News

Obituary for Günther Gedecke
* August 16, 1929 - † April 02, 2025

With great sadness, we bid farewell to Günther Gedecke, who has passed away at the age of 95.
As a long-standing managing director and formative personality of the company, he played a decisive role in shaping the development of technical lubricants over decades and leaves behind a significant industrial legacy.
Günther Gedecke joined the former Richter & Co. company in 1957 after completing his commercial training, became Managing Director just one year later and was to find his professional home here.
For more than three decades, he led Elaskon through challenging times with expertise, innovative strength and a keen sense for technical trends. He navigated the political and economic upheavals - from nationalization and the time in the combine to the trustee administration and reprivatization after 1990 - with foresight and calm.
He himself derived the current name Elaskon from the terms “elastic” and “conserving” and thus developed a brand that still stands for quality today.
A significant technical milestone was his involvement in the development of the first patented lubricant for wire ropes (Koepe ropes), which was granted a patent in 1957. Gedecke recognized the importance of uniform standards early on and made a significant contribution to the standardization of rope lubricants in the GDR with TGL 11877 in 1961.
His name remains inextricably linked with the development of modern rope lubricants and preservation - from patenting and the introduction of technical standards to successes such as ELASKON II, ELASKON 20 and the legendary ELASKON K 60 ML underbody protection.
Under his leadership, Elaskon experienced a series of successes. The “Elaskon II” haulage rope protector was awarded the trade fair gold medal in Leipzig in 1964, as was the “Elaskon 20” wire rope lubricant in 1980.

In addition to his work as Managing Director, Günther Gedecke was an internationally respected expert and speaker. At symposia and professional events both in Germany and abroad, he contributed his expertise and played a significant role in the global recognition of modern rope lubrication.
Even at an advanced age, he remained closely connected to the company — as a point of contact, source of inspiration, and committed “Elaskoner”.
In Günther Gedecke, we have lost an entrepreneurial personality who had a decisive influence on Elaskon for decades - his name and his work will remain inextricably linked to our history.
Our sincere condolences go out to his family in these difficult times.

ELASKON Sachsen GmbH & Co. KG für Spezialschmierstoffe
The management and all employees

On August 16, 2024, the long-time Elaskon operations manager and company owner, Günther Gedecke, became 95 years old. He is also the inventor of the distinctive company name “Elaskon”, which is based on the words “elastic” and “preservative” and at the same time describes the two most important properties of the lubricants with which “Elaskon” has conquered the world market.

Günther Gedecke was born on August 16, 1929 in Dresden and, after complet-ing his commercial training, initially worked in a mineral oil works in Pirna. In 1957 he moved to the then company Richter & Co as technical manager, which had been selling and later producing technical oils and greases since it was founded in 1928. In 1958, Gedecke took over the management of the medium-sized company as a general partner and ran it until 1992.
Günther Gedecke recognized very early on that the lubrication of ropes can make an essential contribution to operational safety and service life. Under this premise, he developed a process for producing a conveyor rope lubricant, which was patented in 1957.
He knew how important objective quality criteria are, which is why standardi-zation of rope lubricants was important to him. He played a key role in the implementation of TGL 11877 – 1961.

Under his leadership, the quality products of the ELASKON brand won sever-al gold medals at the former leading trade fair in Leipzig. The “Elaskon II con-veyor rope protection” was honored in 1964 in recognition of the high scien-tific and technical level. Awards for other products followed in 1973, 1980 and 1988.

Günther Gedecke maneuvered Elaskon through turbulent and uncertain times. With nationalization in 1972, the company became VEB Elaskonwerk. At the beginning of the 80s, 12 chemical-technical companies with around 1,500 em-ployees were brought together as the “Elaskon Combine” and headed by Gün-ther Gedecke as combine director. In 1992, Günther Gedecke managed to have the Elaskon factory retransferred by the Treuhand. At the same time, Gedecke was looking for partners and a successor to ensure the company had a stable perspective in the market economy.
In 1993 he decided to sell the company to the Präg Group from Kempten. Karl Schwald became managing director, who later gradually took over the compa-ny and now runs it as a family business together with his son Tobias and his brother Richard.   

Günther Gedecke always strived for development, optimization and the best quality. He appeared as a speaker and discussion partner at numerous interna-tional specialist events, symposiums and trade fairs. To this day he keeps him-self informed about market developments and is closely connected to his “Elaskoners”. “Especially in the early days, Günther Gedecke’s experiences and advice were important starting capital for us,” explains Managing Direc-tor, Karl Schwald. “We are very grateful to him for the support and above all wish him good health so that he can enjoy his retirement even in old age. The fact that he has developed Elaskon into a respected brand even in difficult times is a great life achievement that he can be very proud of.”

EWRIS honoured Steve Cawthorne for his long term of service and expertise. Steve will retire next year from his TWG Chairman position.

In reflection of when Steve was involved in standards and EWRIS, he remembered of European meetings with Dr. Siegmund and Michael Molkow in the 1990’s – stalwarts of the industry for sure some of the older members of EWRIS will remember. But it was not until the late 1990’s/ early 2000’s that he got heavily into EWRIS activities first under the chairmanship of Pierre Francois Baron and then Ray Allen; although he had worked with them for some time previously in the standards’ meetings. Steve would like to mention Anne Jourdain who was most supportive and welcoming of him into the EWRIS family. Unfortunately Anne, Pierre and Ray are no longer with us, but he would like to think that he was able to continue in their mould, bringing and maintaining professionalism and knowledge into the organisation.