Thielenhaus Microfinish - The Pioneer for Precision

When the American astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon on 20 July 1969, the spectacle was watched on television by over 500 million people. Only insiders are privy to the fact that high-tech components from the city of Wuppertal which were used on board Apollo 11 contributed to the successful completion of the space mission. More specifically, the inertial navigation which made it possible for the lunar module to land accurately was fitted out with extremely precise miniature bearings that had been machined by Thielenhaus using Microfinish machines.

Numerous other examples of technical brilliance from the automotive, anti-friction bearing, aviation, aerospace and medical engineering industries would have been inconceivable had it not been for Ernst Thielenhaus, the son of the company’s founder, who was developing an advanced method for surface finishing and had filed numerous patents back in the 1950s. With the development and continual improvement of the Microfinish process, Thielenhaus Technologies GmbH – a traditional company founded in 1909 and based in Wuppertal – has surpassed the competition to become the global leader in precision machine tools for surface precision machining.

Microfinish has been the technological benchmark in surface precision machining for decades, given that it has experienced significant advances in terms of efficiency, functional reliability, noise minimisation and miniaturisation. Levels of precision up to one ten-thousandth of a millimetre – that’s 1/50 of a human hair – are possible. The high-tech process is used in all areas where the highest degrees of precision and durability, the lowest levels of friction and operational noise, long service lives and the highest energy and raw materials efficiency are required. It therefore meets all the technical and societal mega trends of our time. Almost all tools can be machined to virtually all shapes and dimensions.

The traditional Koellmann brand name, established in Leipzig in 1904, has been part of the globally-operating group of companies since 1955, and is seen as one of the leading German providers of highly durable standard and specialist gear systems as well as diaphragm compressors for the production of oil-free compressed air.