After travelling the world for two years on a self-made motorcycle, he decided to further his education in the field of mechanics and attended Zentralschweizer Technikum in Lucerne, earning a diploma in mechanical engineering in 1988.
After travelling the world for two years on a self-made motorcycle, he decided to further his education in the field of mechanics and attended Zentralschweizer Technikum in Lucerne, earning a diploma in mechanical engineering in 1988.
“Every innovative product I developed in my life arose from a problem for which no solution existed,” Schlumpf explains. One innovation was derived from a personal experience. “When I climbed a steep mountain pass with my old bicycle and was forced to dismount because there were no gears low enough for pedalling all the way, I suddenly had the idea for the ‘mountain drive’ bottom-bracket gearing system.”
Ten years later, Schlumpf developed a hub for unicycles, which is in use by the world’s top unicyclists in races to reach speeds of 40 km/h and more, as well as unicycles for daily commuting. In 2011, the patents and production rights of the bicycle gearing system were acquired by a German group, opening the door to new opportunities for SCHLUMPF to explore new fields of interest in clocks and precision mechanisms. The first Time Machine, the TM1, was introduced at BaselWorld in 2014 as a purely artistic experience with no indication for time.