I'm still waiting for BS degrees in Fluid Power to be offered by some of our nation's large universities. Russ Henke, PE, CFP E The Fluid Power Society emerged in 1960, when Detroit Chapter 1 was chartered and, within about 30 days, Milwaukee Chapter 2 was chartered. I was the first president of the new Milwaukee chapter. The emerging Fluid Power Society was charged with promulgating fluid power training and education. I believe that one of, if not the reason that electrical technology has been so successful is failure of fluid power to penetrate engineering college curricula.
People use what they know and the majority of graduate engineers know little about fluid power.
On the other hand, all engineering colleges have significant electrical technology content in their curricula. The fluid power industry is constantly evolving and changing. In recent history, compressed air equipment manufacturers and distributors have changed the focus of the industry to a whole systems approach. Now, through programs like the Compressed Air Challenge, end-users and distributors are becoming more enlightened to compressed air system requirements. Distributors and manufacturers, in our industry, now service the needs of the entire system - instead of each component individually.