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“ ‘Won’t work’, does not figure in my vocabulary”
Peter Förnsel, co-inventor of Openair® plasma technology, is marking his 67th birthday by stepping down from his management role at Plasmatreat and becoming a consultant.
(bri) Steinhagen. Gyro Gearloose lives in Westphalia under the name of
Peter Förnsel. He was not born in Duckburg, but rather in
Berlin-Spandau in 1940 as the son of a mechanical engineer. Today he
has a white beard, is over six feet tall and his sign of the zodiac is
Virgo – which for many might explain his attachment to technical
perfection and critical analysis, his attention to detail and also his
unassuming and retiring nature.
Photo: Blue Rondo International
The inventor is happiest to be hidden away from all his colleagues
in his research den, fiddling and puzzling over things until once again
another of his inventions is ready for a patent application to be
filed. These always involve energy: electrons and ions, electronic
circuits, high voltage and generators, but above all plasma, the fourth
state of matter, so called because it follows the solid, liquid and
gaseous states. The name “Gyro Gearloose” would indeed be fitting
because Peter Förnsel, the 67-year old managing partner of Plasmatreat
GmbH, Steinhagen, has actually invented special jets and in doing so
marked up another triumph. These jets are used for deploying the
Openair® plasma technology that he along with his business partner
Christian Buske developed about 10 years ago. This technology is a
ground-breaking technique in industry for the environmentally friendly
and highly effective pretreatment of the surfaces of materials.
The inventive spirit in Peter Förnsel became apparent quite early.
“It started when I was eight.” recalls the imposingly built manager
with an amused smile, “I pinched my father’s new alarm clock and
dismantled it into its component parts. I then assembled some of the
parts in a new and slightly different way and suddenly I had a little
vehicle that started moving.” From that moment on no technology was
entirely safe from him, but quite a few years were to pass before
Förnsel invented the plasma jets that are now known throughout the
world.
In the year of his birth events were dominated by the Second World
War. His father found a salaried position in Sudetenland, but in 1945
the family had to flee from the Russians to the grandparents in
Bielefeld. From there they moved first of all to Bavaria, later to
Krefeld and finally back to Westphalia. After completing his
school-leaving examinations Peter Förnsel went on to train as an
electric power engineer, a subject area that has long fascinated him.
For many years he worked in a company as a developer of generators for
the pretreatment of materials by the corona process.
After he successfully constructed a corona installation to his own
design for use in the printing sector he resolved at the age of 54 to
make himself independent and founded his own company. Just a year
later, in 1995, he met up with Christian Buske, who recognising the
potential became a partner. Christian Buske has an exciting vision:
pretreatment should be possible not only by the corona process but also
by a substantially more effective and more economically efficient jet
process. Such a jet, however, and the plasma beam needed to feed it,
first had to be invented. To be properly effective a plasma beam needs
to be adapted very specifically to the surface to be treated. Förnsel
quickly grasps the problem, “For this purpose we need air, a directed
stream of compressed air that steers the plasma and transports the beam
through the jet head with pinpoint accuracy onto the surface to be
treated.” What no-one guesses at the time is that this solution is the
start of a plasma technology that would soon take on a global life of
its own under the name of Openair®.
Only two years later an envisaged rotary system follows which is
immediately taken up by industry. Renowned research institutes, with
the Fraunhofer IFAM leading the field, begin to take interest in the
innovative plasma technology and close collaboration starts. Shortly
after, in 1999, the joint company is given the name “Plasmatreat”.
Patent applications are filed internationally for Förnsel’s and
Buske’s developments. Also in 1999 collaboration with the American
market starts and a little later with Asia. Development proceeds apace:
in 2003 Förnsel discovers the solution to coating and uncoating
materials with Openair® plasma, a process that is setting standards for
protecting metals against corrosion in the automotive industry. In
these few years Buske drives international expansion onwards and by
2007 Plasmatreat is global leader in the supply of atmospheric-pressure
plasma systems with technology centres in Germany, North America and
Japan as well as establishments and agencies in 18 countries.
“The development of the company fills me with enormous pride” declares Peter Förnsel and in reply to the question whether it is now all over with the inventive activity he replies with a smile: “ ‘Won’t work’, does not figure in my vocabulary. There are many important inventions to the benefit of Plasmatreat still running around in my head. As a close advisor in future I will bring them into the company.”
