Refrigeration processing was developed by Carl Von Linde. He (1842-1934) was born at Berndorf, Upper Franconia, Germany, the third of nine children.
He developed his first compression refrigerating machines using methyl ether and studied the difficulties of working with this refrigerant.
He established a methyl ether unit in 1874. He was the first person to use the science of thermodynamics to design his machines; and he was heavily supported by the German brewing industry, desperate for means of keeping their product cool.
He later patented on t only a refrigerator but also the process of liquefying a gas, as part of the basic refrigeration technology as early as in 1876.
The other effect Linde used was that of achieving refrigeration by expanding air. The work performed by such an expansion has to come out of the heat content of the gas, thereby cooking the gas. Such cooling could be produced by expanding air in a piston expansion engine.
Linde then found a simple valve which works exactly like the porous plug could be used. The valve employed was far more reliable than an engine at very low temperatures. So he designed a spiral heat exchanger consisting of a 100 meter long, 4 inch pipe with a 1.5 inch pipe inside it.
Linde’s inventions had immediate effects on industrial gas development. It is well known that the air liquefaction system developed by Carl Linde in 1895 was the first commercially successfully cryogenic system.
The works of Linde were highly appreciated by D. Mendeleew and N. Umov in Russia. Moscow University purchased the air liquefier made y Linde in 1898, thus the first cryogenic laboratory for education purposes was organized in Russia.
Cryogenic air separation has been used for oxygen production since 1902. It was constructed by Carl Linde. This plant with capacity of 120 kg-O2 per day.
Most of the modern industrial cryogenics was later developed based on inventions of Carl Linde.
Carl Linde, refrigeration and cryogenic process
