Rover Gas Turbines
Part of Rover Co
Rover Gas Turbines Ltd, of Solihull
1950 Rover built the first gas-turbine powered car
1953 Private company formed as subsidiary of Rover[1]
Rover/Lucas S2, a twin shaft engine, was developed from the famous Rover P6 gas turbine, the engine that almost made it as the world's first automotive gas turbine. The engine was later used as a compressor unit for the Nimrod aircraft and also as an Auxiliary Power Unit in the HS748 aircraft.
1954 Portable gas turbine engine for industrial uses was shown at the British Industries Fair[2]
1962 Rover T4 gas turbine car was shown at the New York Motor Show.
1963 The Rover B.R.M. Gas Turbine Car, a joint product of Rover and the Owen Organisation, was shown at the 1963 Motor Show. The car was the first gas-turbine car to complete the Le Mans 24 hour race.
1965 A regenerative heat exchanger was fitted to the Rover B.R.M car (with Rover 2S/150/R engine) entered in the Le Mans 24 hour race[3]
A scaled-down version of the S2 power plant, the Rover 2S75, was the basis of Rotax's CT2023 unit and Lucas's CR201 unit. The gas generator section of this engine formed the basis of the Rover TJ125 minijet engine
1966 Sales of gas turbines continued for a range of commercial and industrial applications[4]
1967 New direction announced, concentrating on larger gas turbines for commercial vehicles[5]
1968 Launch of prototype gas turbine-engined lorry by British Leyland Motor Corporation[6]
1968 Launch of the T.J.125 turbo-jet engine [7]
By 1972 the company was known as Leyland Gas Turbines. Dr Noel Penny left to set up his own company making gas turbines[8]
1974 The schedule for bringing the truck into production was slowed down[9] because of the need to develop a version of the engine operating at higher temperature, which would need new materials[10]
See Also
Sources of Information
- Rover Lucas S2 [1]