Frese, Peter Alexandrovich

Born in St. Petersburg, a nobleman , the Frese clan is included in the noble genealogy of the Kazan province in 1785-1917.

• Father, Frese, Alexander Ermolaevich , (1804-1872) - mining engineer, head of the Altai mountain district (1864-1871).
• Mother, Tatarinova Ekaterina Stepanovna, (1820–1896), daughter of Major General, mining engineer Tatarinov Stepan Petrovich
• Brother, Frese, Alexander Alexandrovich , (1840 - after 1917) - Russian infantry general, member of the State Council

• in 1865 he graduated from the Petersburg Mining Institute , receiving a diploma and the right to the rank of second lieutenant.
• About 9 years he served at the enterprises of the Altai mountain district .
  • since 1868 , - the bailiff of the smelting factory of the Pavlovsky plant, then in the same position at the Barnaul silver-smelting plant .
• in 1874, Pyotr Frese, titular adviser , retired, moved to the capital and took up crew building, setting up his own enterprise - a horse-drawn carriage factory.
• In 1876, P. Frese's equestrian carriage factory merged with Carl Nellis's crew workshop. The new company began to be called "Nellis and Frese" and a few years later Peter Frese became its manager ^[2] .
• in 1893 the company was renamed “Frese and Co.”, and from December 1, 1899 it was transformed into a joint-stock company for the construction and operation of crews and cars “Frese and Co.” ^[3] .
• At the World Exhibition in Chicago (June 1893 ), the products of the Frese and Nellis crew factory were awarded a bronze medal and an honorary diploma .
• in May 1896, E. A. Yakovlev and Frese created the First Russian Car . All parts were made in Russia at the Yakovlev plant and at the Frese crew factory.

On May 27, 1896, an advertisement for the First Russian Plant of Kerosene and Gas Engines by E. A. Yakovlev appeared in the Novoye Vremya newspaper in Moscow, informing that the first Russian car was tested at the beginning of the month in the vicinity of Petersburg. And in July of that year, a car with an engine power of 2 hp. was presented as an exhibit at the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod, where he made demonstration trips. The car was even assigned a price of 1,500 rubles. ^[4] (For comparison, one could say that a horse at that time cost 50 rubles.) The price of a Yakovlev and Frese car was half cheaper than those cars that Benz company sold in Russia, but it was not interested in any of the domestic manufacturers.

• in 1899, with the permission of Nicholas II, Frese organized the Joint-Stock Company for the Construction and Operation of Crews and Cars - Frese and Co. Frese became a companion G. G. Eliseev - the owner of a network of famous grocery stores. Production was led by Pyotr Georgievich Arsenyev, who had previously collaborated with E. A. Yakovlev. In the same year, the joint-stock company Petra Frese began manufacturing the first domestic electric vehicles designed by Ippolit Romanov . Russian electric cars were built in 1900 and had two electric motors: each of them using a chain drive set in motion the wheels, the front ones of which were leading. The crew also had two braking systems - mechanical and regenerative , electrodynamic. Smokeless transport could reach a maximum speed of 37.4 kilometers per hour.

Frese and Co. is a joint-stock company for the construction and operation of crews and cars. The factory of carriages and cars (with the help of steam, kerosene, gasoline, acetylene, electricity and other mechanical engines) in St. Petersburg, Ertelev Lane, 10, workshops and warehouse. In Warsaw - Shkolnaya, 15. The board in St. Petersburg - Ertelev, 10. The managing director - Frese Peter A., ​​the Director - Eliseev Grigory Grigoryevich , Shulenburg Sergey Ivanovich . Charter of June 11, 1899. Establishment of the enterprise on November 30, 1899. The authorized capital stock is 300,000 rubles. 250 rub each per share. By January 1, 1902, fixed capital was 300,000 rubles. Source: “All of Russia”, 1902

• in 1900, Frese received the right to represent her cars in Russia from the French company “De Dion-Bouton” (De Dion Bouton) and produced a small number of his 2 and 4-seater electric cars. Frese received a chassis from France and made bodies for them. In the same year, the company "Frese and Co." organized the leasing of electric and gasoline cars of its own construction in St. Petersburg and Warsaw.
• since 1901, he began to acquire motors, gearboxes and rear axles from his partner in Paris, and created the undercarriage (wheels, frames, steering) and bodies on his own. Thus began the automobile production of the company "Frese and Co.", she made cars with engines with a capacity of 3.5; 6 and 8 hp ..

At the initiative of Khilkov, in September 1901, a car ran along the Georgian Military Road from Vladikavkaz to Tiflis with a length of about 200 miles. Three "self-propelled" participated in this run. One of them, the 2-seater French car "De Dion-Bouton" was driven by Prince Khilkov himself. The second car was built in St. Petersburg under a French license with a De Dion-Buton engine. It was a 2-seater “Frese” car and was driven by Peter Aleksandrovich Frese himself. The third car - a 6-seater “Panar-Levassor” (14 hp), was “discharged” by Khilkov from France. “One of the most difficult steepnesses and lengths of descents and ascents was easily covered by urban-type crews without danger to themselves and others.”

• at the end of 1901 P.A. Frese also built his first 60-pound (960 kg payload) truck with a flatbed body, again with a De Dion Bouton engine, but already with 8 hp. and an engine displacement of 864 cm³. It was the first truck , in the full sense of the word, made in Russia. Unlike passenger cars of the Frese brand, copied from French designs, the truck was an in-house development of a St. Petersburg company.
• Since 1902 , the factory began mass production of such trucks, in the same year P. A. Frese also made one 8-seater open omnibus with an internal combustion engine on its basis. A single-cylinder engine with an output of 8 horsepower was installed on the omnibus. Omnibus could reach speeds of up to 15 km / h.
• from 1901 to 1903, Frese produced about a hundred 3-and 4-seater cars, these were the first production cars in Russia . And in subsequent years, Frese continued to build cars. So 4-seater cars "Frese and Co." began to be used in Warsaw as a taxi.

• In 1902, Frese presented his cars on large military maneuvers taking place near Kursk. They aimed to identify the suitability of the new means of transport for the needs of the army. Among others, four 8-horsepower trucks were tested (one of them is an 8-horsepower omnibus) and four cars (of which 2 rear-engine - 6 hp and 2 front-engine - 8 hp). On two front-engine cars, the engine was already in front, as on the French model “De Dion Bouton-Popuyler”, and the three- speed gearbox was at the rear. At the end of the maneuvers, the military department purchased only cars from the Frese firm, considering the “cargo vehicles” for military service to be insufficiently powerful.

“The military commission, having inspected the cars in the square, was accommodated in the cars of the General Staff building and went to Kolomyazhskoye Shosse, where they were tested on the steepest rise. After the tests, all the cars were accepted by the commission of the War Department. There were 50 pounds of cargo on the platforms. This load is designed for dirt roads, and for the highway and the city a load of 80 pounds is allowed. The speed of 8-horsepower trucks with a full load is 15 versts per hour. The price of each car is about 3000 rubles. ”

• In 1902, a car with an electric drive weighing only 820 kg was built at the factory, because it did not need batteries. The base for it was a standard Frese truck equipped with an electric motor driven by high-voltage electric current. The current was supplied by wire (patent of the German company Telegraphen-Bauanstalt Siemens und Halske AG). The current collector was based on the French design of the inventor Lombar-Gerin - a “contact trolley” rolled along the wires. The Automobile magazine in 1902 published a note on testing "a car driven by electric energy received from wires along a path, but walking not on rails, but on a normal road." The machine was intended for the transport of goods. The trials that were successful, except for P. A. Frese, were attended by Minister M. I. Khilkov , Prince P. D. Lvov (referred to as the spring suspension designer), and A. P. , editor of the automobile magazine founded in 1902. Nagel (formerly a figure skater and participant in the First Russian Motor Race of 1898). Among those present was also the initiator of the construction of an electric truck, later called a trolleybus , engineer V.I. Shubersky (previously mentioned as a designer of a car with an inertial energy storage).

On Sunday, March 31, at three o’clock in the afternoon, in the courtyard of the Frese & K factory (Ertelev per 10, the first Russian car was assembled here in 1896) in the presence of Mr. Minister of Railways Prince. M.I. Khilkova and members of the commission on the application of electric traction on railways, highways and waterways, was shown a car powered by current from the central station, using a special trolley rolling along the wires and collecting current from them. The trolley connected to the car with a double wire is moved by the car itself ...
The car, weighing 50 pounds, was loaded with 50 pounds and showed an average current consumption of 7 amperes at 110 volts. In experiments, the car easily avoided the direct direction, backed up and turned. All construction details are worked out by c. S.I. Schulenburg.

• by 1903, Frese, according to contemporaries, had already built about 120 cars. At this time, the company "Frese" has already turned from a car assembly plant into a full-fledged car factory, where more than 100 workers and employees worked, a year earlier the company opened a branch in Warsaw . The Joint-Stock Company for the Construction and Operation of Frese and Co. Cars built almost independently all of its cars, including the chassis. Only engines, gearboxes, and other units most complex in production remained imported. It was one of the most serious Russian automobile enterprises of the beginning of the 20th century.

In the fall of 1903, G. G. Eliseev and P. A. Frese came up with a project for the establishment of the “Black Sea Society of Mechanical Trackless Movement and Electric Energy” ^[5] . However, in 1904, due to the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War, “the issue was removed from the queue,” as reported by the Black Sea Coast newspaper on October 30, 1904.

• in 1903, the post office of St. Petersburg ordered Frese 14 machines to collect letters from mailboxes: 10 double with 6 hp engines. and boxes of 10 pounds of cargo and 4 triples with 8 hp engines and boxes of 50 pounds of cargo. The first postal van arrived at the post office and was tested there in September 1903. P. A. Frese refused the rear location of the power unit in passenger models. The body type "van" was mounted on the chassis of a passenger 4-seater with a short wheelbase (1550 mm). The small base made it possible to maneuver in the narrowest lanes. The mail van was equipped with motorcycle-type wheels and tires. The van had a speed of 18 km / h. Mail delivery by automobiles became faster than horse-drawn vans. On December 4, 1903, Frese mail machines were officially accepted by the Post Office. Under an agreement with a customer, Frese took over the operation and maintenance of postal machines. Unfortunately, these machines did not serve the Russian post for long: on the night of March 26-27, 1904, a fire broke out in the post office garage, which destroyed almost all the cars.

• in 1904, one of the first fire engines in Russia was built at the factory. It was the last Frese car with a single-cylinder engine De Dion Bouton (power 9 hp, working volume 942 cm³). The machine was designed to transport 10 fighters, on it stood a stander * for 80 fathoms of a fire hose and two fire ladders. Fire-fighting equipment was supplied by the St. Petersburg company Langenzipen. The fire truck was built in a single copy and was purchased by the Alexander Nevsky Fire Department of St. Petersburg . Immediately on the day that part of this car was received on June 10 (old style) in 1904, he participated in putting out a fire on the outskirts of St. Petersburg. The first Russian fire truck arrived at the scene 12 minutes earlier than the horse-drawn cart, and proved its practicality.
• in the same 1904 , the Georges Bormann confectionery factory in St. Petersburg ordered five flatbed trucks and vans from Frese. As in the case of orders from the military and postal departments, P. A. Frese took upon himself all the expenses for the maintenance and operation of these cars - a common practice at the dawn of motorism, when the network of service stations was just in its infancy. These five cars were of various designs: two models of flatbed trucks on a long-haul chassis and a short-haul closed van. They were equipped with 2-cylinder De Dion Bouton engines with an output of 8 hp. with a displacement of 864 cm³ and 12 hp - with a volume of 1728 cm³. Lorries and vans at Frese were also made for other customers: the Izhora plant, the Eliseev Brothers store and others.
• in 1905 , the company built and tested in the courtyard of the Castle of Engineering in St. Petersburg the world's first narrow-gauge electric train with active trailers according to the project of engineer-captain Geld. The train consisted of six trolleys 2 m wide and 4.5 m long (almost the same as the cargo platform of the ZIL-130 ). On the head trolley was a gas engine, a 4-cylinder Germain engine of 35 hp. at a speed of 800 rpm. A four-pole generator was connected to it. Each of the trolleys, two of the four wheels were leading and were driven by separate electric motors that received current from the motor generator. Frese suggested using it for passenger transportation, but the government did not appreciate this invention, and Frese sold his train to the famous French automobile company De Dion-Bouton.
• in 1906 , Frese built its first road train - a 2-ton truck with a 4-cylinder 15-horsepower engine from the French company Panhard et Levassor with a working volume of 3308 cm³ with a trailer weighing 1.6 tons. The car was purchased by the Ministry of Railways . It was the first Russian truck with a trailer.

• in 1907 , the First International Automobile Exhibition was held in St. Petersburg , where Frese demonstrated ambulances - two ambulances built on the chassis of the French plants Renault and Lorraine-Dietrich. A stretcher moved into the back of their enclosed body, with two hatch flaps for them having horizontal hinges. The company "Frese and Co." at this exhibition was awarded the Big Gold Medal for the production and distribution of cars in Russia.
• in 1908 , one of the services of the Specific Department , located in the Caucasus in the region of Abarau, ordered Frese a passenger car. It was one of the first Russian universal vehicles . It was intended to carry 50 pounds (800 kg) of wine, five passengers and an armored safe for money. It had a 15-horsepower French Panhard et Levassor engine - the same as on the 1906 road train. This car’s frame was no longer wooden, but steel. The curb weight of the car was about 1200 kg. He developed a speed of up to 33 km / h.
• at the end of 1908 due to the ill-conceived customs policy of the Russian Empire, when import duties on finished imported cars were levied at preferential rates, and duties on foreign components became too high, the Frese factory stopped assembling domestic cars, limiting itself only to building bodies on imported Renault chassis, Clement-Bayard, Lorraine-Dietrich, Panhard-Levassor (France), Germain, Minerva (Belgium), FIAT (Italy). At the same time, the company also sold finished machines in these factories in Russia. In total, from 1899 to 1908, Frese assembled and built more than 200 cars. From 1903 to 1908, the company assembled motorcycles in small batches from ready-made kits. At first, Belgian Sarolei tricycles were assembled and manufactured from imported parts, and then two-wheeled ones of their own design, but with imported engines.
• in 1910, Frese sold his company to the Automotive Division of the Russian-Baltic Carriage Works (RBVZ).
• After the sale of the company, Peter Frese retired and retired to the estate of his father Granovo ^[6] in the Vyshnevolotsky district of the Tver province .
• April 24, 1918 Pyotr Aleksandrovich Frese died and was buried at the Nikolsky cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra .

• A. B. Namzin, L. E. Smirnova, L. N. Konstantinov “Moldyan facets of the inventor Peter Frese”
• List of Mining Engineers, annual edition (1871)
• Prominent scientists of the St. Petersburg Mining Institute. SPb., 1993
• Melua A. I. Geologists and Mining Engineers of Russia: Encyclopedia / Ed. Academician N.P. Laverov. M .; St. Petersburg: Publishing House "Humanism", 2000
• Zablotsky E. M. Figures of the mining service of pre-revolutionary Russia. Brief biographical dictionary. SPb .: Humanism, 2004

• A. B. Namzin, L. E. Smirnova, L. N. Konstantinov “Moldyan facets of the inventor Peter Frese”
• Y. Ponomarev Petr FREZE
• FREZE Petr Alexandrovich
• Anatoly MURAVLEV MODEL SERIES OF FREZE (inaccessible link)
• Tunic MILITARY EXAMPLE
• Stanislav Kirilets Commercial path Frese
• Necropolis of the Holy Trinity Alexander Nevsky Lavra, Frese Peter A., ​​memorial plaque (old monument destroyed)
• Names of the Mountain: Peter Frese
• Speech of the Episcopate of Nazareth at the solemn consecration of the new monument to P. A. Frese
• Frese, Peter Alexandrovich at the Rodovod . Tree of ancestors and descendants
• The first steps of the Russian automotive industry