How about amazingly cool pictures of hovercraft?

[Tootles the Taxi]

I'll get things started






All taken at Dover in about 1985.

[Simpo Two]

I made an Airfix model of that; must have been about 1970. There was also a model of the very first (SRN-1?). Christopher Cockerell and all that. Cockerell, Whittle, Wallis et al - where did it all go wrong?

[FourWheelDrift]

The surviving SRN4s Princess Anne and Princess Margaret at the Hovercraft Museum are for sale, apparently one of them could be on the way back into service on Lake Ontario.

[kiteless]

I only experienced a SRN-4 channel crossing once.

THE NOISE

And that was inside...

[tog]

EnglishRussia

[lewes]

Why did they stop using Hovercraft on the Dover - Calais route ??

Was it due to the Tunnel or another reason


Went on it when I was about 12 and the vibration at the front was unreal, trying to have a drink was similar to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wwPeSDCCAs

[Nickyboy]

Interesting page about the fire that destroyed the Prince of Wales

http://www.hovercraft-museum.org/powfire.html

[Chrisgr31]

lewes said:

Why did they stop using Hovercraft on the Dover - Calais route ??

Was it due to the Tunnel or another reason

I think it was due to fuel costs although it might have been tunnel related as well, as that will have increased capacity, and caused a price war.

How about little hovercraft? http://www.hovercraft.demon.co.uk/ or http://www.hovercraft.org.uk/

[Skywalker]

Got to love the Booties

[Conian]

[RosscoPCole]

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&rlz=1G1GGL...

Great view of the Hovercraft Museum at Lee on Solent

[Tootles the Taxi]

Conian said:

"Where we're going ... we don't need roads"

[FourWheelDrift]

That's just a general aerial view of Lee on Solent.

You need this one - http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&a...

Then close the streetview to see aerial.

[danyeates]

My girlfriends father is the sales manager for HovPod in Southampton. Stick HovPod into YouTube, there are loads of videos on there

[Simes205]

lewes said:

Why did they stop using Hovercraft on the Dover - Calais route ??

Was it due to the Tunnel or another reason


Went on it when I was about 12 and the vibration at the front was unreal, trying to have a drink was similar to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wwPeSDCCAs

I went on one of the last crossings, purely by chance. I'd missed my ferry at Dieppe and drove onto Calais managing to get a ticket for the hovercraft. Slept on the back seat of the car on the pad and was awoken by something like this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESzDrSoTScY

It was the first time I'd been on one since 1982! This time I was big enough to see out of the window!
Amazing it was running on 3 engines and the noise was incredible - quality machine.

Edited by Simes205 on Saturday 25th September 17:59

[Conian]

Bit of info (incase any one is interested) on this thing...

It was made on the US TV show Monster Garage, hosted by Jesse James (yes a relative of the outlaw and yes the one who cheated on Sandra Bullock)

The show spans 1 week, 1 design day and then build days, where a team of invited guests have to convert a vehicle to perfom some task, eg a Porsche 944 collecting golf balls, Ford Mustang lawn mower.

That show was obviously to make a Delorean hover.
The team do most of the work, Jesse does help out and offer direction when he is available. This show he was not available for the first couple of days building, and the team made a bad choice of attaching the delorean bodywork onto an existing hovercraft.

When Jesse returned he pointed out that the idea was to make a car hover, not to make a hovercraft look like a car. One of the team argued n was told to leave.
This left the team half a week to work on the Delorean, they did well in the time they had but it didnt hover by midnight on the last day so they lost.

They did suceed in making it tilt, which they took as some consolation as to the good work they had done in the last days.

[Pothole]

FourWheelDrift said:

That's just a general aerial view of Lee on Solent.

You need this one - http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&a...

Then close the streetview to see aerial.

I took some photos through the gates the other week...I'll post them up tomorrow.

[Silver Smudger]

Amazingly cool? Hovercraft? - How about a home-made flying hovercraft!?

[RosscoPCole]

Here are a few pics from the Hovercraft Museum open day last year on the 50th anniversary of the first flight.












Was a great day watching the different hovercraft and being able to explore an SR.N4 and the other craft on display. I never knew how big the SR.N4 was until I saw it up close.

Edited by RosscoPCole on Sunday 26th September 07:37

[Ross1988]

Full tilt shot of a USN Hovercraft, always makes an impression.