Petrotest

Founding

After working at the former Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin-Dahlem (now the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing [Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung]), Berthold Pensky started his own business manufacturing flash point testers, viscometers, grain testers and partial machinery.

After a few years, he sold his Berlin-based company, then located at Wilhelmstrasse 122, to two of his employees, Wilhelm Sommer and Max Runge. They began operating under the name of Sommer & Runge, which was retained until the 1990s, with distribution markets at the time that included German Empire, the Netherlands, Russia and Romania.

In 1914, Wilhelm Randow and Adolf Preukezas bought the company from Max Runge's widow; later, the company was acquired by Wilhelm Randow's children. During World War II mainly airplane parts were manufactured; the plant was partially destroyed in the bombing of Berlin and temporarily relocated to Dahme/Mark.

1948 - 1978

After 1948, the company was continued by Erwin Wierzbicki – a grandson of Wilhelm Randow – on the old premises and a manufacturing program of petroleum test equipment was specifically built up for the German-speaking market.

The products at that time were mainly precision-engineered laboratory equipment, but some of the first electromechanical automatic flash point testers were also developed and manufactured.

1979 - 2012

Volkmar Wierzbicki took over the company Sommer & Runge on January 1, 1979 by purchasing it from his mother, subsequent to having already founded the company PETROTEST in 1975.

The company SUR was still a traditional company characterized by its highly skilled craftsmanship in the manufacture of laboratory test equipment for the petroleum industry. Sales were almost exclusively focused on Germany. The product range included about 100 different products, with predominantly made-to-order production; batches of five pieces tended to be the exception.

In June 1985, an English-language catalog was published for the first time, which has been continually reprinted and updated. Since the publication of the catalog, foreign sales rose to about 80% of total revenue and now include all of the oil-producing countries. Because of the issues stemming from the national and international ban on purchasing products from Berlin, the sales and export company Petrotest Laboratory Supplies GmbH & Co. KG was built in Hamburg.

In mid-March 1989 after 85 years, the lease for the company premises on Bennigsenstrasse was terminated without conditions and the company moved to Berlin-Marienfelde. Effective January 1, 1992, the company changed its legal form: The companies Sommer & Runge KG, Petrotest, V. Wierzbicki, Berlin and Petrotest Laboratory Supplies, Hamburg were merged to form a new company, Petrotest Instruments GmbH & Co. KG. The over 100-year-old name Sommer & Runge had to be abandoned due to German commercial register regulations and the international recognition of the name Petrotest.

In 1996, the company set up operations for the first time in company-owned buildings to the south of Berlin in Dahlewitz. Since 2002, Florian Wierzbicki has worked at his father's company. At the end of February 2012 Volkmar Wierzbicki sold Petrotest Instruments GmbH & Co. KG to the Anton Paar GmbH.

Since 2012

Since March 1, 2012 the company is named Petrotest GmbH | A company of Anton Paar. The general managers are Heinz Kindlhofer and Florian Wierzbicki.

Products & Innovations

Petrotest products are used for the quality control of petroleum products including crude oil, liquefied petroleum gas, motor fuel, aviation fuel, lubricating oil, grease and bitumen.

There are internationally standardized test methods for all of these products, which for the most part were developed in and around Berlin by scientists such as Engler, Ubbelohde, Martens and Pensky at the end of the 19th century. These processes have, among other things, been integrated into the standards of DIN, ASTM, IP and GOST.

The devices manufactured today meet these standards, but are much easier for the user to operate due to the use of microprocessor technology.

Removable Head for Flash Point Testers

In 1996, the removable head for flash point testers was patented, thus giving the user the option to perform flash point tests with an automatic sample changer. This allows the user to accelerate the individual tests since the manual insertion, the required cooling and the manual removal of the sample container are no longer necessary.

RSSOT - Rapid Small Scale Oxidation Tester - PetroOXY

Numerous test methods for determining the oxidation stability of fuels are known and available. Most of the test methods are outdated and require the user's considerable time and effort for the analytical work on the one hand, on the other very large quantities of fuel are needed, which represents a considerable safety risk.

The results of these measurement methods are often very imprecise and can only be relied on with difficulty for assessing the stability of the fuels and the use thereof, such as in the automotive industry.

Therefore, in 2002 the development of a faster method of measurement was begun that uses a much smaller sample size with the aim of improving user safety and at the same time significantly improving accuracy. The development of this type of new measurement method was welcomed by the industry and proposed for an internationally valid standard measurement method.

To this end, the measurement method had to be presented to the Technical Committees of standardization bodies such as ASTM International in the United States and accepted for the development of a new method.

The procedure was published in 2009 by ASTM International and includes the methods for gasoline (ASTM D7525) and diesel, biodiesel and blends (ASTM D7545). A European standard for liquid petroleum products (EN 16091) was published in 2012 by CEN.

The only device that currently functions according to these standards is the Rapid Small Scale Oxidation Tester (RSSOT), which is exclusively manufactured and distributed by the company Petrotest under the name PetroOXY.

The sole source of supply of the apparatus known to the committee at this time is Petrotest PetroOXY apparatus, available from Petrotest. Instruments GmbH & Co, Ludwig-Erhard-Ring 13, 15827 Dahlewitz, Germany, www.petrotest.com.

For the development of this new measurement method, the company received recognition for outstanding innovative results at the "Business Innovation Award 2007" of the Potsdam Chamber of Commerce and Industry.