd Class, a hereditary knighthood. In 1868 he was appointed to Ministerialrat im Finanzministerium. Later he was managing director of forests and coal plants on state-owned land. He left numerous publications to his special field, mineral processing, in which he was regarded as internationally recognized authority. His seminal textbook on the field was the ''Lehrbuch der Aufbereitungskunde'' (''Textbook of the Processing Art'') of 1867. His work in the field included the early

scientific Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

study of

comminution Comminution is the reduction of solid materials from one average particle size to a smaller average particle size, by crushing, grinding, cutting, vibrating, or other processes. In geology, it occurs naturally during faulting in the upper part ...

, and his theory on

work Work may refer to: * Work (human activity), intentional activity people perform to support themselves, others, or the community ** Manual labour, physical work done by humans ** House work, housework, or homemaking ** Working animal, an animal t ...

and power in rock breakage is sometimes referred to as "Rittinger's law". In 1926, in Vienna Floridsdorf (21. Bezirk), a street was named after him.

Literature

L. Jontes: Rittinger Peter von. In: Österreichisches Biographisches Lexikon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Vol. 9, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1988, , p. 180 f. (Direct links to p. 180, p. 181)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rittinger, Peter von 1811 births 1872 deaths Austrian scientists Heat pumps Palacký University Olomouc alumni