When the first Bosch hydraulics products went onto the market in 1953, they were primarily aimed at one market alone and were intended as a means to lighten the workload of farmers. Today there are countless applications in machine tools, industrial robots, anti-blocking systems, construction machines, excavators, trucks with hydraulic brakes, combine harvesters, hydraulic presses and road-building machines, even control units for convertible hoods where Bosch hydraulic devices are used.

It started in the cornfield

In the 1950s, the technical development of agriculture in Germany was lagging far behind the progress made by her western neighbours. Manual tasks predominated, from sowing to harvesting. This is where the efforts undertaken by Bosch began: work in the fields was to be made easier by the cunning use of technology.

The first step in this direction was the development of a power lift which made it possible to use the engine of the tractor to carry out the arduous task of raising and lowering the plough at the end of each furrow. The ingenious solution: a hydraulic system consisting of pump, oil reservoir, control unit, cylinder and pressure hoses was connected to the engine. And hey presto! The otherwise sweat-generating task was child’s play to perform. A gentle pull on the lever of the control unit was sufficient.

Bosch replaces muscle-power

The hydraulic pump made use of the power of the engine, transferring it to the working cylinder which, via pressure hoses, determined the position of the plough. Engine oil was used to transfer power through the pressure hoses. The meaning of the word "hydraulics" is rooted in "hydor", the Classical Greek word for "water", and hydraulics is concerned with the use of liquids in the widest sense.

Short paths, small dimensions

The secret of hydraulics for this field of applications, i.e. power transmission over short distances, lies in the small dimensions of the components. A gear pump the size of two fists was, even in 1953, able to transmit up to 10 horsepower from the tractor’s engine to the plough-lifter. Electrical transmission could not have been achieved within such small dimensions.

The employment of this compact technology in agriculture bore fruit and paved the way in many fields: in industrial hydraulics (production machines in other words) and mobile hydraulics: hydraulics for vehicles.

By 1958, Bosch was already systematically extending its production of hydraulic products. The new location was the factory acquired from Zündapp in Nuremberg. In order to extend its technological lead via research and testing, Bosch set up its Technical Centre for Hydraulics in 1969 at the new Bosch site in Schwieberdingen.

A new line of business is formed

Once the Product Sector Hydraulics had been combined with the Product Sector Pneumatics to form a single division, Bosch brought both sectors together in 1996 to form the new Automation Technology Division. But that was by no means the end of the story. When Bosch took over Rexroth AG in Lohr, a new Bosch affiliate emerged in 2001 under the name Bosch Rexroth AG. It is here that many years’ experience beginning with a plough-lifter is used in the manufacture of complex industrial equipment.