Farhang (Freddie) Bakhtar is an Honorary Professor in the School of Mechanical Engineering. He was on the Staff from 1960 until his retirement in 1977and now works part time continuing his research. His research work has included metal forming, development work on the Petroforge, heat transfer and combustion but his main research activity has been concerned with problems associated with two-phase flows of steam in turbines.
He has developed theoretical treatments and experimental facilities to study these flows, established strong contacts and collaborated with the manufacturing organizations and utilities in this country and abroad and attracted funds for research. He has lectured widely and written extensively in the scientific and engineering literature, mainly in the Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers but also in the Transactions of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the International Journal of Heat and Fluid Flow.
With co-authors he was awarded a James Clayton Fund Prize for 1972 by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers for a paper on instability in condensing flows of steam and the Thomas Bernard Hall Prize for 2005 for the paper on classical nucleation theory and its application to condensing steam flow calculations listed below.
Farhang (Freddie) received his primary and secondary education in Iran and studied Mechanical Engineering at the University of Birmingham, graduating with 1st Class Honours in 1952.
After industrial training and post-graduate research at Birmingham, he worked in the oil industry in Iran and then joined the academic staff of the University of Birmingham in 1960, where he has remained.
He was awarded the Degree of DSc in 1985. He retired from his post in 1977 but continues to work in the School as an Honorary Professor.