Tatsuo Hasegawa
| Tatsuo Hasegawa 長谷川 龍雄 |
|
|---|---|
| Born |
February 8, 1916 Tottori, Tottori prefecture |
| Died | April 29, 2008 (aged 92) Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture |
| Nationality | Japanese |
| Education | Tokyo Imperial University |
| Engineering career | |
| Discipline | Aeronautics |
| Significant design |
Toyota Corolla Toyota Publica |
| Awards | Japan Automobile Hall of Fame (2004) |
Tatsuo Hasegawa (長谷川 龍雄, Hasegawa Tatsuo, February 8, 1916 – April 29, 2008) was a Japanese automotive engineer, and known as the development chief of the first Toyota Corolla. He built the base of the economy cars in Japan through the development of the Corolla and the Toyota Publica.
Tatsuo Hasegawa was born in Tottori, Tottori Prefecture on February 8, 1916. After majoring in aerodynamics as a self-supporting student, he graduated from the Section of Aeronautics of the Faculty of Engineering at the Tokyo Imperial University in 1939.
After graduating, he joined Tachikawa Aircraft Corporation and was related to the development of the Tachikawa Ki-94 in 1943 as the chief designer. The high-altitude interceptor aircraft was designed to intercept the bomber, and proposed to the Imperial Japanese Army. One aircraft was completed in August 1945 but before it flew, the World War II ended.
Before the start of the development, Hasegawa had designed an airfoil based on his theory, and publishing the paper in the scholarly journal of the Japan Society for Aeronautical Sciences (present The Japan Society for Aeronautical and Space Sciences) in March, 1942. He named it "TH airfoil theory" after his name (Tatsuo Hasegawa). He used the "TH airfoil" to the Ki-94.
The idea of this theory is very similar to the Supercritical airfoil theory that NASA created later in the 1960s, thus, when NASA lodged the patent application of the airfoil in Japan in 1979, this patent was not admitted to the agency.
He lost job by the end of the war because Japan was prohibited to manufacture the airplane under control of the General Headquarters (GHQ) of General Douglas MacArthur, but, in next year, Hasegawa was employed by Toyota which was recruiting engineers at that time.
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