Thomas Wanke is the Director of the Milwaukee School of Engineering’s Fluid Power Industrial Consortium and Industry Relations. He’s one of the industry’s most popular trainers, with more than three decades of fluid power courses to his credit.
Thomas Wanke, CFPHS, CFPE is the Director of the Fluid Power Industrial Consortium and Industry Relations at Milwaukee School of Engineering. He has more the 50 years of experience in the fluid power industry, 47 of which have been at MSOE. Tom was recently inducted into the International Fluid Power Society’s (IFPS) Hall of Fame. Prior to his current position, Tom was the Director of MSOE’s Fluid Power Institute for 37 years. He has a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology and a master’s degree in Engineering, both with the Fluid Power Specialty Option from MSOE. Tom is an IFPS Certified Fluid Power Hydraulic Specialist and Certified Fluid Power Engineer.
He has worked on projects in the following areas: component and system design; development and evaluation; field troubleshooting and failure analysis; and fluids, filtration and contamination control. Tom has authored numerous technical articles and papers.
He has developed & presented numerous fluid power courses, workshops and seminars covering a wide variety of topics in fluid power. He has also mentored undergraduate and graduate student teams in fluid power capstone senior design and MS Thesis projects.
Tom is a member of SAE and IFPS. He is active on various NFPA and ISO fluid power standards committees and was Co-chairman of the International Fluid Power Exposition (IFPE) 2014 and 2017 Educational Programs.
Tom was awarded two US Patents and was the first recipient of the following awards from MSOE: Karl O. Werwath Engineering Research Award 1990; Otto J. Maha Pioneers in Fluid Power 2007 Award and the Fluid Power Achievement Award 2012. He was also one of the first recipients of the NFPA Fluid Power Challenge Champions Award in 2012.
