50 years Hagerbach Test Gallery: A proud anniversary marked by many stories and pioneering spirit, always with the aim of creating a unique environment for experiments and innovations.
Company founder Rudolf Amberg in one of the laboratories.
The Hagerbach Test Gallery was founded in 1970, but the story begins four years earlier. In 1966, the Gonzen iron mine, from which hematite, magnetite and hausmannite ores are extracted at that time, was closed. The ambitious mining engineer Rudolf Amberg was the technical director at the time of the closure. In this function, he carried out trials and tests with companies in the mining industry. The focus was on increasing the mining performance and improving the tunnelling work. This test environment and the innovations associated with it were lost when the iron mine ceased operations.
Plan of the gallery system from the 70s.
Rudolf Amberg was by no means discouraged by the closure of the mine, on the contrary: in the same year, he founded the Rudolf Amberg Engineering Office in Sargans. Due to his education as a mining engineer, the services of the young company concentrated on the planning, design and construction management of underground structures. This also included drilling and blasting tests in cooperation with industrial partners, which were carried out in the nearby Weisstannental or in the Harzloch in Mels. Due to the high noise and dust emissions, however, these two locations were not a long-term solution.
Impression from the early days.
In 1970, Rudolf Amberg found the current location. It was ideally suited as a research and development facility, and soon the first trials began together with the Swiss Industrial Society (SIG). Initially, the focus was on drilling and blasting technology, but soon tests with rock protection materials such as anchors, prefabricated concrete elements, steel girders and shotcrete were added.
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