2014-15 Product Resource Guide: Vacuum Pumps

Top 6 Things You May Not Know About Vacuum Pumps

1. The suction pump, a predecessor to the vacuum pump, was invented by the Arabic engineer Al-Jazari in 1206. It was not until the fifteenth century that the suction pump first appeared in Europe.

2. The first mercury barometer was invented by Evangelista Torricelli, based upon earlier work by Galileo, in 1643. The first sustained vacuum was achieved later the same year.

3. However, the first true vacuum pump wasn’t invented until 1654 by Otto von Guericke, who used it to evacuate the air between two hemispheres in order to demonstrate that they could not then be separated by two teams of horses (the famous “Magdeburg hemispheres experiment”).

4. In 1855, Heinrich Geissler invented the mercury displacement pump and used it to achieve an unprecedented vacuum of around 10 Pa (0.1 Torr).

5. Later that century, in 1874, a new style of pump consisting of vanes mounted to a rotor that turned within a cavity was patented by Charles C. Barnes of Sackville, New Brunswick, Canada. This type of pump became known as the rotary vacuum pump, and took depth of vacuum to a new level.

6. Dr. Wolfgang Gaede first reported the principle of the molecular drag pump at a 1911 meeting of the Physical Society in Karlsruhe. The pump was extremely well received and was considered to be the major event of the meeting. After many problems and setbacks, the first 14 pumps were ready for sale by the fall of 1912.

For the Top 6 Questions You Should Ask When Buying a Lab Vacuum Pump, click here.

Need more help in finding the right vacuum pump for you? Check out our Vacuum Pump Product Finder.

Recently Released Vacuum Pumps

Rocker 300 Laboratory Vacuum Pump

• Piston-powered oil-free pump provides vacuum and pressure in just one unit
• Features precise construction, quality moving parts, and the noise level is only 50 dB
• Almost maintenance-free due to the oil-free design
• Guaranteed operation of two years or 3000
  working hours of free service parts
  (excluding the moisture filter)
• Equipped with a 1/8 hp motor

New Star Environmental
www.newstarenvironmental.com 

N 920 KT.29P Diaphragm Vacuum Pump

• Provides lab technicians with adjustable vacuum performance, without the need for lubricating oil or recirculating water
• Also gives users quiet function with long product life in myriad laboratory applications
• In addition to N 920 KT.29P’s adjustable vacuum performance, it delivers deep end vacuum up to 1.5 Torr, and a flow rate of 20 L/min

KNF Neuberger
www.knfusa.com 

IDP-15 Dry Scroll Vacuum Pump

• Features a hermetic, isolated design
• Provides rapid pump-down with a 60 Hz pumping speed of 15.4 cubic meters per hour
• Quiet and vibration-free, and its single-sided scroll design makes it highly cost-effective, requiring only simple annual maintenance
• Gives users clean, dry vacuum pumping, suitable for all non-corrosive, non-hazardous academic, research, analytical instrumentation and industrial applications

Agilent
www.agilent.com 

Fossa FO 0015 A Scroll Vacuum Pump

• Hermetically sealed, completely dry-compressing vacuum pump is suitable for a wide range of specialist applications
• When used in conjunction with a turbomolecular vacuum pump, the Fossa provides a completely dry vacuum for use in high vacuum applications
• Design eliminates contamination or chemical reactions with pump operating fluids
• Optional gas-ballast valve available for the improved pumping of vapors

Busch
www.busch.co.uk 

Vacuum Pump Manufacturers