Williams International is an American manufacturer of small

gas turbine A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directio ...

engines based in

Pontiac, Michigan Pontiac ( ') is a city in and the county seat of Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the city had a total population of 61,606. A northern suburb of Metro Detroit, Pontiac is about northwest of Detroit. Found ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. It produces jet engines for

cruise missile A cruise missile is a guided missile used against terrestrial or naval targets that remains in the atmosphere and flies the major portion of its flight path at approximately constant speed. Cruise missiles are designed to deliver a large warh ...

s and small

jet aircraft A jet aircraft (or simply jet) is an aircraft (nearly always a fixed-wing aircraft) propelled by jet engines. Whereas the engines in propeller-powered aircraft generally achieve their maximum efficiency at much lower speeds and altitudes, jet ...

History

Dr.

Sam B. Williams Sam Barlow Williams (7 May 1921 in Seattle, Washington – 22 June 2009 in Indian Wells, California) was an American inventor and founder of Williams International. He was best known for his development of the small fan-jet engine, and received s ...

worked at

Chrysler Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automotiv ...

on their automotive turbine systems, but always imagined a wider set of applications for the small gas turbine engine. He left Chrysler to form Williams Research Corporation in

Birmingham, Michigan Birmingham is a city in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is a northern suburb of Detroit located along the Woodward Corridor ( M-1). As of the 2010 census, the population was 20,103. History The area comprising what is now the ...

in 1954. In 1981, the company became Williams International. It has been building small

turbofan The turbofan or fanjet is a type of airbreathing jet engine that is widely used in aircraft engine, aircraft propulsion. The word "turbofan" is a portmanteau of "turbine" and "fan": the ''turbo'' portion refers to a gas turbine engine which ac ...

engines since the 1950s for use in cruise missiles as well as target and reconnaissance drones. Using the missile engines, Williams developed a series of personal

VTOL A vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is one that can take off and land vertically without relying on a runway. This classification can include a variety of types of aircraft including helicopters as well as thrust-vectoring fixed-wi ...

flying craft, including a jet-powered belt in 1969, the Williams Aerial Systems Platform (WASP), also known as the "flying pulpit" in the 1970s, and the X-Jet, which was evaluated by the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, ...

in the 1980s.Kocivar, Ben.
Turbofan-powered flying carpet
''

Popular Science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...

'', September 1982. Accessed: September 2014. The WASP platform was the only competitor to the

Garrett STAMP The Garrett STAMP (Small Tactical Aerial Mobility Platform) was a two-person aircraft prototype made by a division of AiResearch Manufacturing Co. of Phoenix, Arizona, for the United States Marine Corps STAMP program, in the early 1970s. Develo ...

in the United States Marine Corps STAMP (Small Tactical Aerial Mobility Platform) program of the early 1970s. Also in the 1980s, Williams identified a need in the

general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations with the exception of commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services ...

market for a small, light jet engine to power cost-effective personal and corporate jet aircraft. The company introduced the FJ44 engine, which in turn made possible the introduction of a number of small jet aircraft. In 1992,

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedin ...

initiated its

Advanced General Aviation Transport Experiments The Advanced General Aviation Transport Experiments (AGATE) project was a consortium of NASA, the FAA, the general aviation industry and a number of universities. Its goal was to create a Small Aviation Transportation System (SATS) as an alternat ...

(AGATE) program to partner with manufacturers and help develop technologies that would revitalize the sagging general aviation industry. In 1996, Williams joined AGATE's General Aviation Propulsion program to develop a fuel-efficient turbofan engine that would be even smaller than the FJ44. The result was the FJX-2 engine. Williams then contracted with

Burt Rutan Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan (; born June 17, 1943) is a retired American aerospace engineer and entrepreneur noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, and energy-efficient air and space craft. He designed the recor ...

Scaled Composites Scaled Composites (often called simply Scaled) is an American aerospace company founded by Burt Rutan and currently owned by Northrop Grumman. It is located at the Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, California, United States. Founded to deve ...

to design and build the Williams V-Jet II, a

Very Light Jet A very light jet (VLJ), entry-level jet or personal jet, previously known as a microjet, is a category of small business jets seating four to eight people. VLJs are considered the lightest business jets and are approved for single-pilot operati ...

to use as a testbed and technology demonstrator to showcase the new engine. The aircraft and engine were debuted at the 1997 Oshkosh Airshow. The production version of the engine, the EJ22 flew on the prototype Eclipse 500 VLJ (which had evolved from the V-Jet II), but was subsequently replaced by a

Pratt & Whitney Pratt & Whitney is an American aerospace manufacturer with global service operations. It is a subsidiary of Raytheon Technologies. Pratt & Whitney's aircraft engines are widely used in both civil aviation (especially airlines) and military av ...

engine.

Products

Aircraft

Engines

References

Notes

Bibliography

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External links

* {{Williams aeroengines Aircraft engine manufacturers of the United States Companies based in Oakland County, Michigan Privately held companies of the United States