Bendix Corporation
| Industry | automotive |
|---|---|
| Fate | Absorbed; 1983 |
| Successor | Honeywell |
| Founded | 1924 |
| Headquarters | Several for various divisions |
|
Key people
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Vincent Bendix |
| Divisions | Bendix Pacific on 1160 Sherman Way in North Hollywood, CA and expanded around 1965 to Sylmar, CA. Name changed to Bendix Electrodynamics around 1963 Bendix Scintilla in Glendale, CA Bendix Field Engineering Red Bank in Eatontown, NJ |
| Website | bendixbrakes.com |
The Bendix Corporation was an American manufacturing and engineering company which during various times in its 60-year existence (1924–1983) made automotive brake shoes and systems, vacuum tubes, aircraft brakes, aeronautical hydraulics and electric power systems, avionics, aircraft and automobile fuel control systems, radios, televisions and computers. It was also well known for the name Bendix, as used on home clothes washing machines, but never actually made these appliances.
Founder and inventor Vincent Bendix initially began his corporation in a hotel room in Chicago in 1914 with an agreement with the struggling bicycle brake manufacturing firm, Eclipse Machine Company of Elmira, New York. Bendix granted permission to his invention which was described as "a New York device for the starting of explosive motors." This company made a low cost triple thread screw which could be used in the manufacture of other drive parts. By using this screw with the Eclipse Machine Company, Bendix had a good foundation for his future business plans.
General Motors Corp. purchased a 24% interest in Bendix in 1924, not to operate Bendix but to maintain a direct and continuing contact with developments in aviation, as the engineering techniques of the auto and aircraft were quite similar then. Bendix in the 1920s owned and controlled many important patents for devices applicable to the auto industry, for example, brakes, carburetors, and starting drives for engines. It acquired Bragg-Kliesrath brakes in the late 1920s. In 1942 Ernest Breech became president of Bendix, moving from General Motors Corp., and after performing brilliantly for Bendix by introducing GM management philosophies he then attracted the attention of Henry Ford II who induced him over to Ford Motor Corp. where he finished his career. By 1940 Bendix had sales running around $40 million, and in 1948 General Motors sold its interest in Bendix as it wanted to focus on its expanding automotive operations. Bendix was formally founded in 1924 in South Bend, Indiana, United States. At first it manufactured brake systems for cars and trucks, supplying General Motors and other automobile manufacturers. Bendix manufactured both hydraulic brake systems and a vacuum booster TreadleVac for its production lines for decades. In 1924 Vincent Bendix had acquired the rights to Henri Perrot's patents for drum and shoe design.
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