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| Industry | Aerospace, Engineering |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1929 |
| Defunct | 1964 |
| Fate | Merged withWestland Aircraft |
| Headquarters | East Cowes, Isle of Wight, UK |
Key people | Samuel Edgar Saunders Alliot Verdon Roe Francis Percy Beadle[1] Maurice Brennan Ray Wheeler |
| Products | Aircraft, helicopters, hovercraft |
Saunders-Roe Limited, also known asSaro, was a British aerospace and marine-engineering company based atColumbine Works,East Cowes,Isle of Wight.[2]
The name was adopted in 1929 afterAlliott Verdon Roe (seeAvro) and John Lord took a controlling interest in the aircraft and boat-buildersS. E. Saunders. Prior to this (excepting for the Sopwith/SaundersBat Boat) the products were Saunders, theA4 Medina for example dating from 1926. Sam Saunders, the founder, developed theConsuta material used in marine and aviation craft.[3]
The Saunders-Roe interest in aviation didn’t prevent the firm from continuing with the boatbuilding activities associated withS. E. Saunders Ltd.
Saunders Roe concentrated on producingflying-boats, but none were produced in very large quantities – the longest run being 31Londons. They also produced hulls for theBlackburn Bluebird. During the Second World War, Saro manufacturedSupermarine Walrus andSupermarine Sea Otters. Their works atBeaumaris,Anglesey, modified and servicedCatalinas for the Royal Air Force.
In January 1931Flight magazine revealed thatWhitehall Securities[4] Corporation Limited acquired a substantial holding in Saunders Roe. Whitehall Securities was already a large shareholder inSpartan Aircraft Ltd, of Southampton, and arising out of this investment Spartan was effectively merged into Saunders Roe.
In 1938 Saunders-Roe undertook a re-organisation of the commercial and administrative sides of its business. First, the marine section, consisting of the shipyard and boat-building business, was transferred to a new company, Saunders Shipyard Ltd., all of the shares of which were owned by Saunders-Roe Ltd. Mr. C. Inglis was appointed shipyard manager. Secondly, the plywood section of the business carried on at the factory on the River Medina was transferred to a new company, Saro Laminated Wood Products Ltd., in consideration for a majority of the shares therein. Laminated Wood Products Ltd., which had marketed most of the plywood output, also merged its interests into the new company. Major Darwin, managing director, left the company. On the aircraft side of the business Mr. Broadsmith continued as director and general manager. All other senior posts in the executive staff remain unchanged.[5]
In 1947 they flew theSR.A/1 fighter prototype, one of the world's first jet-powered flying boats, and in 1952 they flew the prototypePrincess airliner, but the age of the flying-boat was over and the two further Princess examples to be completed were never flown. No further new seaplanes were produced here. Modification work on Short-built flying boats continued atCowes until 1955.
The last fixed-wing aircraft they built was the experimentalSR53 mixed-power interceptor.
In 1951 Saunders-Roe took over the interests of theCierva Autogiro Company at Eastleigh including theSkeeter helicopter project. In September 1952 the company comprised:
There was a branch design office in London, during the 1950s. It was situated in Queens Square, overlooking theGreat Ormond Street Hospital for Children
In 1959 it demonstrated the first practicalhovercraft built under contract to theNational Research Development Corporation toChristopher Cockerell's design, theSR.N1.
In the same year Saro's helicopter and hovercraft interests were taken over byWestland Aircraft which continued the Skeeter family with theScout andWasp. In 1964 all the hovercraft businesses under Westland were merged withVickers-Armstrongs to form theBritish Hovercraft Corporation. This, in turn, was taken over byWestland and was renamed Westland Aerospace in 1985, and hovercraft production was reduced to nearly nothing until the advent of theAP1-88. The company produced sub contract work forBritten-Norman, produced composites and component parts for the aircraft industry, especially enginenacelles for many aircraft including theDe Havilland Canada "Dash 8", theLockheed Hercules, theBritish Aerospace Jetstream and parts for theMcDonnell-Douglas MD-11. By the mid-1990s, over 60% of the world's production ofturboprop nacelles took place in the East Cowes works.
In the late 1960s/early 1970s the Saunders-Roe Folly Works, by then owned byHawker Siddeley was merged with theGloster works to formGloster-Saro utilising both companies' expertise in aluminium forming to producefire appliances and tankers in the Gloster factory atHucclecote, mostly based onReynolds-Boughton chassis. In 1984 Gloster Saro acquired the fire tender business of theChubb group with the company merging in 1987 with Simon Engineering to formSimon Gloster Saro.
In 1994 Westland was taken over byGKN, and when GKN sold off its shares of Westland to formAgusta-Westland, it retained the East Cowes works, where it continues aircraft component design and production.
Laird (Anglesey) Ltd was formed in 1968 and incorporated theBeaumaris andLlangefni factories of Saunders-Roe and the engineering business ofBirkenhead shipbuilders Cammell Laird. Laird developed the Centaur, which was halfLand Rover and halflight tank. The company is now known as FAUN Municipal Vehicles Ltd.having been taken over yet again. Today,FAUN manufactures portable aluminium roadways and runways at Llangefni under its TRACKWAY brand.[6]
In 2015, the East Cowes Columbine Hangar, which later became notable for its large Union Jack painted on its doors, was leased from the Homes & Communities Agency to Shemara Refit, now known asWight Shipyard Co. Ltd, to refitMY Shemara. They also constructed the catamaran ferry Red Jet 6 inside the hangar for Red Funnel Ferries, with the next in the series,Red Jet 7, also built there. The GKN North site had been sold in 2002 for £8m to theSouth East England Development Agency (an English regional development agency closed by the UK government in 2012) for the regeneration of East Cowes. This stalled with the financial crash in 2008 and is set never to achieve the site's full potential as a deep water Prime Tier 1 Marine Industrial Site.[7]
The docks at the Columbine Hangar have also been used by Red Funnel as berths for theirRed Jet catamaran ferries when not in use; for example,Red Jet 6 was berthed at the Columbine while undergoing system tests, whileRed Jet 3 was docked there while on sale awaiting a buyer during 2018.[8]
With theRoyal Aircraft Establishment
The Rocket Development Division was formed in 1956 and the Rocket Test site at Highdown started functioning exactly one year later. The division was headquartered atYeovil. It was this division, in conjunction with the Royal Aircraft Establishment, that was responsible for the design, manufacture and static testing of theBlack Knight Rocket, the first of which was successfully fired atWoomera, South Australia, on 7 September 1958.
Designed by Fred Goatley# Marine designerMark 2 Canoe – 1941–1942 (used on the Cockleshell Heroes "Frankton Raid")Mk 2** Canoe – 1943 ( used in Leros – various, incl. Sunbeam Raids )12-man Assault craft c. 1940–19428 ton load carrier. c. 1942–1943[14][15]
The Electronics Division was formed in 1948. Its progress was rapid and the division also designed and manufactured such diverse specialist equipment as Analogue Computers, Control Simulators and a variety of Electronic Equipment and Electronic Test sets associated with Guided Weapons. When usingstrain gauges of the normal wire type in the dynamic testing of helicopter components, notably rotor blades, Saunders-Roe found that such a high proportion of the gauges were failing that development was considerably retarded. The Electronics Division was therefore asked to devise an improved gauge and, in collaboration with Messrs. Technograph Printed Circuits Ltd.,[16] produced the foil strain gauge.
Early in aviation, it was difficult – if not impossible – to supply uninterrupted power in aircraft. Saunders-Roe solved this problem by putting an ionising gas (tritium;3H) in small tubes. Tritium was discovered in 1934 byLord Rutherford. The tubes ("Betalights") are made ofborosilicate glass. The inside of the tubes is coated with a fluorescent powder, which glows as a result of the ionizing radiation of the tritium gas. Such a tube emits light for 15 years. Betalights were used to illuminate the flight instruments, exit signs and corridors of the aircraft produced by Saunders-Roe. When Saunders-Roe was acquired byWestland Helicopters production continued via Saunders-Roe Developments Ltd of North Hyde Road,Hayes, Middlesex (the formerFairey Aviation Head office).Betalight production was made independent under the name SRBT (Saunders-Roe Betalight Technology). A factory was established in Pembroke, Ontario, Canada, where tritium supplies are readily available. Today betalights are used in self luminous escape-route signs, under the product name Betalux.
In early 1953, Saunders-Roe at Anglesey completed the Mark 3airborne lifeboat to be fitted underneath theAvro Shackleton maritime reconnaissance aircraft. This model was made entirely of aluminium, previous marks being made of timber. Parachuted at a rate of 20 feet per second into the rescue zone, the craft was powered by aVincent motorcycles HRD T5 15 hp engine; sails and a fishing kit were also provided. The Mark 3 measured 31 feet (9 m) from bow to stern and 7 feet (2 m) across the beam and held enough to supply 10 people with food and water for 14 days.[17]
During World War II, Saunders-Roe opened a factory at Fryars in Llanfaes, Anglesey, converting and maintaining Catalina flying boats. In the late 1940s and 1950s theBeaumaris factory began making bus bodies under the names Saunders, SEAS (Saunders Engineering & Shipbuilding) and SARO. WhenAEC took overCrossley Motors, many of the design staff left and joined SARO. In pre-Atlantean days whenLeyland began looking at low floor vehicles, the "Low Loader" (STF 90) bodied by SARO was similar in certain respects to the Crossley chassisless bus designs. Bodies were manufactured at Beaumaris for installing on "Leyland Royal Tiger" and "Leyland Tiger Cub" chassis; SARO bodied 250RTs for London Transport between 1948 and 1950 (RT 1152–1401), which were almost indistinguishable from the standard Weymann/Park Royal products; and some double-deck buses for Liverpool Corporation. 620 prefabricated Rivalloy (the brand name comes fromrivetted (aluminium)alloy) single deck buses components for local assembly were sold to Autobuses Modernos SA, Cuba which later became Omnibus Metropolitanos, S.A. Another large customer was Auckland Regional Transport in New Zealand who took the Rivalloy body on 90Daimler Freeline chassis. In 1948 the only double deck bodies to be exported were 20 ordered by South African operator Durban Motor Transport which were mounted on AEC Regent Mark III chassis.[18]In the UK large numbers of SARO bodies were specified by theBritish Electric Traction group on Leyland Tiger Cub chassis, operators including Trent, East Midland, Ribble, Yorkshire Traction and the Northern General Group. An integral version of the body design powered by a Gardner 5HLW engine was bought by Maidstone & District.
The factory later passed toCammell Laird who mainly used it for producing refuse-collection vehicles, but whenMetro Cammell Weymann had a production backlog, they completed a batch of MCW-style double deck forward-entrance highbridge bodies onLeyland Titan PD3 for Brighton Corporation, these were numbered 31–5, registered LUF131-5F and delivered in June and July 1968, they were unusual as front engined half-cab buses built to be driver operated.[19]
