Vosper Thornycroft (UK) Ltd: Gas-Turbine-Powered Fast Patrol Boats

Luke Georghiou, J. Stanley Metcalfe, Michael Gibbons, Tim Ray and Janet Evans

Chapter 31 in Post-Innovation Performance, 1986, pp 284-292 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Vosper Thornycroft won the Queen’s Award to Industry in 1966 for its development of gas-turbine powered fast patrol boats (FPBs). This award, which was conferred just after the Portsmouth-based firm of Vosper had taken over John I. Thornycroft of Southampton, recognised pre-merger development work undertaken by Vosper Ltd. The FPBs in question represented the culmination of a path of development, on which Vosper first embarked in the 1930s, that aimed to produce small, high-speed warships. Such craft could attack larger ships and then use their speed to escape before the target could bring its defences to bear. Vosper’s innovative use of gas-turbines in FPBs, coupled with a range of general design features oriented towards achieving high speeds, was intended to exploit this principle of ‘strike and retreat’ to the full. With top speeds in excess of 50 knots these FPBs were among the fastest warships ever built.

Keywords: Diesel Engine; Naval Architect; Private Venture; Patrol Boat; Hull Design (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1986
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-1-349-07455-6_36

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.palgrave.com/9781349074556

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-07455-6_36

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Palgrave Macmillan Books from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().