The first uses of hydraulics can be traced back to the 6000's B.C. when water was used to power irrigation systems by the ancient Mesopotamians and Egyptians. Several centuries later in 1647, Pascal's Law was discoverd.
The industrial revolution helped expand its use cases even further and in the late 1800s some of the first pieces of construction equipment and other heavy machinery started using hydraulics. Use of hydraulics only grew from there. When Power & Motion, originally called Applied Hydraulics, was started in 1948, it was stated in the editor's letter that after utilizing hydraulics in the majority of planes built for World War II that much was learned about the technology and how it could be applied in a range of other industries.
Visit the historical equipment page of Construction Equipment, an Endeavor Business Media partner site, to learn more about the use of fluid power and other technologies in construction and mining equipment over the centuries.
