kwijibo99
19th Sep 2018, 09:09 AM
Today I got a chance to visit Ruhla, Germany, the hometown of Gebrüder Thiel, and the spiritual home of my Thiel Duplex 158 milling machine. According to the lathes.co.uk site the 158 was made in Leinfelden, near Stuttgart after Ruhla ended up on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain but I'm not going to get a chance to visit there unfortunately.
Ruhla is a beautiful little town in the Thuringia forest, it has a history in metalworking dating back to the fourteenth century as reflected in the town crest seen painted on one of the buildings and cast into the 650th aniverary sewer covers.
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Except for an office building dating from 1929, which now houses a museum dedicated to the Thiel watch company, all of the buildings associated with the Thiel / Ruhla UMF factory have been demolished. Unfortunately I didn't have time to have a look through the museum but just visiting the town is something I'm glad I got to do.
The area is still involved in the machine tool industry because about ten minutes out of Ruhla on my way to Berlin I passed through the town of Seebeck and there on my right was a large Deckel Maho factory.
375563
Thiel actually got merged into Maho then into the DMG group so I guess In a way they are still going strong in the region.
Cheers,
Greg.
Ruhla is a beautiful little town in the Thuringia forest, it has a history in metalworking dating back to the fourteenth century as reflected in the town crest seen painted on one of the buildings and cast into the 650th aniverary sewer covers.
375561 375562
Except for an office building dating from 1929, which now houses a museum dedicated to the Thiel watch company, all of the buildings associated with the Thiel / Ruhla UMF factory have been demolished. Unfortunately I didn't have time to have a look through the museum but just visiting the town is something I'm glad I got to do.
The area is still involved in the machine tool industry because about ten minutes out of Ruhla on my way to Berlin I passed through the town of Seebeck and there on my right was a large Deckel Maho factory.
375563
Thiel actually got merged into Maho then into the DMG group so I guess In a way they are still going strong in the region.
Cheers,
Greg.