Marquardt Corporation was an aeronautical engineering firm started in 1944 as Marquardt Aircraft Company and initially dedicated almost entirely to the development of the ramjet engine. Marquardt designs were developed from the mid-1940s into the early 1960s, but as the ramjet disappeared from military usage, the company turned to other fields.
99-454: In 1968 Marquardt was merged with CCI Inc. of Tulsa, OK. The newly merged firm became known as "CCI-Marquardt, Inc.". That name changed back to "CCI Inc." after a few years. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s pieces of Marquardt were sold off or merged with other firms. By the 1990s, one of the remnants of the company, called Marquardt Manufacturing Inc. (MMI) was embroiled in a legal suit with its predecessor organization, which had become principally
198-572: A BSI committee. This also inspired the development of ASCII . In collaboration with the Victoria University of Manchester they built a new version of the famous Mark 1 that replaced valve diodes with solid state versions, which allowed the speed to be increased dramatically as well as increasing reliability. Ferranti offered the result commercially as the Mercury starting in 1957, and eventually sold nineteen in total. Although
297-525: A United States defence contractor based in Pennsylvania . The company subsequently changed its name to Ferranti International PLC. and restructured the combined business into the following divisions: Ferranti Computer Systems, Ferranti Defence Systems, Ferranti Dynamics, Ferranti Satcomms, Ferranti Telecoms, Ferranti Technologies and International Signal and Control. Unknown to Ferranti, ISC's business primarily consisted of illegal arms sales started at
396-400: A conglomerate ( GenCorp, Inc. ) with holdings in tire manufacturing (General Tire, Inc.), rubber compounds (DiversiTech General), rocketry and aeronautics ( Aerojet ), and broadcasting ( RKO General ). The company's tire division was sold to Germany's Continental AG in 1987, becoming Continental General Tire Corp. before its re–incorporation again to its current name. The compounds division
495-559: A contract for the complete Sonar 2050. The work was originally carried out at the Wythenshawe factory and then at Cheadle Heath. Takeovers of other companies gave it expertise in sonar arrays. This business later became Ferranti Thomson Sonar Systems . The selection of the radar for the project that became the Eurofighter Typhoon became a major international issue in the early 1990s. Britain, Italy, and Spain supported
594-452: A contract to produce rocket engines to speed airplane liftoff, and formed a company named Aerojet . The group succeeded with liquid–fuel rockets, but needed additional materials science and manufacturing expertise to create more sophisticated solid–fuel rockets. Aerojet went into partnership with The General Tire & Rubber Company, using their capitalization, expertise with rubber binders, and chemical manufacturing facilities. The partnership
693-698: A hot bed of scientific research activity. Marquardt made significant advances in many fields, including space propulsion, medicine, optics, life in space, panoramic photography (the VueMarq System), transportation, hypersonic flight, high-temperature metallurgy, water desalination, slurry fuels, underwater propulsion, ram air turbines, afterburners and thrust-reversers for jet aircraft, computer storage, anti-mortar defense systems, FAX machines, television transmission, LED research, and devices as seemingly mundane as pick-up shoes for electric locomotives powered by third-rail power. Roy Marquardt had always believed that
792-446: A huge defense contract fraud at ISC amounting to $ 1-billion (perhaps equivalent to $ 3 billion in 2020 dollars), masterminded by James Guerin, ISC's deputy chairman prior to the merger. Guerin subsequently received a 15-year prison sentence for fraud and arms smuggling. This led to a restructuring at Ferranti and the plan to sell off some of the assets they had acquired from ISC. Ferranti declared bankruptcy in 1991. In August 1991 one of
891-558: A landlord who owned the buildings and land where MMI was located. By then, most of the remaining pieces of Marquardt were part of Ferranti in England which was in bankruptcy. MMI subsequently declared bankruptcy and sank into oblivion. The remaining piece, Marquardt Jet Laboratories was sold to Kaiser Aerospace. Kaiser-Marquardt was later sold to Primex in Florida. Primex finally became part of Aerojet Rocketdyne . Roy Edward Marquardt
990-605: A larger company with better manufacturing abilities, as the Van Nuys plant wouldn't be able to build the 1,500 engines quickly enough. Instead, the Air Force and Marquardt collaborated on a new plant on the shores of Great Salt Lake just outside Ogden, Utah . The plant opened in June 1957 and delivered the first engines a month ahead of schedule. By 1958 the engine was in full production, leading to an additional engine contract from
1089-657: A missile launch simulator for the Sheridan Battle Tank. Marquardt had invented a hemispherical photographic system it named VueMarq , and the marriage of the VueMarq system with the ALI TV technology produced a very advanced Sheridan/Shillelagh gunnery simulator. Marquardt was not the successful bidder on the program, and later in 1965 after the GASL merger was completed, ALI was absorbed into GASL and disappeared as
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#17327866265121188-485: A new company CCI-Marquardt . This merger permitted CCI to become listed on the New York Stock Exchange , using the listing that had been Marquardt's. Within a few years, the name of the company was changed back to "CCI Inc." and the effort intensified to spin-off or sell the balance of Marquardt it had acquired in 1968. Also in 1968, The R. W. Neill Company, part of the industrial products group MIPCO,
1287-556: A new president, John B. Montgomery; the founder, Roy Marquardt, was retained as chairman of the board. The gradual reduction of the company's focus on research and development was begun at that point to improve profitability. Pieces of Marquardt were then sold off over time. In 1966, Marquardt sold the Pomona Electronics Division, excluding the Industrial Products subsidiary MIPCO, to Conductron ,
1386-464: A newsletter for summer, 1960, he said "I believe that one of our more important actions this year has been to greatly increase company-sponsored and financed research and development, a program started late last year ... Much hard work lies ahead if we are to develop the programs and business replacing the Bomarc as it phases out..." Throughout the late 1950s and 1960s, Marquardt and its subsidiaries were
1485-579: A result of The General Tire & Rubber Company's increased investment in WOR). RKO/General also added Canadian 50,000 watt power house CKLW in Windsor to the family. The "Big 8" was No. 1 in the Detroit market. The company's final move into entertainment was the acquisition of RKO Radio Pictures from Howard Hughes in 1955 for $ 25 million. The General Tire & Rubber Company was interested mainly in using
1584-623: A small part of Ferranti's empire, the computer division was nevertheless highly visible and operated out of a former steam locomotive factory in West Gorton . Work on a completely new design, the Atlas , started soon after the delivery of the Mercury, aiming to dramatically improve performance. Ferranti continued their collaboration with the University of Manchester, and Plessey became
1683-666: A stand-alone entity. In 1965, Marquardt merged General Applied Science Laboratories, Inc. (GASL), of Westbury, New York, into the company. GASL had been founded in 1956 by Antonio Ferri and Theodore von Karman . Von Karman was a Hungarian-born scientist who had emigrated to the United States in 1930. It was von Karman who founded the Jet Propulsion Laboratories ( JPL ) at the California Institute of Technology in 1944. Antonio Ferri
1782-577: A study for NASA on water purification during long-duration space missions. In 1978 this subsidiary was sold to Akzo NV in the Netherlands, which became Organon Teknika . The REDY system for home dialysis was then marketed world-wide. Finally, in 1983 the balance of the company was purchased by the ISC Defense and Space Group International Signal and Control . In 1987, ISC was purchased by British-based Ferranti . In 1989, Ferranti discovered
1881-690: A subsidiary of McDonnell Aircraft . Conductron later became McDonnell-Douglas Electronics . In 1967, both Dr. Antonio Ferri and Roy Marquardt resigned from the company, completely ending the founders' association with their firms. Roy Marquardt subsequently engaged in numerous charitable activities in the Los Angeles area, while Antonio Ferri became the Vincent Astor Professor of Aerospace Sciences at New York University . In 1968 Marquardt merged with CCI Inc. in Tulsa, OK , and formed
1980-478: A system to jam microphones in rooms being used as secure locations, so they could not be 'bugged'. Other work at MSPL was classified. In 1962, Marquardt was licensed by the Southern Pacific Railroad to design and produce a device called the " Grade Crossing Predictor ", developed at Stanford University . Marquardt formed a subsidiary, Marquardt Industrial Products Company (MIPCO), as part of
2079-652: A third partner. The second generation supercomputer first ran in December 1962. Eventually six machines were built, one of which was a stripped-down version that was modified for the needs of the University of Cambridge Mathematical Laboratory ; the Titan (or Atlas 2 ) was the mainstay of scientific computing in Cambridge for nearly 8 years. Atlas was the first computer in the world to implement virtual memory . By
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#17327866265122178-421: Is accomplished with a series of shock waves created by a carefully designed inlet. Starting with the existing 20" design from 1947, work progressed until the new engine was ready for use in 1949. At this point the company had outgrown its Venice plant, and lacked the resources to fund a larger facility. Roy Marquardt sold a controlling interest in the company to General Tire and Rubber Company in 1949, and used
2277-879: Is not directly related to the major Ferranti corporation. The company has over 200 employees that manufacture BT's public phones, oil pumps for large industrial vehicles, electric motors for motorbility solutions, electronics, and small MOD equipment. General Tire and Rubber Company Continental Tire the Americas, LLC , d.b.a. General Tire , is an American manufacturer of tires for motor vehicles , and semi trucks . Founded in 1915 in Akron, Ohio by William Francis O'Neil, Winfred E. Fouse, Charles J. Jahant, Robert Iredell, and H.B. Pushee as The General Tire & Rubber Company using funding from Michael O'Neil, William Francis O'Neills' father, who owned Akron's O'Neil's Department Store . The company later diversified by 1984 into
2376-435: Is now part of Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems , located on eastern Long Island , New York. Over the next few years, several additional parts of Marquardt were sold or spun off. In 1971 MIPCO (Marquardt Industrial Products Company) was combined with another CCI rail equipment subsidiary and named Safetran Systems , a company that has subsequently passed through several ownerships including Hawker Siddeley in England, and
2475-606: Is now part of Siemens Rail Systems . In 1971, Marquardt Marine Products Division was sold to Ametek . MMP had been formed originally to manufacture and market the doppler navigation products of the Janus Division of GASL in New York. In 1973, CCI formed a company named CCI Life Products to develop and market a Marquardt-invented kidney dialysis machine. The device, using a method called sorbent dialysis had been developed by Marquardt while its scientists were conducting
2574-845: The Don Lee Broadcasting System , a well–respected regional radio network on the West Coast, in 1950. Among other stations, it added KHJ-AM – FM in Los Angeles, California and KFRC-AM-FM in San Francisco, California to its stable from the New York Yankees acquisition. In 1952, it bought WOR / WOR-FM / WOR-TV in New York City and merged its broadcasting interests into a new division, General Teleradio (purchased from R. H. Macy & Company alongside WOR & Bamberger Broadcasting; named as
2673-503: The Hermes and Poseidon and these were followed by the F1600 in the mid-1960s. Some of these machines remained in active service on naval vessels for many years. The FM1600B was the first of the range to use integrated circuits and was used in many naval and commercial applications. The FM1600D was a single- rack version of the computer for smaller systems. An airborne version of this
2772-515: The James B. Lansing Company , a manufacturer of high-quality audio speakers known by the brand " JBL ". In the late 1940s, Marquardt took over JBL operations, but the firm was divested when Marquardt was acquired by General Tire and Rubber Company in 1949. JBL speakers are still in production. In 1947 Martin built the Gorgon IV missile testbed, powered by the 20" engine. Four Gorgon flights with
2871-695: The National Grid in 1926. In 1912, in a move driven by A.B. Anderson, the Ferranti Managing Director, Ferranti formed a company in Canada, Ferranti Electric , to exploit the overseas meter market. But in 1914, two significant events happened, Anderson drowned on his return from Canada in the Empress of Ireland sinking and the outbreak of WWI signalled an opportunity for Dr. Ferranti to once again get involved in day-to-day events in
2970-561: The Space Shuttle program. The company developed and provided the 25 and 870 lb. thrusters for the space shuttle. In 1960, Roy Marquardt had told the employees of the company that government procurement of the Bomarc Missile would end in mid-1962, and that an effort must be made to replace that business. His solution was to use the great scientific and engineering capabilities of the company to develop new technologies. In
3069-578: The Tornado since it was rushed into service during the first Gulf War. From the 1960s through to the late 1980s, the Bristol Ferranti Bloodhound SAM , for which Ferranti developed radar systems, was a key money earner. In 1970, Ferranti became involved in the sonar field through its involvement with Plessey in a new series of sonars, for which it designed and built the computer subsystems. This work later expanded when it won
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3168-817: The United States (inc. Ferranti International Controls Corporation in Sugar Land, Texas) and several British Commonwealth countries including Canada , Australia and Singapore . Ferranti Australia was based in Revesby, Sydney NSW. There was also a primarily defence-related branch office in South Australia. Products manufactured by Ferranti Defence Systems included cockpit displays (moving map, head-down, head-up) video cameras and recorders, gunsight cameras, motion detectors, pilot's night vision goggles, integrated helmets, and pilot's stick controls. On
3267-405: The 1960s. During this period the main Van Nuys plant was also involved in research into new systems, including a nuclear-powered ramjet for Project Pluto and a liquid air cycle engine (LACE) for the Air Force's Aerospaceplane efforts. Another new product line started with the introduction of their first ram-air turbine , small air-powered generators for providing aircraft with electric power if
3366-689: The Air Force for an equally large run of a more advanced version for the IM-99B "Super BOMARC". Meanwhile, the X-7 continued to break records, eventually setting the speed record for air-breathing vehicles at Mach 4.31. In 1958 Marquardt purchased the assets of Associated Missile Products Company in Pomona, California (AMPCO), part of AMF Atomic, and named it the Pomona Electronics Division. The Pomona Division designed and manufactured radar simulators used to train navigators, bombardiers, and radar systems operators. In
3465-689: The American wartime spy Morris (Moe) Berg of the Office of Strategic Services (forerunner to the CIA ) to Europe to convince Italian scientists to emigrate to the U.S., particularly the aeronautical genius Antonio Ferri. Berg had been a major-league catcher prior to the war, and when he returned with Ferri, President Roosevelt remarked "... I see that Moe Berg is still catching very well". Ferri pioneered many breakthroughs in hypersonic flight, including Supersonic Combustion Ramjet (SCRAMJET) propulsion, and research into
3564-642: The Depression was particularly hard on manufacturing, The General Tire & Rubber Company bought several Ohio radio stations on which it advertised. In 1943, it diversified the core business strategy, purchasing the Yankee Network and the radio stations it owned from Boston 's Shepard Stores, Inc. Thomas F. O'Neil , son of the founder William F. O'Neil, served as New York Yankees chairman with Shepard's John Shepard III serving as president. The company continued its move into broadcasting by acquiring
3663-508: The Ferranti-Thompson Alternator. Ferranti focused on alternating current power distribution early on, and was one of the few UK experts. In 1885 Dr. Ferranti established a new business, with Francis Ince and Charles Sparks as partners, known as S.Z. de Ferranti . According to J.F. Wilson, Dr. Ferranti's association with the electricity meter persuaded Ince to partner him in this new venture, and meter development
3762-594: The Ferranti-led ECR-90 , while Germany preferred the MSD2000 (a collaboration between Hughes , AEG and GEC). An agreement was reached after UK Defence Secretary Tom King assured his German counterpart Gerhard Stoltenberg that the British government would underwrite the project and allow GEC to acquire Ferranti Defence Systems from its troubled parent. Hughes sued GEC for $ 600 million for its role in
3861-521: The London area were too high, so the company moved to Hollinwood in Oldham in 1896. In July 1901, Ferranti Limited was formed, specifically to take over the assets of S.Z. de Ferranti Ltd and raise equity, but failed to impress potential new investors as it was still dominated by family ownership. Over-optimistic market projections in the boom of 1896–1903, declining revenues and liquidity problems, forced
3960-572: The Navy's Rigel missile , and the Air Force's CIM-10 Bomarc anti-aircraft missile. To test the new engine design for the Bomarc, the Lockheed X-7 high-speed radio control test aircraft was built. Over the next few years, the X-7 missile broke many records, and led the Air Force to award Marquardt a contract for the BOMARC missile engines. Originally they had intended to award the production to
4059-666: The Pomona, California electronics operations, and began selling the computer to major railroads across the country, and eventually world-wide. It enabled the warning lights and gates at grade-level crossings to be lowered based on the speed of an approaching train, rather than at a fixed distance, reducing grade-crossing congestion in populated areas like Chicago. In 1964, Marquardt purchased a small aerospace firm in Mineola, New York named Automation Laboratories, Inc. (ALI), principally to use their television broadcast expertise in developing
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4158-550: The RKO film library to program its television stations, so it sold the RKO lot at Sunset and Gower in Hollywood, California to Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz 's Desilu Productions in 1956 for $ 6 million. The remaining assets of RKO were merged with General Teleradio, and the new company became known initially as RKO Teleradio Pictures , then RKO Teleradio , before eventually becoming RKO General . The radio stations became some of
4257-522: The Royal Canadian Navy develop DATAR (Digital Automated Tracking and Resolving). DATAR was a pioneering computerized battlefield information system that combined radar and sonar information to provide commanders with an "overall view" of a battlefield, allowing them to coordinate attacks on submarines and aircraft. In the 1950s, work focused on the development of airborne radar, with the company subsequently supplying radars to most of
4356-719: The Silverknowes site in Edinburgh . In addition to their other military and civil applications, they were used in the ESA Ariane 4 and first Ariane 5 launches. Ferranti also produced the PADS (Position and Azimuth Determining System), an inertial navigation system which could be mounted in a vehicle and was used by the British Army. With the invention of the laser in the 1960s, the company quickly established itself in
4455-811: The Tornado aircraft, Ferranti supplied the radar transmitter, inertial navigation system, LRMTS, TIALD pod, mission recording equipment, and cockpit displays. A number of uses of the Ferranti name remain in use. In Edinburgh , the Ferranti Edinburgh Recreation Club (FERC), the Ferranti Mountaineering Club and the Ferranti Ten-pin Bowling League are still in existence. While these organisations no longer have any formal ties with
4554-720: The UK and the various international offices. In 1943, Ferranti opened a factory at Crewe Toll in Edinburgh to manufacture gyro gunsights for the Spitfire aircraft. After the war they set up Ferranti Research to complement this business which grew to employ 8,000 staff in 8 locations, becoming the birthplace of the Scottish electronics industry , and a major contributor to company profitability. Later products included solid state ring laser gyros. From 1949, Ferranti-Packard assisted
4653-459: The UK's fast jet and helicopter fleets. Today the Crewe Toll site (now part of Leonardo S.p.A. ) leads the consortium providing the Euroradar CAPTOR radar for the Eurofighter Typhoon . In the 1960s and 1970s, inertial navigation systems became an important product line for the company with systems designed for fast jet (Harrier, Phantom, Tornado), space and land applications. The electro-mechanical inertial navigation systems were constructed at
4752-400: The Van Nuys plant in 2001. With the sale of Kaiser-Marquardt and the thruster rocket business to Primex in 2000, the name Marquardt disappeared completely from American aerospace industry. Ferranti Ferranti or Ferranti International PLC was a UK electrical engineering and equipment firm that operated for over a century from 1885 until it went bankrupt in 1993. The company
4851-489: The behest of various US clandestine organizations. On paper the company looked to be extremely profitable on sales of high-priced "above board" items, but these profits were essentially non-existent. With the sale to Ferranti all illegal sales ended immediately, leaving the company with no obvious cash flow. In 1989 the UK's Serious Fraud Office started criminal investigation regarding alleged massive fraud at ISC. In December 1991 James Guerin, founder of ISC and co-chairman of
4950-470: The board of directors hired a new president to change the focus toward more profitability. Unfortunately, this meant Marquardt would have to move forward with only the existing product offerings then being manufactured, with little hope of new breakthroughs and future growth. In 1966, the new president announced that in his first year (1965) he had increased profits in part by the "... elimination of research and development efforts that weren't directly related to
5049-467: The building, the generating plant and the distribution system and on its completion in October 1890, it was the first truly modern power station. It supplied high-voltage AC power at 10,000 volts, which was transformed to a lower voltage for consumer use where required. Success followed and Ferranti started producing electrical equipment (especially transformers) for sale. Soon the company was looking for considerably more manufacturing space. Land prices in
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#17327866265125148-501: The case for MSD-2000." The company began marketing optical position measuring equipment for machine tools in 1956. Moire fringes produced by diffraction gratings were the basis for the position measurement. In the late 1980s there were several sections of the company involved in non-military areas. These included microwave communications equipment (Ferranti Communications), and petrol (gas) station pumps (Ferranti Autocourt). Both of these departments were based at Dalkeith , Scotland. In
5247-432: The companies which subsumed the Ferranti companies which operated in Edinburgh, they still operate under the old names. Ferranti Thistle F.C. was formed in 1943 and joined the Scottish Football League in 1974. Due to strict sponsorship rules it changed its name to Meadowbank Thistle F.C., and later to Livingston F.C. Denis Ferranti Meters Limited is still (2021) owned by a direct descendant of Sebastian de Ferranti but
5346-497: The company bankers Parrs to send the company into receivership in 1903. The business was restructured in 1905, Dr. Ferranti's shareholding being reduced to less than 10%. For the next eleven years the company was run by receiver managers and Dr. Ferranti was effectively excluded from commercial financial strategies. He spent much of this period working in partnership with the likes of J.P. Coats of Paisley on cotton spinning machinery and Vickers on re-superheating turbines. Through
5445-417: The company's current activities". The market for ramjet engines had largely disappeared by the mid-1960s due to increased performance from turbojet engines, and the belief that rockets were more appropriate for the nation's defense. Marquardt continued low-level development on advanced designs. One system, developed in partnership with Morton Thiokol , placed a solid fuel booster inside the ramjet core. When
5544-418: The company. He wanted to get involved in the manufacture of shells and fuzes but it wasn't until 1915 that he finally convinced the board to accept this. As a result of this work Ferranti were in a healthier financial position at the end of the war. High voltage power transformers became an important product for Ferranti; some of the largest types weighed over a hundred tons. Dr. Ferranti's son Vincent joined
5643-422: The difficult business climate of World War I , in 1917, O'Neil established a dealership network and began an advertising campaign. By 1930, the company had 14 retail stores and about 1.8% of the tire market. During the depression, as competitors failed, The General Tire & Rubber Company bought out Yale Tire and Rubber Company, and India Tire and Rubber Company. By 1933, it had increased market share to 2.7%. This
5742-412: The early 1950s supersonic cruise missile and target drone projects for various roles were quite common. Many of them were designed to be shot down as target drones, or simply crash or explode at the end of their mission, so simplicity and low cost was as important as high-speed performance. This made the ramjet ideally suited to those roles. By 1952 Marquardt was involved in a number of projects, including
5841-399: The early 1960s their mid-size machines were no longer competitive, but efforts to design a replacement were bogged down. Into this void stepped the Canadian division, Ferranti-Packard , who had used several of the ideas under development in England to very quickly produce the Ferranti-Packard 6000 . By this time Ferranti's management was tired of the market and were looking for someone to buy
5940-418: The early part of the century power was supplied by small companies, typically as an offshoot of plant set up to provide power to local industry. Each plant supplied a different standard, which made the mass production of domestic electrical equipment inefficient. In 1910, Dr. Ferranti made a presidential speech to the IEE addressing this issue, but it would be another sixteen years before the commencement of
6039-544: The electro-optics arena. From the early 1970s, it was delivering the Laser Rangefinder and Marked Target Seeker (LRMTS) for the Jaguar and Harrier fleets, and later for Tornado. It supplied the world's first man-portable laser rangefinder/designator ( Laser Target Marker , or LTM) to the British Army in 1974, and had notable successes in the US market, establishing Ferranti Electro-optics Inc in Huntington Beach, California . Its TIALD Pod (Thermal Imaging Airborne Laser Designator) has been in almost constant combat operation on
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#17327866265126138-404: The electronics division accounted for ⅓ of Marquardt's total sales. Also in 1958, Marquardt purchased the Cooper Development Corporation of Monrovia, California (CDC). Clifford D. Cooper, the founder and president, became a Marquardt vice-president. CDC manufactured high-altitude solid-fuel sounding and weather rockets. Cooper Development had been the company responsible for the upper stages of
6237-419: The entire division. Eventually it was merged into International Computers and Tabulators (ICT) in 1963, becoming the Large Systems Division of ICL in 1968. After studying several options, ICT selected the FP 6000 as the basis for their ICT 1900 series line which sold into the 1970s. The deal setting up ICT excluded Ferranti from the commercial sector of computing, but left the industrial field free. Some of
6336-401: The first cone and plate viscometers . Ferranti built a new power transformer works at Hollinwood in the mid-1950s at a time when there was growth in the power supply distribution industry. By 1974, Ferranti had become an important supplier to the defence industry, but its power transformer division was making losses, creating acute financial problems. This led to the company being bailed out by
6435-500: The first European company to produce a silicon diode , in 1955. In 1972 they launched the ZN414 , a single-chip AM radio integrated circuit in a 3-pin package. Ferranti Semiconductor Ltd. went on to produce a range of silicon bipolar devices, including, in 1977, the Ferranti F100-L , an early 16-bit microprocessor with 16-bit addressing. An F100-L was carried into space on the amateur radio satellite UoSAT-1 (OSCAR 9). Ferranti's ZTX series bipolar transistors gave their name to
6534-405: The funds to move to a new site in Van Nuys , the former Timm Aircraft factory. The purchase wasn't a happy one for General Tire due to management differences, and after making "only" 25% return in one year, they agreed to sell their share of the company to another investor. Eventually, such an investor was found, and General Tire sold their stake to Laurance Rockefeller in 1950 for $ 250,000. In
6633-500: The government's National Enterprise Board , taking a 65% share of the company in return. During World War II, Ferranti became a major supplier of electronics, fuzes , valves , and was, through development of the Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) system, heavily involved in the early development of radar in the United Kingdom. In the post-war era, this became a large segment of the company, with various branches supplying radar sets, avionics and other military electronics, both in
6732-449: The inheritor of Ferranti Semiconductor's discrete semiconductor business, Zetex Semiconductors plc . In the early 1980s, Ferranti produced some of the first large uncommitted logic arrays (ULAs), used in home computers such as the Sinclair ZX81 , Sinclair ZX Spectrum , Acorn Electron and BBC Micro . The microelectronics business was sold to Plessey in 1988. In 1987 Ferranti purchased International Signal and Control (ISC),
6831-448: The late 1940s Ferranti joined with various university-based research groups to develop computers . Their first effort was the Ferranti Mark 1 , completed in 1951, with about nine delivered between 1951 and 1957. The Pegasus introduced in 1956 was their most popular valve (vacuum tube) system, with 38 units sold. Circa 1956, Ivan Idelson, at Ferranti, originated the Cluff–Foster–Idelson coding of characters on 7-track paper tape for
6930-407: The leading broadcasters in the world, but the division was dragged down by unethical conduct at its television stations. This culminated in the longest licensing dispute in television history, eventually forcing RKO General out of the broadcasting business by 1991. In the late 1930s, the United States Army became interested in rockets. A group of California Institute of Technology engineers won
7029-475: The main Marquardt businesses, the manufacturing of components for Rockeye cluster bombs and other weapons, was sold to a group of investors who formed a new company called Marquardt Manufacturing Inc. In December 1991, the other main business, a rocket-propulsion division, was sold to Kaiser Aerospace & Electronics Corp. The original Marquardt Co. became principally a landlord, retaining ownership of 56 acres and several buildings near Van Nuys Airport. MMI and
7128-454: The main engine failed. Marquardt also developed and produced thrust reversers for jet engines, as well as afterburners (which are functionally the same as a ramjet). With this diversification came a name change, to Marquardt Corporation . In 1960, Marquardt established a small research laboratory in Maryland named "Marquardt Special Projects Laboratory" (MSPL), whose principal scientist
7227-1100: The merged company, pleaded guilty before the federal court in Philadelphia to fraud committed both in the US and UK. All offences which would have formed part of any UK prosecution were encompassed by the US trial and as such no UK trial proceeded. The financial and legal difficulties that resulted forced Ferranti into bankruptcy in December 1993. The company had factories in Greater Manchester at Hollinwood , Moston , Chadderton (Gem Mill), Waterhead (Cairo Mill), Derker , Wythenshawe , Cheadle Heath , West Gorton , and Poynton . Eventually it set up branch-plants in Edinburgh (Silverknowes, Crewe Toll, Gyle, Granton and Robertson Avenue factories, plus its own hangar facility at Turnhouse Airport), Dalkeith , Aberdeen , Dundee , Kinbuck (near Dunblane ), Bracknell , Barrow in Furness and Cwmbran as well as Germany and
7326-499: The missile used to place the first U.S. satellite in orbit - the Explorer I . By 1959 the company had sales of $ 70 million (equal to over $ 600 million in 2020 dollars), and had purchased several other smaller aerospace firms. One of these purchases, Power Systems , led to a number of designs for small rocket motors used as positioning thrusters. This would eventually become one of Marquardt's biggest and most important product lines in
7425-554: The new engines were made that year at Mach 0.85 at 10,000 feet (3,000 m) altitude, and in 1948 a newer engine pushed the speeds to Mach 0.9. Martin eventually won a contract to convert the Gorgon design into a target drone, becoming the KDM-1 Plover , and delivering Marquardt a contract for 600 more 20" engines. In 1948 the newly created United States Air Force took delivery of several larger 30" (0.76 m) designs and fitted them to
7524-480: The original Marquardt Co. became embroiled in a lawsuit, which led to the bankruptcy and disappearance of Marquardt Manufacturing. Kaiser reportedly picked up the Marquardt Jet Laboratory for a mere $ 1 million, with about $ 50 million in outstanding Space Shuttle contracts. Kaiser sold the bipropellant rocket engine product line to Primex Technologies in 2000 (now Aerojet Rocketdyne ) and closed
7623-545: The primary mission of the company was "Dedicated to Keeping the United States First in Technology" . He kept a large roster of scientists and engineers in the company, and believed that the technical staff should make up about ⅓ of all the personnel of Marquardt. These large engineering and development costs taxed Marquardt's profits, and although the company remained profitable throughout this period, by 1964
7722-532: The proper shaping of airfoils, engine inlets, and hypersonic reentry phenomena. He was one of the early advocates of swept-back wings for high-speed aircraft. In 1966, Marquardt bought The R. W. Neill Company in Chicago , a manufacturer of communications systems for railroads. Two smaller firms, Howard+Gould , and Western Industries , also in Chicago, were purchased and merged with R. W. Neill. The Neill company
7821-723: The ramjet principle, and in November 1944 he started Marquardt Aircraft in Venice, California to develop and sell ramjet engines. In the late 1940s, the company relocated to Van Nuys, California , adjacent to the Van Nuys Airport . Marquardt's initial products were wind tunnels, but by the end of their first year they had delivered an experimental 20 inch (0.51 m) ramjet to the United States Navy for testing. The United States Army Air Forces purchased two of
7920-550: The same design early in 1946, and fitted them to the wingtips of a P-51 Mustang fighter for in-flight testing. By this time the Navy had installed theirs on an F7F Tigercat ; flight tests commenced in late 1946. Later, the Navy tested the same engines on an XP-83 and F-82 Twin Mustang . Another early product developed by Marquardt Aircraft was a pulse-jet powered helicopter which was assembled and flown, but never put into production. Marquardt also provided space and capital for
8019-701: The selection of the EFA and alleged that it used Hughes technology in the ECR-90 when it took over Ferranti. It later dropped this allegation and was awarded $ 23 million; the court judged that the MSD-2000 "had a real or substantial chance of succeeding had GEC not tortuously intervened ... and had the companies, which were bound by the Collaboration Agreement, faithfully and diligently performed their continuing obligations thereunder to press and promote
8118-481: The solid fuel burned out the ramjet would ignite as normal. The idea was to combine the booster and ramjet into a single airframe, thereby reducing cost, size, and range safety requirements, as nothing would be jettisoned in flight. Marquardt took advantage of its advanced metal-forming talents to fill the void left by the end of Bomarc ramjet production. Products such as air inlets for the F-4 Phantom , cases for
8217-636: The submarine-launched Polaris missile, leading-edge slats for the Lockheed L-1011 , and launch rocket motor cases for TOW missiles became main products of the firm. However, the sales volume of the company was still below the peak of the early 60s, due to the end of the Bomarc program in Ogden and the B-52 bombardier/navigator simulator program in Pomona. In 1964, the board of directors appointed
8316-584: The technology of the FP 6000 was later used in its Ferranti Argus range of industrial computers which were developed in its Wythenshawe factory. The first of these, simply Argus , was initially developed for military use. Meanwhile, in Bracknell the Digital Systems Division was developing a range of mainframe computers for naval applications. Early computers using discrete transistors were
8415-659: The territories of its earlier franchisees. Dissatisfied, O'Neil decided to compete with Firestone instead, using the expertise he had gained with Western Tire and Rubber. He went into partnership with four other men, using funding gained from his father, and formed The General Tire & Rubber Company on September 29, 1915 using $ 200,000 USD in capital borrowed from the store. O'Neil & his associates hired away some Firestone managers. Initially, they focused on repair materials, as with Western Tire & Rubber Company, but in 1916 they expanded into tire manufacturing, focusing on high–end products. Early products included: Despite
8514-627: The transformer department as manager in 1921 and was instrumental in expanding the work started by his father. After the death of Dr. Ferranti in 1930, he became the chairman and chief executive. In 1935, Ferranti purchased a disused wire drawing mill at Moston : from here it manufactured many "brown goods" such as televisions, radios, and electric clocks. The company later sold its radio and television interests to EKCO in 1957. Production of clocks ended in 1957 and other product lines phased out in 1960 Ferranti Instruments, based at Moston, developed various items for scientific measurements, including one of
8613-425: The wingtips of a P-80 Shooting Star , which became the first manned aircraft to be powered by ramjets alone. An even larger 48" (1.22 m) design was built as a booster for a new interceptor design, but not put into production. The same year the company also started conversion of the existing engine designs to operate at supersonic speeds. This requires the airflow to be slowed to subsonic speeds for combustion, which
8712-876: The years following the Marquardt purchase, the Pomona Division created radar simulators for the 412L Weapon Control System in Europe; the GAM-72 (Quail) decoy missile; the GAM-77 (Hound Dog) nuclear missile; the AN/APQ T-10 Simulator for the B-52 Navigator and Bombardier; an Atlas Missile launch simulator; the AN/GPS T-4 air defense radar simulator; and other weapon systems trainers. By 1963,
8811-506: Was Dr. Oleg Enikeieff. Enikeiff, a 1943 graduate of California Institute of Technology , had joined Marquardt after being a research engineer for the Harry C. Miller Lock Company, the owner of Sargent Locks. Oleg's expertise was centered on security devices, and some of his unclassified work while at MSPL included patents for an ID card identification system that would scramble its coded contents after each use so it could not be copied, as well as
8910-460: Was a 1940 aeronautical engineering graduate of The California Institute of Technology ( Caltech ) who was employed at Northrop during World War II on the YB-35 flying-wing bomber project. While working on problems cooling the engines of the YB-35 , which were buried in the trailing edge of the wings, he found that the engine heat could be used to provide useful thrust. This created an interest in
9009-462: Was a relatively large number, considering that the company limited its product line. In the post–war years, The General Tire & Rubber Company gradually ceased to be exclusively a tire manufacturer and marketer. It entered the entertainment business, followed by tennis ball, wrought iron, and soft drink production, as well as chemicals and plastics manufacturing; in the early 1980s General Tire even began motion picture and video production. Because
9108-619: Was also made and used aboard the RAF Nimrod . The FM1600E was a redesigned and updated version of the FM1600B, and the last in the series was the F2420 , an upgraded FM1600E with 60% more memory and 3.5 times the processing speed, still in service at sea in 2010. Ferranti had been involved in the production of electronic devices, including radio valves , cathode-ray tubes and germanium semiconductors for some time before it became
9207-542: Was an Italian aerospace scientist who studied supersonic flight in Italy prior to World War II. Ferri had doctorates in both Aeronautical Engineering and Electrical Engineering from the University of Rome. During World War II, after the Germans invaded Italy, Ferri destroyed much of his laboratory equipment and hid his research papers from the Germans. Ferri was in hiding as part of a partisan group when President Roosevelt sent
9306-505: Was fundamental to the survival and growth of his business for several decades to come. Despite being a prime exponent of alternating current, Ferranti became an important supplier to many electric utility firms and power-distribution companies for both AC and DC meters. In 1887, the London Electric Supply Corporation (LESCo) hired Dr. Ferranti for the design of their power station at Deptford . He designed
9405-636: Was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index . The firm was known for work in the area of power grid systems and defence electronics . In addition, in 1951 Ferranti began selling an early computer, the Ferranti Mark 1 . The Belgian subsidiary lives on as Ferranti Computer Systems and as of 1994 is part of the Nijkerk Holding. Sebastian Ziani de Ferranti established his first business Ferranti, Thompson and Ince in 1882. The company developed
9504-464: Was operated as a subsidiary of the Industrial Products group, MIPCO. In 1962 North American Aviation selected Marquardt to provide the reaction control system engines for the Apollo program spacecraft. By 1970 Marquardt was known primarily as "the" company for small rocket engines and thrusters. Practically all US space vehicles and satellites used their designs, eventually including a major win for
9603-627: Was renamed Aerojet General. General Tire's restructuring plan went forward; General Tire and its industrial products, and chemicals, and plastics divisions, along with Aerojet General and RKO General, Inc., became subsidiaries of the holding company GenCorp, Inc. in 1984. In 1987, GenCorp, Inc. underwent large–scale restructuring, in part to ward off a hostile takeover attempt by General Acquisition, Inc. GenCorp, Inc. sold its flagship tire division General Tire to German tire manufacturer Continental AG in 1987. General Tire still exists today as part of Continental Tire of North America. General Tire
9702-629: Was spun off & became OMNOVA Solutions Inc. The rocketry and aeronautics business was kept and expanded, and after a couple company name changes, the parent company eventually became Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc. William Francis O'Neil owned a Firestone Tire and Rubber Company franchise in Kansas City, Missouri . He started a small manufacturing facility for tire repair products, and called it The Western Rubber & Supply Company initially, then The Western Tire & Rubber Company. As Firestone grew, it sold additional franchises, reducing
9801-562: Was spun off for an undisclosed amount and became the Larry McGee Company . Larry McGee had been the vice-president of sales and marketing for R. W. Neill Company. The Larry McGee Company is now part of Miller Ingenuity in Minnesota . General Applied Sciences Laboratories (GASL) in New York was divested. Its ownership has passed through a series of owners including GenCorp , Allied Aerospace , and Alliant Techsystems ; it
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