Graviner is a British engineering company that makes oxygen (life support) and fire extinguishing systems for civil and military aircraft. The name is a

portmanteau In linguistics, a blend—also known as a blend word, lexical blend, or portmanteau—is a word formed by combining the meanings, and parts of the sounds, of two or more words together.

gravity In physics, gravity (), also known as gravitation or a gravitational interaction, is a fundamental interaction, a mutual attraction between all massive particles. On Earth, gravity takes a slightly different meaning: the observed force b ...

and

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History

The company was independently operational from 1933 to 1980 and is now a component of United Technologies Corporation (UTC).

Explosion suppression

In the 1930s, as the Graviner Manufacturing Company in

Gosport Gosport ( ) is a town and non-metropolitan district with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in Hampshire, England. At the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 Census, the town had a population of 70,131 and the district had a pop ...

, it made the Graviner Extinguisher, an explosion-suppression system, which operated to prevent fuel from catching fire in an aircraft crash. The system deployed the compound

carbon tetrachloride Carbon tetrachloride, also known by many other names (such as carbon tet for short and tetrachloromethane, also IUPAC nomenclature of inorganic chemistry, recognised by the IUPAC), is a chemical compound with the chemical formula CCl4. It is a n ...

, the forerunner to the modern gaseous extinguishing agents collectively referred to as ''

Halon Halon may refer to: * Haloalkane, or halogenoalkane, a group of chemical compounds consisting of alkanes with linked halogens (in particular, bromine-containing haloalkanes) * Halomethane compounds: ** Halon 10001 (iodomethane) ** Halon 1001 (bromo ...

''.

Fire detection

In the early 1950s it made a product called ''Graviner Firewire'' which detected fires onboard aircraft. The company was now based in

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (, abbreviated ''Bucks'') is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-east, Hertfordshir ...

. The Graviner Firewire extinguisher system was also used extensively by British Rail. All Diesel Multiple Units (referred to as 'Railcars' at the time) built in the 1950s and 1960s, had the system installed around the underfloor mounted engines and transmissions. Thousands of the systems were installed beneath every DMU 'Power-car' built by British Rail workshops and by private contractors. The original systems remained in use right up until the last units were withdrawn from the, by now Privatised National Rail system in the early 2000s, and remains installed on the many preserved DMUs on heritage railways, although most have had the original extinguishing medium (CTC) replaced with non-toxic, modern Halon based medium. In July 1966 it won the contract to provide fire detection and suppression systems for

Concorde Concorde () is a retired Anglo-French supersonic airliner jointly developed and manufactured by Sud Aviation and the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC). Studies started in 1954, and France and the United Kingdom signed a treaty establishin ...

. It also made fire detection systems for marine craft; it makes a well-known

oil mist Oil mist refers to oil droplets suspended in the air in the size range 1~10 μm. Formation of oil mist Oil mist may form when high pressure fuel oil, lubricating oil, hydraulic oil, or other oil is sprayed through a narrow crack, or when l ...

detector. In 1983 it provided the fire detection and suppression systems for the world land speed record car Thrust2. In 1984 it introduced the world's first microprocessor-controlled engine fire detection system. By the 1980s, half of the world's

Boeing 747 The Boeing 747 is a long-range wide-body aircraft, wide-body airliner designed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes in the United States between 1968 and 2023. After the introduction of the Boeing 707, 707 in October 1958, Pan Am ...

s carried its technology. In 1991 it won a contract to provide the fire detection systems for the experimental

Lockheed YF-22 The Lockheed/Boeing/General Dynamics YF-22 is an American single-seat, twinjet, twin-engine, stealth aircraft, stealth fighter aircraft, fighter technology demonstrator prototype designed for the United States Air Force (USAF). The design te ...

, which subsequently evolved many years later into the

Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor The Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 Raptor is an American Twinjet, twin-engine, Jet engine, jet-powered, Night fighter, all-weather, supersonic Stealth aircraft, stealth fighter aircraft. As a product of the United States Air Force's Advanced Ta ...

, entering service with the USAF around 2006.

Nuclear energy

By the early 1960s it had a nuclear energy division.

Ownership

In the 1980s it was owned by Allegheny International. By the 1980s it was part of the same group as a similar company, Deugra, based near

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...

. It was bought, with Deugra, for £24m in 1986 by RHP Group ( bearings). By the late 1980s, RHP Group had become Pilgrim House Group. The company is now part of United Technologies Corporation (UTC). The business at Colnbrook closed on 21 December 2017. Production was transferred to a sister company, L'Hotellier in Paris.John O'Brien, Technical Manager, Kidde Graviner

References