|
AP1-88
The British Hovercraft Corporation AP1-88 is a medium-size hovercraft. In a civil configuration, the hovercraft can seat a maximum of 101 passengers, while as a troop carrier, it can transport up to 90 troops. When operated as a military logistics vehicle, the AP1-88 can carry a pair of Land Rovers, a Bv202 tracked vehicle and trailer unit or up to roughly 10 tons (10,000 kg) of cargo. The AP1-88 had several advantages over earlier hovercraft in terms of its increased fuel economy and reduced noise output, which is principally due to the decision to power the craft using several diesel engines instead of using gas turbine engines, the latter having been used on earlier craft. From 1983 to 2018, AP1-88-100s were operated in Britain by Hovertravel on a route from Southsea in Hampshire to Ryde on the Isle of Wight. Outside of the United Kingdom, vehicles of the type have also been operated in a various of locations around the world, including Norway, Australia, China, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hovertravel
Hovertravel is a ferry company operating from Southsea, Portsmouth to Ryde, Isle of Wight, UK. It is the largest passenger hovercraft company currently operating in the world since the demise of Hoverspeed. Hovertravel is now the world's oldest hovercraft operator, and this service is believed to be unique in western Europe. Hovertravel describes itself as "the world's only year-round passenger hovercraft service" (although there is a regular winter-only operator in Estonia). The operator's principal service operates between Southsea Common on the English mainland and Ryde Transport Interchange on the Isle of Wight: the crossing time of less than 10 minutes makes it the fastest route across The Solent from land to land. This service commenced operations in 1965, Hovertravel currently operates two 12000TD hovercraft on a single route between Ryde and Southsea. Additionally, Hovertravel has frequently operated other routes throughout the United Kingdom, typically as charter s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Hovercraft Corporation
British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC) was a British hovercraft manufacturer that designed and produced multiple types of vehicles for both commercial and civil purposes. Created with the intention of producing viable commercial hovercraft in March 1966, BHC was the result of a corporate merger between the Saunders-Roe division of Westland Aircraft and Vickers Supermarine's hovercraft interests. None of the Vickers hovercraft designs reached quantity production, manufacturing efforts being centered upon Saunders-Roe's existing portfolio. Perhaps the most high-profile vehicle produced by BHC was the large SR.N4 ''Mountbatten'' class hovercraft; it was the largest civil-orientated hovercraft to ever be put into service; several were completed and used in revenue services across the English Channel for multiple decades. Later on, the BHC developed their own newer hovercraft designs, such as the military-oriented British Hovercraft Corporation BH.7, BH.7 ''Wellington'' class and the med ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hovercraft
A hovercraft (: hovercraft), also known as an air-cushion vehicle or ACV, is an amphibious craft capable of travelling over land, water, mud, ice, and various other surfaces. Hovercraft use blowers to produce a large volume of air below the Hull (watercraft), hull, or air cushion, that is slightly above atmospheric pressure. The pressure difference between the higher-pressure air below the hull and lower pressure ambient air above it produces lift, which causes the hull to float above the running surface. For stability reasons, the air is typically blown through slots or holes around the outside of a disk- or oval-shaped platform, giving most hovercraft a characteristic rounded-rectangle shape. The first practical design for hovercraft was derived from a British invention in the 1950s. They are now used throughout the world as specialised transports in disaster relief, coastguard, military and survey applications, as well as for sport or passenger service. Very large version ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saunders-Roe
Saunders-Roe Limited, also known as Saro, was a British aerospace and marine-engineering company based at Columbine Works, East Cowes, Isle of Wight. History The name was adopted in 1929 after Alliott Verdon Roe (see Avro) and John Lord took a controlling interest in the aircraft and boat-builders SE Saunders. Prior to this (excepting for the Sopwith/Saunders Bat Boat) the products were Saunders, the A4 Medina for example dating from 1926. Sam Saunders, the founder, developed the Consuta material used in marine and aviation craft. The Saunders-Roe interest in aviation didn’t prevent the firm from continuing with the boatbuilding activities associated with SE Saunders. Saunders Roe concentrated on producing flying-boats, but none were produced in very large quantities – the longest run being 31 Londons. They also produced hulls for the Blackburn Bluebird. During World War II, Saro manufactured Supermarine Walrus and Supermarine Sea Otters. Their works at Beau ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Technology Group
BTG Limited is an international specialist healthcare company that is developing and commercialising products targeting critical care, cancer and other disorders. The current name was adopted when the British Technology Group changed its name on 27 May 1998. BTG was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index until it was acquired by Boston Scientific in August 2019. History In 1948, the National Research Development Corporation was formed with the purpose of commercialising innovations that arose from public funded research. This was complemented, in November 1975, by the establishment of the National Enterprise Board to implement the then-Government's policy of moving public sector industry into commercial private enterprise. These two organisations were merged by the Government in 1981 to form a new, non-statutory body called the British Technology Group. It acted principally to license and commercialise the use of publicly funded developments. The Group was put onto a statutory footi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sound Barrier
The sound barrier or sonic barrier is the large increase in aerodynamic drag and other undesirable effects experienced by an aircraft or other object when it approaches the speed of sound. When aircraft first approached the speed of sound, these effects were seen as constituting a barrier, making faster speeds very difficult or impossible. The term ''sound barrier'' is still sometimes used today to refer to aircraft approaching supersonic flight in this high drag regime. Flying faster than sound produces a sonic boom. In dry air at 20 °C (68 °F), the speed of sound is 343 metres per second (about 767 mph, 1234 km/h or 1,125 ft/s). The term came into use during World War II when pilots of high-speed fighter aircraft experienced the effects of compressibility, a number of adverse aerodynamic effects that deterred further acceleration, seemingly impeding flight at speeds close to the speed of sound. These difficulties represented a barrier to flying ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Helicopter
A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes allow helicopters to be used in congested or isolated areas where fixed-wing aircraft and many forms of short take-off and landing (STOL) or short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) aircraft cannot perform without a runway. The Focke-Wulf Fw 61 was the first successful, practical, and fully controllable helicopter in 1936, while in 1942, the Sikorsky R-4 became the first helicopter to reach full-scale mass production, production. Starting in 1939 and through 1943, Igor Sikorsky worked on the development of the Vought-Sikorsky VS-300, VS-300, which over four iterations, became the basis for modern helicopters with a single main rotor and a single tail rotor. Although most earlier ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Turboshaft
A turboshaft engine is a form of gas turbine that is optimized to produce shaft horsepower rather than jet thrust. In concept, turboshaft engines are very similar to turbojets, with additional turbine expansion to extract heat energy from the exhaust and convert it into output shaft power. They are even more similar to turboprops, with only minor differences, and a single engine is often sold in both forms. Turboshaft engines are commonly used in applications that require a sustained high power output, high reliability, small size, and light weight. These include helicopters, auxiliary power units, boats and ships, tanks, hovercraft, and stationary equipment. Overview A turboshaft engine may be made up of two major parts assemblies: the 'gas generator' and the 'power section'. The gas generator consists of the Gas compressor, compressor, combustion chambers with ignitors and fuel nozzles, and one or more stages of turbine. The power section consists of additional stages of turbi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the China, People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast, and the Philippines to the south. It has an area of , with mountain ranges dominating the eastern two-thirds and plains in the western third, where its Urbanization by country, highly urbanized population is concentrated. The combined Free area of the Republic of China, territories under ROC control consist of list of islands of Taiwan, 168 islands in total covering . The Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, largest metropolitan area is formed by Taipei (the capital), New Taipei City, and Keelung. With around 23.9 million inhabitants, Taiwan is among the List of countries and dependencies by population density, most densely populated countries. Tai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1973 Oil Crisis
In October 1973, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) announced that it was implementing a total oil embargo against countries that had supported Israel at any point during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, which began after Egypt and Syria launched a large-scale surprise attack in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to recover the territories that they had lost to Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War. In an effort that was led by Faisal of Saudi Arabia, the initial countries that OAPEC targeted were Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This list was later expanded to include Estado Novo (Portugal), Portugal, Rhodesia, and South Africa. In March 1974, OAPEC lifted the embargo, but the price of oil had risen by nearly 300%: from US to nearly US globally. Prices in the United States were significantly higher than the global average. After it was implemented, the embargo caused an oil crisis, or "shock", with many short- and long ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
