Science & invention / Auto industry
Zoltán Jánosi
1929–2024
· vehicle engineer, terramechanics researcher
Hungarian refugee engineer whose soil-shear equation, worked out at the Army's Land Locomotion Laboratory by the Detroit Arsenal, still helps model off-road wheels and tracks.
- Born
Hungary- Died
- Birth name
- Jánosi Zoltán
- Also known as
- Jánosi Zoltán · Zoltan J. Janosi · Z. J. Janosi
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Jánosi graduated in mechanical engineering at the Technical University of Budapest and worked in the mechanics department of an agricultural university before the 1956 revolution sent him abroad. In metro Detroit he joined the Land Locomotion Laboratory, the vehicle-mobility lab of the Army's tank-automotive research organization at the Detroit Arsenal, and stayed with the Army's tank-automotive command in Warren until he retired. At the first international conference on soil-vehicle mechanics, held in Turin in 1961, he and B. Hanamoto presented a way to calculate the pull of a tracked vehicle from how much it slips, built on a formula linking soil shear stress to shear displacement. The Janosi–Hanamoto model became a basic tool of terramechanics, the science of how vehicles move over soft ground, and is still used in simulations. He was a founding member of the International Society for Terrain-Vehicle Systems, translated and edited for its Journal of Terramechanics and organized its 1993 conference. He died in November 2024 at 96.
Highlights
- Co-author of the Janosi–Hanamoto soil shear model, Turin, 1961
- Worked at the Army's Land Locomotion Laboratory by the Detroit Arsenal
- Founding member of the International Society for Terrain-Vehicle Systems
- Main organizer of the society's 1993 conference
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 1
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Worked here
Detroit Arsenal (U.S. Army Garrison)
The Albert Kahn–designed tank plant of World War II, later the Army's ground-vehicle research center; an active base, not open to the public.