HOVERTRAVEL - The Solent

digitalexpressionuk@hotmail.com
recent  |  interesting  |  random  |  favorites  |  contacts  |  sets  |  tags:  
HOVERTRAVEL - The Solent
HOVERTRAVEL - The Solent

Pictured: SOLENT FLYER on the swing at Southsea Hover port about to enter her elements - The Solent!

COMMERCIALISATION
Through these improvements, the hovercraft became an effective transport system for high-speed service on water and land, leading to widespread developments for military vehicles, search and rescue, and commercial operations. By 1962, many UK aviation and ship building firms were working on hovercraft designs, including Saunders Roe/Westland, Vickers-Armstrong, William Denny, Britten-Norman and Folland. Small-scale ferry service started as early as 1962 with the launch of the Vickers-Armstrong VA-3. With the introduction of the 254 passenger and 30 car carrying SR.N4 cross-channel ferry by Hoverlloyd and Seaspeed in 1968, hovercraft had developed into useful commercial craft.

Another major pioneering effort of the early hovercraft era was carried out by Jean Bertin's firm in France. Bertin was an advocate of the "multi-skirt" approach, which used a number of smaller cylindrical skirts instead of one large one in order to avoid the problems noted above. During the early 1960s he developed a series of prototype designs, which he called "terraplanes" if they were aimed for land use, and "naviplanes" for water. The best known of these designs was the N500 Naviplane, built for Seaspeed by the Société d'Etude et de Développement des Aéroglisseurs Marins (SEDAM). The N500 could carry 400 passengers, 55 cars and five buses. It set a speed record between Boulogne and Dover of 74 kn (137 km/h). It was rejected by its operators, who claimed that it was unreliable.

Another discovery was that the total amount of air needed to lift the craft was a function of the roughness of the surface it travelled over. On flat surfaces, like pavement, the needed air pressure was so low that hovercraft were able to compete in energy terms with conventional systems like steel wheels. However, as the hovercraft lift system acted as both a lift and very effective suspension, it naturally lent itself to high-speed use where conventional suspension systems were considered too complex. This led to a variety of "hovertrain" proposals during the 1960s, including England's Tracked Hovercraft and France's Aérotrain. In the U.S., Rohr Inc. and Garrett both took out licenses to develop local versions of the Aérotrain. These designs competed with maglev systems in the high-speed arena, where their primary advantage was the very "low tech" tracks they needed. On the downside, the air blowing dirt and trash out from under the trains presented a unique problem in stations, and interest in them waned in the 1970s.

Photograph Copyright: Digital Expression UK (2020)

© All Rights Reserved
Taken on: February 22, 2020
Tags: Everybody's photos tagged with Hovercraft Hovercraft Everybody's photos tagged with The The Everybody's photos tagged with Solent Solent more » Everybody's photos tagged with Transport Transport Everybody's photos tagged with Maritime Maritime « less
Sets appears in:   • The Solent    • SEA   
Groups appears in:   • Just Hovercraft    • South-Coast Transport    more » • PBWA - Photography By Wandering About    • United Kingdom Transport    • HOVERTRAVEL Enthusiasts    • HOVERCRAFT GROUP    « less
Stats: 2,955 views