Rudolf Diesel, born on 18 March 1858, was a German inventor and mechanical engineer, famous for the invention of the Diesel engine, and for his suspicious death at sea. Diesel was the namesake of the 1942 film Diesel.
Diesel Engine Day is celebrated annually on February 23. Did you know that diesel engines today, power all sorts of things including heavy construction machinery, farm tractors, trucks, marine vessels, buses, and locomotives? They are even turned into power generators at offices, airports, and hospitals. It is simply impossible to imagine our current world without this unique power system, hence the reason why it is more than deserving of its own day.
The invention of this engine is credited to Rudolf Diesel, an engineer, who was granted a patent for the diesel engine on February 23, 1893. He came up with the engine after setting out to improve the efficiency of the Otto engine, a large, single-cylinder, four-stroke engine developed back in the 1870s.
Rudolf Diesel, passed away on 29 September 1913.