The Contribution of Petro Mukhachov (1861–1935) to the Development of Mechanical Engineering and Metallurgy

Abstract

In the second half of the 19^th century, the Second Industrial Revolution began worldwide. One of its achievements was the discovery of new technologies for steel smelting: in Bessemer and open-hearth furnaces, as well as steel working by pressure. This significantly reduced the cost of steel production, which began to be used en masse for the manufacturing railway rails. For many years, railways became the main consumer of ferrous metallurgy products. The development of railways, in turn, accelerated the development of mechanical engineering, primarily the production of steam locomotives and railcars.

Ukraine, as part of the Russian Empire since the abolition of serfdom in 1861, experienced a railway boom which was common in almost all countries of Europe and the United States in the second half of the 19^th century.

During the 80–90s of the 19^th century, a powerful industry for that time developed on the territory of modern Ukraine, which before the World War I provided the production of 72.2% of all iron ore mined in the Russian Empire, 86.9% of all mined coal, 73% of coke, 77.6% of all produced soda, 75% of all rail production, 40% of all steam locomotive production, etc.

Ukraine’s railways accounted for less than 19% of the Russian Empire’s total railway network at the beginning of the 20^th century, yet they handled more than 40% of the cargo turnover. That is, Ukrainian railways were used approximately twice as intensively as the national average.

Ukrainian railways played a key role in the development of the Donbas and the entire Ukrainian industry. In the last third of the 19^th century, neither Ukrainian metallurgy, coal and chemical industries, nor domestic mechanical engineering could do without railway building.

Therefore, studying the formation and development of domestic transport engineering, as well as metallurgy, represents an important stage in the research of the global history of science and technology. One of the most prominent figures in steam locomotive construction and hot metalworking was the extraordinary personality Petro Matviiovych Mukhachov – Honored Professor of the Kharkiv Technological Institute (KhTI), its fifth director from 1905 to 1917, and the first director of the Ukrainian Scientific and Research Institute of Metals (UkrNIIMet) from 1928 to 1929.

Thanks to his visits to several advanced factories located in Germany, France, Belgium, England, and Russia, and to World Industrial Exhibitions, Petro Mukhachov authored numerous works on steam locomotive theory, metallurgy, and mechanical engineering. His works were among the first ones in Eastern Europe and were subsequently widely used in engineering practice.

Thanks to Petro Mukhachov’s persistent and diligent work, railway science was significantly extended in promising areas, primarily the production and improvement of steam locomotive designs. He made a significant contribution to the training of scientists and engineers in locomotive construction and hot metalworking, published a large volume of specialized literature on these topics. His students, trained at the KhTI, subsequently worked at many railways, machine-building and metallurgical plants throughout the Russian Empire.